Special Olympics

Special Olympics is a sports competition for people who have disabilities. There are all kinds of different sports that are included in the Olympics. There is a Special Olympics home page that tells you what someone can compete in. They get a lot of different awards and a lot of praise for their hard work. It is a great thing to have.

There are both summer and winter sports which have different Olympics. These events are held in different cities, then after the different events are held in the different cities, the first place winners in each event go to state. State is much more competitive and really great to watch. The winners from that can go on to nationals and compete.

I think this boosts the self-esteem of many students who have disabilities. This can create a better community, like unified sports does. It helps the people who have disabilities get more acceptance in their community. This program lets people have some activity in sports so they can feel just like everyone else. This is very important to have everywhere, so people with disabilities can have more opportunities.

I think every country should have these. I think it is becoming increasingly imperative because the number of people who have disabilities are rising considerably. If there are more people with disabilities, then there are more people that can get some benefit of these sports.

This is a wonderful opportunity that we are lucky to have here. There are many different states who participate in these games, it really connects people with disabilities around the United States. I think this helps our whole nation grow because the more we come to treat people who have disabilities as other people, the more we will all grow as people. It will benefit both people with disabilities, and those without. 

If we get to participate in sports, have our Olympics, and have amazing athletes, I think it is only fair that students with intellectual or developmental disabilities should get the same opportunity. These games level the playing field, because they get to compete with other athletes struggling with the same things they are, and it is equally matched.

There sadly isn’t this opportunity everywhere, though. We are lucky enough to have it in Iowa, but not every other state or country is the same. I think all countries around the world should have these games, so everyone gets their chance to be a star.

Unified Sports

Unified sports can be done at any school. This is a team of both special education students and general education students pairing up to make a whole unified team. These can be members with both high functioning and low functioning disabilities. These are very helpful for all students including the general education students. I personally feel that the students in the general education classes get more from it. There is no feeling better than the feeling that you just helped someone and made a difference in their life.

This creates a more unified community and a more unified school. These are great because a more unified school or more unified community creates more acceptance in both. A lot of people are good about accepting others, but not hanging out with them and fully accepting them, so this would help. These kinds of sports would better even the most accepting communities.

Schools can create these or someone can in the community. They can be any range of sports, and if they are good at it they can compete in the Special Olympics. There can be anything from cheerleading teams to bocce ball teams. You could even create your own sport to compete in. If you do that though, you cannot compete in the Special Olympics, and you will not have teams to compete against.

This will help with Best Buddies as well. You can use these sports as bonding with your buddy, or go watch some competition they are in. This creates stronger friendships and longer lasting ones. I know I feel closer to teammates and they become your friends or even are sometimes referred to as a sports family. 

I want to start a unified sports team at my school. I think it will help promote inclusion and help make others more knowledgeable about students with disabilities. I want to show everyone the other students can be just like us. They can participate in sports, and do anything we can. I think it will help because they will get to celebrate wins just like we do and get celebrated in the school. They can also get awards and have fun. I think it is a win for everyone.

Stereotypes

 Are kids with disabilities being stereotyped? The plane answer is yes. A lot of students get stereotyped both at school, and in the media. There are many different stereotypes that go along with having a disability.

In movies people who have disabilities are stereotypically adults, with a child’s mind. This is not true for a lot of the students I work with. They are not as mature, but do not like everything an elementary student would. There are some that are like that, but it is usually brain damage at a younger age that leads to that. Their brain just sort of cannot grow much past the age they suffered damage to it, depending on how severe the injury was.

They are also stereotypically put in more severe disabilities than they have. There is a huge range of disabilities that occur. Some are so slight you would not even know they are there. The most famous one is Jim Parsons, who plays Dr. Sheldon Cooper on the TV show The Big Bang Theory. He has mild Asperger’s, and is still a huge celebrity and famous actor. Almost nobody knows he has the disability, because he seems so normal. This is true of a lot of people with disabilities. Sometimes you can’t tell if a person has a disability or not.

How does this affect them? I will use Jim Parsons for an example again, he was ashamed of it and kept it a secret from everyone. He didn't want to be treated differently, and he was ashamed of the disability, because of all the negative thoughts and stereotypes that go along with it. I also get students who have the disabilities coming up to me and asking me why they have them, or why they are treated a certain way. It always breaks my heart when I get those questions.

How can it be prevented? The media can help stop this. They can quit portraying the people with disabilities as these extremely severe cases. They can help make it so they become more accepted and welcomed into the community. If they used actual actors who have disabilities to play their roles it would help a lot.

Sadly stereotypes in former schools have led to bullying, name calling, and other horrible things. I remember in elementary school other peers would pretend to be autistic and flap their arms. They would also say things like, “Don’t touch the railing, the autistic kids wipe boogers on them.” It is little things like this that lead to worse stereotypes and people not accepting others. Thankfully they usually grow out of saying things like this.

What Can I Do To Help

This question can be asked by both parents, siblings, and family members. It can also be asked by family friends and other people in communities with special needs kids. There can be a lot of people helped if this question was answered.

If parents want to help they can put the students with Intellectual or Developmental Disabilities in sports. There are great things they can do. If they are deaf they could be in football and possibly play at Gallaudet. Their football team is doing great! There are also other Special Olympic sports they can participate in if they have other disabilities. I am going to write a section on that for next week and will link it after I get it on.

There are other things parents can do to help like putting their kids in clubs or other activities. It does not have to be sports. There are so many things a child with a disability can do now. I am personally going to help put on a play that all the actors are high school aged children with disabilities soon. That will be a lot of fun.

