This video may be canceled due to snow. We'll just have to see.
Every year when Fall comes around I hear the back
to school commercials and I get reminded, 'oh, yeah, the kids are
going back to school.' And it makes me think about my own time in school.
And what was school like for me growing up. For grammar school
or elementary school I went to Cos Cob School.
It was in Greenwich, Connecticut... in the Cos Cob section of Greenwich, Connecticut.
I went there for the kindengarden through the sixth grade. This was a public school
in Greenwich. My mom fought for me to get into public school
because what they wanted to do was put me in a separate
class in what they called the "special class" with kids
with all sorts of different types of learning disabilities and other kinds
of handicaps. My mom kept insisting, "No, no,
my kid, his cognitive skills are fine, he just can't see.'
And she fought and she got me in
and matriculated into the regular school curriculum.
As far as my earlier years of school,
everything I did was in braille. I had
braille books, I had braille storybooks, braille everything.
And at the same time I was learning braille too.
As I get a bit older now, like into the 3rd and 4th grade when you're actually doing work
and working out problems and writing
stories and things like that, I had a braille teacher
who'd come in just about every day and take the stuff I would do
in braille and print over it. And she would
print all my mistakes, all my spelling errors and everything, and then she could
hand it to the teacher and that was my work. And I could get my
grade back so that's how I did school work. I even had a mobility
instructor. Now, that's somebody that comes and teaches me
cane travel and how to get around the school building and how
to find the sidewalks, and my way in and out of school and all that kind of stuff.
So I used my cane then too. I had my
Perkins brailler which we actually made a video about so if you'd like to see that
and learn about it, we'll put a link for it right there in the description.
[banging on brailler]
That's easy to concentrate, isn't it?!
Another thing was a talking calculator. Made a video about that as well.
You can find a link for that in the description as well.
How do you say 'no' in German? VOX: Nine.
[music plays] Now it's time for me to move along to
Central Junior High School for middle school or junior high.
Now I have to learn a whole new school building and this is going to be a bigger school
with a lot more kids. So again I have a mobility
instructor come and teach me and I
caught on to it pretty quickly I think because I was able to run around that school
and I knew where every single classroom was and I even knew
where my locker was. We didn't have combination locks on them.
You could actually bring your own lock so I did.
I went to the hardware store and bought a lock and a key and everything.
And that was how I did it. I wore it around my neck so I wouldn't
lose it as a kid. A lot of things about junior high are pretty much the
same as grammar school. I still had a braille teacher come in
and write over my work. The work just got a bit harder
and I started having more fun in school and hanging out and getting in trouble.
One time this kid and I found a light bulb. I was like,
"hey, let's break it somewhere." And so we did because I just wanted to hear the sound.
I like the sort of "pop" when a light bulb breaks. And then a teacher
said, "Hey, nice going fellas." And we got called into a little
detention. To tell you the truth, the schools
I went to... if I heard this once, I heard it a hundred times.
"Oh, we've never had anybody like you before,
so we'll figure this out together." It's true.
I was the only blind person I knew throughout my entire
education career. Now, I'm curious, what about
you guys, did you go to school with a blind kid? I'd love to hear
your stories in the comments down below.
[music plays] Gym was funny for me because
there wasn't a lot of stuff I could do. You know, I couldn't play football.
I couldn't play basketball. I learned how to shoot a basket.
And I learned how to throw a football. The only stuff I could do
with the other kids was that president's physical fitness thing
that you had to do back in the day. And you had to run like
a 600 yard dash and do a few other things.
Running a thing like that 'sighted guide'
stinks, but now they've sort of figured it out and there's like a rope
or something you can hold on to and run and you don't have to depend
on somebody else to do it so it's nice. Now, when I was in class
I couldn't take notes like the other kids for example because the
braille machine would make too much noise so I would just try to remember
things. As far as the way I was treated in class, I was called on
just like the other kids. I didn't get any special treatment because
I was blind in class. I still had to do all the work.
I probably did get away with a little bit more, yeah,
because I had somebody transcribing my work. There were sort of different avenues
that I could take to get away with stuff and I did.
And I was a big talker too so I would try and talk my way out of stuff.
And there were some teachers who would buy it and there
were a bunch who didn't. And I didn't really care for those
people too much. [music plays]
In 10th grade is when I started high school.
Now for most of the time I was at the Canterbury School in New Milford, Connecticut.
When I got to Canterbury things changed a lot because now I'm out
of the public school system so we don't have the resources
to get all the books in braille. I couldn't use a braille
writer. There was nobody who was going to transcribe my work for me every day.
So I had to type my assignments on real typewriter.
And that's kind of how I learned to type. There were no braille stickers
on this typewriter. I had to learn the home row just like everybody else.
You're not supposed to look at the keys when you type so
I never cheated. In high school, the students
were very cool with me. Right, because we all lived together.
There were 40 of us that lived in this one dorm so
I knew kids all the time. I saw them all day, every day.
When I was younger though people used to bully me and push me around
and say things and call me 'blind as a bat' which
I hated. You know, because they didn't call any of the other kids that. It was
only me. That must have been like the 2nd,
1st, 2nd, 3rd grade. Somewhere in there. I was a little kid.
It was hard enough being blind, you know, and then I needed some kid busting my chops
about it. My father always said this and you know what he was right.
"It builds character." And it did.
Listen, I'm not thankful for the experience but at the same time
I'm sort of glad it happened because it taught me how to deal with people like
that. And you're going to find bullies like that all throughout your life.
You're going to work for bullies. So, it's good
I learned it at an early age.
[music plays]
BEN: What advice would give teachers who have blind students?
TOMMY: I think the advice that I'd give to any teacher who had a blind student in their
class would be to just treat them as normally
as possible. Do all the same stuff you do with the other
kids in the class. Don't single the blind person out.
You know, because it's all about matriculation so
you want to have that kid feel like all the other kids
because the only different is the blind kids can't see.
That's the only difference. And don't tell the kid,
"Oh, we've never had anybody like you before. We're not quite sure what to do."
That tells the kid, time to run wild on
the teacher. They don't know what they're doing. I got this.
I'll just talk my way through everything.
BEN: What advice would you give to a student who is blind
about how to improve their experience at school?
TOMMY: Use your voice. You know, speak up
when there's something that doesn't feel right to you, just ask a question.
Nothing bad is going to happen if you just ask a question.
And if you need any kind of disability or whatever and you're
not getting it, say something to somebody. Maybe talk to your
parents or talk to your teacher too and just say,
"Hey, you know, this would really be helpful for me."
[music plays]
Hey, if you're interested in hearing some stories about some of things I got in trouble for
at school, we did a couple videos on those earlier this year,
and you can find a link for them right in the description.
Hey, thanks for watching for the video. If you're new to the channel, I hope you
subscribe and turn on those notifications so you can
find out every time we post a brand new video. As far as school,
you the one thing I learned, is how much I hate homework.
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