| Putting his arms into the sleeves of a shirt while one hand was
taped into a fist, depriving him of a thumb and extra fingers to hold
the garment, was frustrating enough for Josh. Then the wiry 11-year-old
had to button the shirt. "Oohhhhh," he said after successfully fastening three buttons then encountering a fourth that slipped away from his free thumb and fingers. Josh was one of nearly 50 youths at The Christie School who gained an idea Wednesday of how people with physical disabilities do such everyday tasks as getting dressed, pouring water from a bottle and writing legibly. The students, ranging in age from 8 to 18, attended workshops led by Kevin Chong, 35, of Vancouver, Wash., who was born with cerebral palsy. The condition means his brain has difficulty telling the muscles on his left side what he wants them to do, he explained to the students. He has conducted workshops at schools in the region for eight years. His goal, he said, is to help students understand how disabilities affect people, and how students can develop empathy -- not sympathy -- for people who may walk or talk differently from themselves. The staff at Christie, the state's largest residential treatment center for children between the ages of 8 and 18, invited him to bring his workshops to the campus in Lake Oswego. Four out of five of Christie's 80 students have experienced neglect or abuse, spokeswoman Drina Simons said. Their treatment plan includes ways to help them regain a sense of self-worth and empathy for others, she said, as well as providing them with emotional security and appropriate ways to express distress. In the workshops, students wore blindfolds to pour water from a bottle into a cup, gaining a sense of how blind people do the task without spilling. They lifted up their feet while maneuvering a wheelchair through a doorway, using only their arms to push the big wheels. Then they reached back to close the door after themselves. They wrote on a wall board, using felt-tip pens taped to the ends of 3-foot sticks. The students held the other ends of the sticks, feeling how awkward it is to make letters and numbers without using the fine muscles in their arms and hands. "That's the way it is for me to write," Chong said, as some of the students graduated from the large board to an 8.5-by-11-inch piece of paper, feeling even more awkward while trying to write clearly in the smaller space. He can't make his left thumb and fingers maneuver around a pen well enough to pick it up, Chong demonstrated for the students, but he has learned to tie his own shoelaces. He can ride a bike, water ski and rock climb. It took him five years, he said, but he can play billiards well enough to win tournaments. And he's been driving since he was 16, with no need for a specially equipped vehicle. "Driving is really cool," Chong said. "When I'm in a car, no one knows I'm disabled." He's also learned to swim, ride a horse and cook for himself, he said. His family, including two older sisters, always encouraged him to do whatever he wanted to accomplish, he said. "You guys have the world in front of you," he told the students. "You can do anything you set your mind to doing." For Juan, 8, perseverance was the key to buttoning the front of an over-sized dress shirt. Then, with his good hand, he buttoned one sleeve. The second sleeve was more difficult, but he continued to steady the cuff with the fingers of his good hand while maneuvering the button hole with the end of the thumb on his taped hand. "Oh, I did it," he said at last. What was the secret to his success? "I just tried and tried," Juan said. You can reach Janet Goetze at 503-294-5917 or by e-mail at janetgoetze@news.oregonian.com Comments from J. Woodson, Teacher at Chinook Elementary |