Let me Tell you About a Wonderful Little Girl
My Grandbaby
This little girl, age 3 1/2, is my granddaughter. That alone almost qualifies her for any number of superlatives, but the following will probably cause you to love her, too. Here's what happened.
At Lottie's pre-school, there are some places for autistic children. These children each have an adult shadow who helps them cope with the subtleties and layers of being in a noisy, lively environment. There are also some children who quite unknowingly help these little ones with special needs. My granddaughter is one of those kids.
Yesterday, the mother of a little boy in Lottie's class called my daughter and said, "Can I tell you how much I love Charlotte?" She then went on and shared with my daughter what she had watched that very morning. When Charlotte entered her little classroom and saw this lady's son, Luca, she went over to him and said "Good morning, Luca." Luca is autistic. He didn't respond to her, didn't look at her and Lottie persisted until he finally looked up. She then patted him on his head and said "Good Boy." Then it was Circle Time; you know, everyone grab your mat and sit in a circle while the teacher reads a story. The rule is you sit on your mat. Don't stand, lay or roll around on it...just sit on it. Luca appears uncomfortable when sitting on the floor so he frequently just lays down. Lottie got up and went over to him and said, "Luca, look at me Luca. Luca, come on Luca. Luca, you have to sit up. Come on, Luca, you can sit up. Good boy, Luca." Lottie then patted him on his head and went back to her mat. She had gotten him to do what his Mom, his teacher and his shadow couldn't accomplish and she did it without upsetting him. These small victories for Luca gave his mother such hope and joy. Hearing what Lottie did just made me enormously proud of this little girl. She is a sweet, caring child and that means so much to me.
Today, Luca & Lottie and their moms went out for lunch. My granddaughter had her very first strawberry milkshake which was so good it blew her away. She looked over at Luca and said, "Luca, you have got to order one of these next time you come. They're delicious." Luca didn't respond, but I'm sure he will, one day very soon.
posted by Lin @ 9:23 PM
4 Comments:
Beautiful post and indeed a beautiful little girl. The compassion and empathy that small children just naturally display is quite heartening for the human race. Lucky Nana!
But also Lin, on the bloggy side of things I am not sure how to help. Have you tried changing the template? I have never tried this but if you change to another template it may go back to default settings. I think if you haven't got a computer whiz to help I would set up another blog as a sort of guineapig and then you can fiddle with that and experiment on it (put it in a little maze where one door leads to cheese and the other to an electric shock - that sort of thing!)
Thank you Ova chica for your kind words. One day when I have loads of energy, I will try to effect some bloggy changes. Until then I'll just bitch about being unable to do anything just the midlest degree techie on the computer.
whooo...what did you do? It's gone back! you ARE computer whiz!
Lovely child. Hope she keeps that unselfconscious concern..meantime isn't everyone lucky - she should grow up special...
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