Special Needs Prom!

           

For my Physical Environment Assignment, I went home last weekend and took my 17-year old younger brother, Bryan, to his special needs prom at their local high school. As well as already having a blast just being around the variety of children, I also learned a lot about kids with disabilities other than my little brother’s. My little brother can walk, however, a girl in his class named Jenda, was in a wheelchair and I saw just how difficult it was to be at a dance while not being able to really dance. Although Jenda could not stand up and dance around, she showed great adaptability to her situation by using her hands to show her expressions.  The multipurpose room that prom was held in had great accessibility, or ease in movement throughout an environment, to all types of disabilities. There was hardwood flooring throughout, seats around the room for resting, and no crowding at all. We were able to push Jenda around the room to see the senior walkout and other activities going on. One of my favorite parts about the night was when they played the recently popular song “Happy.” It gave true meaning to the environment to me because the song is just an overall happy song and to see everyone around the room with smiles on their faces was just so contagious. Jacob, Bryan’s best friend, is a red-headed boy with down syndrome. He made a good example of the activity, or perceived intensity of ongoing behavior within an environment, part of a physical environment when he proceeded to sing and dance on the stage for about 30 minutes of the night. I think that the environment the prom was held in was full of comfort, or sensory and mobility fit that facilitates task performance, and every child was able to express themselves by dancing, interacting with the partner’s club, or just sitting and eating the food that was offered. I feel like a dance is the one thing that children of all disabilities are able to participate in. Regardless of being able to speak, like Bryan, or walk, like Jenda, they were all able to express themselves through dance and music. The sociality, or degree to which an environment facilitates or inhibits social interaction among people, was phenomenal. Bryan cannot talk to tell me how much fun he was having, but the look on his face said it all. And not once did Jenda get upset because she couldn’t do the “wobble” like the rest of us. She had a smile on her face the entire night. At one point, we all stood in a circle with Jenda and held hands and showed her that we could have fun dancing that way also.

            After the dance, I took Bryan to his favorite place to eat, Sonny’s. We got to have dinner together in a privacy setting, where I could converse with him, through sign language, about his night. I could tell that at the beginning of the night, he was nervous/unenthused about going to the prom, but once we actually got him there around his classmates and friends he had a blast. Taking Bryan to his special needs prom was such a fulfilling experience. It is great to still be a huge part of his life even though I am away in college.