Show me your hands!

This week we finished our summer free online activities for children with additional needs. AllChildrenIncluded got together with University and High school students, with a few teachers and many parents to make sure children of Determination could keep enjoying and learning through the summer.

Let me tell you about one of the children who attended.

He made us all laugh so much! Once he started talking, he wouldn’t stop!

But he did sometimes misunderstand instructions.

One day, in the art expression session, the group was making giraffes from hand shapes.

The first step was to draw round your hands and cut out the hand shapes, then decorate them. (I am not going to spoil it and tell you how these turned into giraffes... you can keep reading to see in the photo below!).

This little fellow, about 6 years old, cut out his paper hands and showed them proudly to Kriti, the session Leader.

She then asked him to decorate them with glue and paint then sprinkle sparkles on the hands.

So he got to work.

A few minutes later, instead of holding up the paper hands, he held up his own hands and said

"Ma’am I decorated my hands!”

I am sure his parents had fun getting the sparkles out of his real hands!

This was only one of the many cute things that happened during these five extraordinary weeks.

The programme took on a life of its own, and became a magical Summer Club, with students from schools and Universities volunteering, as well as some parents and teachers - and we became a united team learning and having fun together.

Parents commented: ‘My child had such fun - he carried on making the model after the session’ and ‘ my daughter loves learning from the older kids’ and - I can’t believe this is my son! He never says a word in school!’

A key thing that many parents and children said was that they felt they had made friends, and all accepted each other without feeling any difficulties. Some of these amazing student leaders had never worked with children who needed extra help before - and were just so natural with them. It's a Club that will continue, insha Allah.

It is another very positive thing to chalk up to the strange experience that is 2020! and shows that it only needs a few to make big things happen!

We can all create magic in our own ways!