Page 12 - Inspire Magazine

WA EDUCATION ASSISTANT OF THE YEAR

tephanie Lee tells a good story – “I knew she wouldn’t believe that he was
and has she got a lot of them to tell. actually swimming. She and her husband came
An education assistant at College along and I looked over at them and they were
S Row School in Bunbury, Stephanie crying, sobbing at the side of the pool.
has dedicated the last 20 years of her life to “I thought, ‘wow, this is emotional’.
showing students with disability that they are I knew it was amazing but I didn’t realise
capable of more than anyone ever dreamed how emotional it would be for them.
possible. “It turned out that his mum and dad had
It’s her students’ stories – their successes never learnt to swim, and here – their little boy
– that make it all worthwhile. – could do something that they had never been
“I had a student a few years back who was able to do themselves.
severely intellectually and physically disabled. “Millions of those sorts of things go
He could walk, but only had a tiny bit of vision on here, that’s why I love my job.”
so he was classified as blind,” Stephanie says. Stephanie has worked at College Row
Stephanie saw something in him that School for students with disability since 1993.
sparked an idea. “I must be the longest-serving staff “WE TAUGHT HIM
“I have been a swimming teacher in the member here now – I’ve had a lot of TO SIT UPRIGHT ON
past so I decided to get him into the pool,” different roles. I did ICT for a time, as well
she recalls. “It was great, he had no fear – as implemented a method of teaching called THE FLOOR – FROM
I wondered if it would be possible to get Active Learning,” she recalls. THAT POINT HIS
him to float. Danish psychologist and educator, the late
“We kept at it and in a few weeks Lilli Nielsen who founded the Active Learning LIFE CHANGED. HE
that little boy who ‘could do nothing’ was program, is her guru. HAD A WHOLE NEW
swimming up and down the pool. He was “I came across Lilli at an in-service in WORLD.”
on his back with an odd stroke, his nose and Perth when she first came to Australia – it blew
mouth just out of the water – but he was me away,” she says.
swimming laps!” “We always found it hard to put together
His teacher invited the boy’s mother a curriculum for our students with multiple
to come to the school to see for herself. disability, and there it was – Lilli had it!

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