Siblings can help by babysitting or doing a number of things. They can babysit their younger siblings, like most other siblings do. They can help drive them around or be there when they get picked up or dropped off. They can also help by doing simple chores around the house. It is already stressful having a child with a disability, but having a messy house to clean every night does not help.

Family members and friends can help by doing things similar to siblings. They can help watch the kids, provide help for parents, and even drive the other kids to activities. These are all things other parents do for each other. They can also provide a huge service to the parents and be moral support. This is a big deal to a lot of parents, because they do not get a lot of time to themselves and they sometimes just need to relax. They moral support can go a long way as well. Just knowing someone is there for you and you can talk to them makes life easier.

Others in the community can help by volunteering. This does not help parents, but helps the child. This helps get them friends and makes them feel more welcome in the community. It also is rewarding for yourself because there is nothing better than the feeling of helping someone.

Now I've Got a Child With IDD

A lot of people do not know what to do once their child is diagnosed with an intellectual or developmental disability. I want to let you know this is not the end of the world. There are people that can help you. It might take a while for everyone to come to accept the child in the family, but they eventually will.

If you are worried about the people in your family accepting your child, you should not. They will accept them eventually. I say eventually, because just like you they had the shock, and have to process their emotions. Everyone is different and will approach this differently. Let them process it and have their reactions. Try not to get defensive if they say something rude, or are shocked at first. Not everyone will be as receptive to it at first.

You also should not worry about them making friends. There are great opportunities for them to make friends now. There are schools with great programs that promote inclusion of the special education programs and the students in them, like best buddies. These things are huge steps for our society becoming more open and caring towards those with disabilities. It is a great thing.

I think that they also do a great job of making the students with disabilities become more connected to each other. There are great programs for that as well. There are things they can do both during the school year, and while school is out during summer vacation. If you look you can find a lot of different opportunities for the students to have to make new connections and stronger ones.

The summer day camps are great. A lot of the special needs students I help go to a lot of different camps during the summer. It keeps them busy and makes them feel more normal. I think these opportunities are great for them and are great for everyone involved. It helps promote more inclusion from other students that help at these programs.

I would also strongly recommend asking other parents what they can do around that area. It is very helpful if they can make friends in the areas near their house. This prevents long drives to other places and they get to see their friends more. The parents also know what is good to do and what is bad. A lot of more experienced parents will know where to go and what to do. They are awesome resources. They are better than the internet.

Where can I find help?

There are a lot of different ways to find help and places to find it. There are speech therapists, job coaches, and any specialized person you can imagine to help with your child's disability. There are a lot of people out there to help you and it can be a lot easier if you let them.

There are "Paras" in the classrooms of the special education rooms that help children with disabilities. There are also special one on ones people can get if they are not always in a special education classroom or do not need to be in one. One of my friends is blind and has a one on one to help him with many things, like taking notes, when he is in the general education classrooms. He needs his one on one so he does not miss anything important and so that he can learn like anyone else. Having a one on one educator is very helpful for him. Because he has one he now can learn just like everyone else.

There are also people that help work on people’s speech. This can be hard for someone with autism. Part of the disability often comes with slurred speech as a result. This can be helped through speech therapy though. There are also word and picture cards that can be used instead of speech that the speech therapists can help with, if your child is nonverbal.

There are also different people that help with social skills. These people work with children with a wide range of abilities. They can just help with little, minor social ticks and awkward interactions. They can also help with more severe help on social interactions. It is all need based. If your child needs help with something, there is probably someone that can help.

There are also special babysitters for children with autism. Some children need help with seizures and normal babysitters are not equipped to handle that. Some are aggressive and might hurt a babysitter, but there are people that are trained for these situations and can babysit. A lot of the time parents need a date night away which is allowed.

The last thing I will talk about is there are interpreters for the deaf. I know this might sound a bit obvious to some people, but others might not know about them, and they can be very helpful. If you are hearing and your spouse or child or both are deaf, they might need an interpreter if you cannot make it there, or just cannot interpret all of what everyone is saying, like in a hospital situation. Like I said above, use all the resources you can to your advantage, they are there to help you.

How do I Cope?

A lot of parents that find out their child has autism want to know how they cope with this. This might sound harsh to people who have not experienced this, but when you have a child you picture their wedding, prom, and who they are going to be, then with one sentence, it all changes. You have to re-imagine everything you thought you would see for this child. Have to figure out what you are supposed to do with a child with autism. This can be a huge task for someone with no experience dealing with people with special needs.

There are a lot of parent support groups out there for parents with autism. A lot of new parents go to these. There are also a lot of parents who have experience who can give advice at these. They can tell you some success stories and will give honest responses to questions any parents might have. Some are held as small gatherings, while others are a little larger. If parents know another parent is getting stressed they might invite them to one.

Other parents are the best resource for parents to seek. They will be able to give you advice on anything you need. Odds are they have been through something similar, or are going through the same thing. This is very helpful to a lot of parents both for stress reasons, and parenting reasons. It helps the parents have less stress because they know they are not the only one going through this. It also helps parenting because they can get advice on how they handled the situation or how they are going to handle it.

Therapists can also help with this. It might seem unnecessary to some people to go all the way as to go to a therapists, but it really can be helpful. Sometimes you just need to talk to someone who is not going to judge you and will help you. A lot of people find going to therapists to be relaxing and a stress reliever. Therapists are there to listen to your problems and help offer some insight on how you can deal with the problem better.

There are a number of things a person can do to help cope with this, but you have to find what works best. Everyone is different and feels comfortable doing different things. There are many different places you can go for help, the most important thing is to not bottle up all the stress and fear. Let others help you cope.