Visiting a Special Needs School // 10 Nov 2014

Probably one of the most meaningful experiences I can ever have, a short acquaintance with children who suffer from cerebral palsy and Down syndrome, wondering if our presence made a lovely little difference in their day. I recalled how ignorant and affectless I used to be during an old folks home community service in secondary school. It was merely a task to be completed to get good grades. However, this visit was utmost different from the abovementioned, in other words I’d say I have grown up and I know what to care.   

Together with 4 of my classmates, we visited PDK Semenyih (Pusat Pemulihan Dalam Komuniti), a community-based rehabilitation centre for those who have special needs. The idea of the centre is to involve the local community especially parents and guardians to provide assistance for the disabled to acquire skills in order to adapt to the societal life. In view of this purpose, it can be deduced that the centre subscribes to essentialism but at the same time, also adopts progressivism because the involvement of parents and local community is weighed heavily in their education. The members of the centre are addressed as “trainees” (pelatih) instead of “students”. They are accompanied by their parents to work hand-in-hand during the lessons. The centre, albeit appeared to be rather small and poorly funded, yet consists of a little computer lab, an awesome “Snoozeleen Room” to stimulate sensorimotors and a decent swimming pool for water therapy. We were also shown the resource room where teaching and training materials are stored. With my limited knowledge on special needs education, I’d say the materials are well-designed to suit the trainees’ needs (stimulate their sensors etc) but some are quite out of date. Notwithstanding, the lady in charge pointed out that they are constantly in the need of innovative ideas to develop better materials. Case in point, Play dough is inedible but the trainees wouldn’t be aware of it and they will start chewing it which might also shallow it. Therefore, the staffs came out with an idea to use flour to make dough to ensure their safety (edible). Frankly, I wouldn’t have thought of that but if I ever (hopefully) spark a brilliant idea such as, I’d love to contribute! J As the saying goes when the going gets tough, the tough gets going!

As scheduled today, trainees with cerebral palsy will be attending to the centre for physiotherapy, mouth exercise and group singing. As the trainees gradually arrived to receive physiotherapy, 5 of us were absolutely clueless about what we could do but it would be rude if we just stand and stare so we decided to split ourselves to join different staffs to help out. We were offered a chance to massage the trainees as well. One particular trainee who I had worked with was a girl with severe cerebral palsy as a result of fever during childhood. She was constantly in a posture as if she was in pain. She couldn’t relax her joints, therefore her legs and hands were always bending at (more or less) 60 degree and she clutched her fist very tight. I was so afraid as if I had hurt her because I don’t really know how to massage in the way that will make her feel comfortable. The staff encouraged me to use more strength because it wouldn’t hurt her, she wasn’t in pain. Her mother was, likewise, very friendly and willing to give me the opportunity to massage her daughter. She couldn’t speak, I wouldn’t know her exact feelings, but she can hear and seem to be able to comprehend a little, therefore throughout the session, I kept singing until I ran out of songs and realized I suck at memorizing lyrics (initially I was just showing her photos from my phone which didn’t seem to be a good idea so I started giving her a solo concert). Sometimes she would stare at me with wonders (I am a stranger after all) and sometimes she would reply me with the brightest smile in the world. If only I am a mind reader then I would know if my songs had made her day. I wished I had brushed up my memory of nursery songs and of course other pop songs before attending this visit. Where words fail, music speaks J

Besides, I got to know a brief story about this girl and understand that she had a surgery previously to straighten her joint by putting metal bar in her. Unfortunately it didn’t work and worsened her condition. I could sense a trace of lament in the mother’s tone and yet she is able to reconcile herself with the fact that her daughter is disabled. Their presence at the centre is the best proof. By the very least, the girl gets to view and socialize with the outer world instead of staying home. Throughout our conversation, there were a lot of moments when our eyes reddened and almost couldn’t hold back our tears. This is when a mental epiphany struck me, I restored my faith in humanity! I see sympathy and love in this centre therefore it was rather saddening when a senior observed and asserted that the staffs were not attempting to establish proximity with the trainees. Luckily the others explained immediately that the staffs might be restless due to the competition hold yesterday. I guess that senior was equally disappointed for not being able to receive the sort of emotion like I did. If only the staffs can maintain a consistent level of performance would make them less a human but a robot … (?) It is good to observe this situation because it would most likely happen on us as well. Dying passion and wrongly perceived attitude… but we are no one to judge their attitude on their job because we had only met once. It would be less prudent to be judgemental without any sort of prior knowledge about them. I suppose we are living in the world where mistakes are not affordable. A doctor’s misdiagnosis could cost a live, a chef’s bad cooking might ruin a person’s day and a teacher’s one less appropriate word or behaviour would influence the future.

In short, touching lives of others remind me how fortunate I am and therefore, hopefully in the future I can instill a sense of benevolence in my students so that they feel obligated to take care of these disabled students. Moreover, I shall educate them to take any form of community service with appropriate attitude (unlike myself of course) and hopefully I can execute and coordinate that activity in the manner that will not merely serve as a task. The true mark of a civilization lies within how the society treats its vulnerable members (not sure where I came across this quote, prolly Time Magazine but apologies I had forgotten which issue). That is the very essence of what I desired to educate my future.