Autism Celebration at Elementary School
Following the skits, the elementary students worked in groups to fill a large chart paper with kind words. Next, the students each had the chance to crumple the chart and direct a mean word to the paper. Finally the students were asked to smooth their paper out and make the wrinkles disappear. They discovered it was impossible. The students were asked to think about the lasting power of unkind words and how they ruin the power of many kind words.
The rally ended with a balloon release. Everyone recited an Autism poem, and on cue the sky was dotted with spots of blue. Each balloon carried a message from the school about the rally as well as the name and grade level of a Diller-Odell student. As of Monday the students have been contacted by one family from Rolla, MO, who found the air delivered greeting from 1st grader, Madilyn Dendinger. Read their email below:
Ms. Kostal,
Hi! My name is Sharon Clayton and I am from Rolla, Mo. I got your name out of the newspaper article regarding your classes balloon release on Friday. Just wanted to write and let you and the students know we found the balloon of first grader, Madilyn Dendinger, in our tree line Saturday morning. I think it is really nice what your class did to bring awareness to autism in support of their classmate.
Keep up the good work!
Sharon
