Kirstin’s first year in public school was a success in some ways but difficult in other ways. As much as we thought Kirstin was prepared for school, she was still behind the other children, and her progress was less than we had hoped. She did not participate in group activities such as singing or art. On the playground, little boys fed her sand. She wandered away and had to be supervised at all times. In spite of the problems, testing at the end of the school year did reveal progress. When she entered kindergarten, she could recognize six out of eight colors, one out of ten numbers, and could not count at all. By the end of kindergarten, she could identify eight out of eight colors. four out of four shapes, nine out of ten numbers, twenty-two out of twenty-six letters, count to five, and print her name. Her scores put her in the fourteenth percentile, but taking into account where she was when she began, that was amazing progress.

We also found out that Kirstin was learning to stand up for herself. One day I received a phone call from a somewhat frustrated principal, who told me Kirstin had come into his office on her own. She told him that someone on the playground had pulled down her pants. The principal wasn’t sure what to do , because Kirstin, hands on hips, kept insisting, “the pink girl did it.” Unable to identify the “pink girl,” he said there wasn’t much he could do except ask the playground aides to keep an eye out. We were satisfied with that and also relieved to see that Kirstin was learning to handle her own problems.

It is doubtful that the “pink girl” was someone in Kirstin’s class. If that had been the case, Kirstin would have known her name. At the end of the kindergarten year, there was a promotion celebration in her classroom. The teacher talked about each student and his or her special abilities. Kirstin, we found out, was the only student in the class who knew everybody’s name. While her social skills might be lagging, she certainly was paying attention, and she could remember things that were important to her.

Excerpt from This Little Light of Mine, A woman with Down syndrome shines brightly in the world. Available on Amazon.