Kliewer
REFLECTION
Reading this article made me think about my experiences in school with children who had disabilities. I can remember specifically when I was in the first grade, a boy named Tim was in my class. Tim and I became best friends, and I mean we were always together. We ate lunch together, played at recess, and sat next to each other in class. Tim and I remained friends all through elementary school, having almost the same teacher each year, except for two out of the five years. You may not know it from the description I provided, but Tim had down syndrome. In elementary school Tim was very rarely removed from our class, from what I can remember, and always in some way participated in the activity we were performing in class. In middle school, I began to lose touch with Tim because he began to be removed from certain classes in order to take separate ones for students who needed more assistance or had a disability. As we passed on to high school, the same thing happened except even more frequently. Tim was barely in any classes as the other students without disabilities and most of his day was spent in the life-skills classroom. Physical education, and art are the only classes that I can remember that Tim participated in with students who did not have a disability.
From my experience and friendship with Tim, I learned a lot about myself and him as well. Being friends with Tim taught me how to accept others, understand that people are different from on another and that does not make them any less or more of person than the other. If Tim was never included in my elementary school classes we most likely would not have become friends, and we would not have learned from each other. Inclusion in classrooms is extremely important for not only the student being included but also the rest of the class. Not only can those students with disabilities learn from the others, more importantly and I think more often the rest of the class learns from that individual.
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