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A Story to Help Children Discover
How Everyone Learns Differently
James Dillon
Illustrated by Kara McHale
Kevin never smiled at school.
He didn’t talk much either.
But he was different at home.
He jumped up and down and
did a little dance when his
favorite football team
scored a touchdown.
He screamed,
“Cannonball!” when he
jumped into a swimming
pool and made a big splash.
He used pretend voices for
his imaginary characters when he
played with blocks in his bedroom.
On his first day in kindergarten, his teacher,
Mrs. Brooks, read a book about the first day of
school to the class. After reading a few pages,
she asked, “Who can tell me why the boy
was nervous?”
As Kevin began to think of an answer, he saw
five waving hands shoot up around him.
Mrs. Brooks pointed to a girl with curly brown
hair wearing a yellow shirt with a rainbow across
the front of it, and said, “Emma, what do you
think?” Putting her hand down and taking a deep
breath, Emma smiled and said, “He was worried
that he might make a mistake.”
Mrs. Brooks nodded and said, “Good thinking,
let’s read more and find out what happens.”
Kevin bit down on his lower lip and thought,
“That was my answer. I’ll try to be faster
next time.”
Kevin tried harder for a lot of days and a lot of questions, but the other kids kept putting their hands up even faster, sometimes even before Mrs. Brooks had finished saying the whole question.
Kevin started to feel that he would never catch up with the other kids, no matter how hard he tried.
At night, Kevin would lie in his bed trying to figure out why school was easy for the other kids and hard for him. One night he thought, “The other kids are just faster and smarter than me. They are okay and I’m not okay.”
Kevin didn’t like being not okay.
One day, Mrs. Brooks said to the class, “Boys and girls, I will be
meeting with each of you to find out how much you have learned.
You just need to try your best.”
Mrs. Brooks called each student over to a little table in the corner
of the room.
Kevin watched Emma go over and sit next to Mrs. Brooks. After
just a minute, Emma popped up and went back to be with the rest
of the class. The same thing happened with Travis, Emily, Jamal,
and the other kids.
Then it was Kevin’s turn. He walked slowly over to Mrs. Brooks,
who was smiling at him. She said, “Kevin, I have a list of the
letters of the alphabet. I want you to say the letter that I point to.”
He replied, “Okay, I’ll try.”
Kevin looked at the letters Mrs. Brooks pointed to. He
remembered some, like A, B, C, and K, right away. He had to
think for a few seconds for letters like R, M, and F, and couldn’t
remember other letters like Q, U, G, and L.
Mrs. Brooks said to him, “Good job! Kevin, you know a lot of
letters and we’ll help you learn the rest. Keep trying your best.
Okay?”
Kevin nodded and said, “Okay,” but he was thinking that the
other kids sat down and got up a lot faster than he did.
One day, his mother knocked on his bedroom door and said, “Kevin, we need to talk. I met with Mrs. Brooks and she told me that you are learning a lot and always trying your best. That’s very important! But you need extra help, so you can read on grade level.”
Kevin asked, “What does grade level mean?”
His mother replied, “That means that you are behind where you need to be. The other kids are learning to read a little faster than you are. With extra help you can catch up. You’ll work with Mrs. Martinez, the reading teacher, every day in the reading room. Keep trying your best and everything will be okay. Okay?”
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