“I WANT LETTERS, NUMBERS, TISSUE PAPER, CRAYONS!”
That is the cry that I heard from Calvin about 8 years ago (he would have been around 10 years old). I had no idea what he was talking about.
“I WANT LETTERS, NUMBERS, TISSUE PAPER, CRAYONS!”
Again. And I had no idea what he wanted, but he was standing by the computer, so I knew it was a web site or program. And so I clicked through everything he liked . . . Barney, PBS, starfall.com, and then after one specific program, he immediately nudged me out of the way, started smiling and took over the keyboard. It was Microsoft Word.
Over the next few years, he would continue to ask for Microsoft Word in this way. If the computer was not working, he would repeatedly yell at the top of his lungs to no one in particular, “LETTERS, NUMBERS, TISSUE PAPER, CRAYONS!”
And then the mystery was solved . . .
It was several years later–I don’t exactly when–that we were getting ready to move. In the attic, I discovered a now long-gone and obsolete electronic dry erase board, very similar to this picture.
I knew the kids liked it when they were younger, so for kicks, I turned it on. In a few seconds, a pre-recorded motherly voice over a cheap toy speaker happily chirped: “Hi! Do you want to write letters and numbers? Get some tissue paper and crayons.” That was it–it was this easel from years ago.
He didn’t know how to ask by name for Microsoft Word–a program for typing letters and numbers, so he asked for it by repeating a phrase he remembered from years earlier . . . a toy on which he used to hand-write letters and numbers.
I probably had a dozen light bulbs over the top of my head in that moment. For me, it unlocked a new way to understand Calvin–if he didn’t know how to communicate something, the computer in his brain would pull up the next closest thing.
He does this in many other ways. He calls all canned drink “pops.” If a website is down, he’ll yell “COM-PUT-ER!” Looking past the simplicity of these associations, this is a locked-up brain working overtime trying to figure out how to communicate wants and needs. It’s a pretty staggering concept to consider and I plan to use this knowledge in my journey towards finding innovative ways for us to communicate.
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