It all started at the bus stop.
My son was having a bit of a hard time in the first grade. Maybe it was ADHD or maybe it was the brain tumor and three brain surgeries, the doctors could not decide. What ever it was I guess it really didn't much matter. My adorable little seven year old could not sit still or concentrate at school. He was managing to learn how to read but when it came to writing, forget about it. We tried medications, diet changes, bed time adjustments, incentives, consequences all the things I always assured my clients would work. Well, they didn't work.
Then it happened. One morning my son was up a little early, read 3:00am. He was restless, AKA tearing up the house. Fed up with all the activity, noise and the sound of my own voice saying NO, I decided to take him to the bus stop early. (sorry to everyone who thought they had over slept. Funny how much we can come to depend on the rhythm of our community. My son's wait at the bus stop had become a single that it was time to start heading to work.) That day even the bus stop could not contain his energy, so we started to walk.
It was remarkable. We had so much fun listening for birds and just chatting. We had so much fun we almost missed the bus. The driver was really nice about it. It turned out she was a bird watcher and was as excited about our adventure as we were. We continued our morning walk all through the first grade.
I can't say if it helped my son's school work any at all but there were some positive results. My son's PE teacher noticed a big difference in his ability to follow directions. My stress level went down. Most importantly, sharing our adventures watching the birds with the bus driver deepened our sense of community providing my son with those childhood memories of acceptance and safety that sustain us through he hard times.
