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Jonathan Christopher Adams
DOB: 01/12/91 22q11 Deletion John calls the CD "Jadz Life". He refers to himself as Jade. His name is Jonathan Christopher Adams, and you will hear him refer to himself as JC in one of the songs. Mom Tara Lynne Myers
My 13 year old son has shown a gift
for music for years now, in so far
as he could hear a commercial on T.V. and then go sit down and play the
tune on the piano. With the encouragement of Howard Lenhoff, the father
of Gloria, a chromosome deleted opera singer, I got the Music Therapist
Intern at Bethany Children's Home, where I work as a Nurse, to teach my
son to read music and play the
piano. After just 4 lessons, I came home from work one evening and my
son, John, announced to me that he had signed
himself up for the ELCO School District Talent Show. I
asked him what he was going to do, and he said "play the piano".
I then asked him what he was going to play (after only 4 lessons), and he
said, quite confidently, "Fur Elise" by Beethoven (and I didn't
even know he knew those words). After I picked myself up off of the floor,
I asked him (almost incredulously) how he was going
to learn this piece in two weeks, and he said, "I ALREADY know
it" -- at which point he sat down at the keyboard and played
"Fur Elise" by Beethoven, which he had taught himself to play,
by heart, by listening to it. On Friday evening, April 30th, my son
performed to a packed auditorium, dressed in his Sunday best, and would
have made Beethoven proud! He was BY FAR the child with the least amount
of piano lessons, considering the other three piano players needed sheet
music, and had been taking lessons for 7 months, 5 years, and 7 years
respectively. I could hardly stay in my seat, because I felt as if I
was bouncing off of the ceiling with pride. My son finished his
performance, stood up next to the piano, and bowed to the audience, just
like a pro. If all of that isn't enough to make my life complete, my son
was just honored at the pre-game ceremony at Reading Municipal Stadium,
for being an "Outstanding Student". He stood at the podium, down
on the field, and spoke his name and school into a microphone while
his image was projected up onto a gigantic screen for everyone to see. We
never dreamed that our son would be making us
this proud of his accomplishments -- but we would love him anyway,
no matter what. He is SUCH a GIFT!!! As far as school is concerned,
I wrote my own I.E.P. and educated myself in the regulations and policies
and laws governing special needs children. By "thinking outside of
the box" I tailor-made an extremely individualized educational
program for my son that was met with complete disbelief and shock by all
of the professionals in the room (and there were a LOT). I took my son out
of special
education, and after having him tested by three private, independent
evaluators, I put my son back two entire school years, into the grade at
which level he was functioning, and put him into the Regular Education
curriculum, with a one-on-one academic aide. To everyone's astonishment,
John is doing extremely well, and earns all A's and B's on his report
card. I had to prove to them that I hadn't lost my mind -- and I not only
accomplished that goal, I opened up a lot of eyes to new and previously
unexplored possibilities for children like John
Tara Lynne Myers |
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