Danny lovingly placed the calculator in his pocket and looked over at the other parcel. “And that’s mine too?”
Carol smilingly handed it to him.
Danny eagerly lifted the lid of the box. “HEY! a cassette tape recorder… and tapes!” He looked wickedly across at Carol. “Are these the Barenaked Ladies?”
“They’re blank at the moment, but they are going to be your stories.”
“They are?” Danny looked baffled and turned the tapes over and over in his hands. “I don’t get it.”
“The tape recorder will help in several ways Danny, but first in language classes. Normally when you’re asked to make up a story, you have trouble writing it down, don’t you?”
“Yeah… I only get one line done so, no one ever gets to know what my stories are about,” said Danny sadly. “And I’ve thought up some great stories.”
“Exactly.” Carol tapped the tape recorder. “So now you get to make up your story by speaking into the tape, telling it first. That way your teacher can listen to the story and mark it on content and the way you’ve organized your thoughts, then we’ll get you some help to write it down.”
Danny’s eyes widened. “Someone will help me write?”
“Sure. The stories will still be your ideas and words, but a teacher’s aide or your mom or dad will help you with the spelling.”
Danny hopped around the room excitedly. “Hey, I have this terrific story about a giant grasshopper that eats people. It’s a mutant caused by an atom explosion way out in the Pacific Ocean and there’s only one person who knows how to alter the grasshopper’s DNA molecules and kill it.”
“Enough, enough.” Carol waved her hands in the air. “Get it down on the tape tonight, Danny. It sounds terrific, but I’m running out of time.”
“OK… I’ll shut up.” Danny plonked himself down on the bed again and grinned at her. “This is like Christmas. What else is there?”
“Greedy.” Carol ruffled his hair. “There’s nothing else, but there might be later on…” she paused teasingly.
“Well, go on… what is it… come on Carol, tell me?” Danny pleaded.
“If all this goes well, we might be able to arrange time for you on a computer in the months ahead.”
“FANTASTIC.” Then Danny calmed down a little. “But how is a computer going to help me in school?”
“It will help you with your writing and spelling Danny. It won’t happen overnight, but by learning to use the word processing program on a computer you will be able to write more and to correct your own mistakes. This will help what we call the ’patterning’ of your brain. Gradually, the more you write on the computer, your spelling will improve.”
Carol paused and looked seriously at Danny. “You are very lucky, Danny. Not every child with learning disabilities has parents and a school prepared to help them with the tools they need. Look after them.”
“I will, I will,” said Danny fervently.
“In the meantime your mom will bring you into Calgary every Saturday so you and I can work together on patterning your brain with numbers and letters.”
Danny shook his head to clear it. “Wow, my brain’s mush. I can’t take in any more.”
“I’m not surprised.” Carol stood up and stretched. “I’m feeling pretty mushy myself. Off you go to class. Discuss this tonight with your folks. Mr. Berg will talk to you about the report presentation and I’ll see you next Saturday.”
“Thanks Carol.” Danny hesitated at the door then flung himself across the room, hugged her, and ran.
Chapter Twenty-One
The gentle revolution in Danny’s life continued slowly and surely, though he still hated math and continued to struggle at the bottom of that subject.
“Check the answer on your calculator,” became Mr. Berg’s constant refrain.
“I did,” cried Danny in frustration, “but my stupid brain made me punch the numbers in the wrong way ’round.”
“Michael. Watch Danny enters the numbers in the right order,” suggested Mr. Berg. So slowly and with help, Danny would try again.
The language arts classes were totally different.
“Can we hear one of Danny’s stories,” came the request a number of times when Mr. Berg asked the class for suggestions for a 10 minute filler at the end of the day.
The tape of the Giant Mutant Grasshopper had proved an instant success. Danny experimented and made it into a four-part serial with sound effects. Brett Gibson became so hooked he allowed his helicopter to be borrowed to make authentic sounds for the episode featuring kamikaze pilots trying to shoot down the giant grasshopper as it flew over the Rockies. In the grand finale, Danny gleefully described the laser death ray that finally zapped the giant as it flew over Lake Louise. The ray turned the grasshopper to green slime that slowly dripped through the air and trailed over the lake, the final blob landing SPLAT on a tour bus.
“And that is why Lake Louise is so green,” finished Danny’s voice with a flourish.
Mr. Berg laughed so hard tears came to his eyes. Especially when he discovered the oozy green slime sounds were made by Danny walking in his dad’s rubber boots through a patch of mucky cow pasture.
In between his school work and home activities, Danny worked on his Socials project.
On the day of his presentation to the class, Mr. Budzynski drove Danny to school. Mike was waiting. Carefully he and Danny carried in what looked like four large boxes taped together. Mr. Berg cleared room on his desk and the mysterious package was set down carefully. Mr. Berg wrote out a DO NOT TOUCH sign with (AND THAT MEANS YOU TOO, BRETT) underneath, and stuck it on the top of the boxes. Danny ran out to the car and fetched one more box.
“Good luck son, I’ll be thinking of you,” shouted his father as he drove off.
“You scared?” asked Mike curiously as he opened the classroom door so Danny could edge through without dropping anything.
“A bit,” admitted Danny. “But not as scared as I was when I thought about doing a written report.”
Michael rolled his eyes. “You’re nuts—rather you than me.”
The presentation started after morning recess. The class filed in followed by Mr. Hubner and Danny’s mother.
Danny frowned. “I didn’t know you were coming,” he whispered as she passed.
“Neither did I, but Mr. Hubner invited me this morning,” she whispered back. “Do you mind?”
“Guess not… just didn’t know you and the principal were going to be here.” Danny walked to the front of the class and stood fidgeting by Mr. Berg’s desk. He looked quite calm, but his heart was thumping, cold sweat was trickling down his spine and he felt decidedly ill. “Wish I wasn’t doing this,” he thought miserably. “What if I mess up?”
“Hey… gonna open the box and let the monkey out, Danny?” called Brett Gibson from across the classroom.
“Looks like it’s already out,” retorted Danny swiftly. The class giggled and Danny’s tension eased a little.
Mr. Berg entered, smiled at Danny and spoke to the class.
“For the next few minutes we are going to listen to an experiment. We all know Danny has trouble with writing. But that shouldn’t affect his research skills. So, instead of handing in a written Socials project Danny has chosen to present his knowledge to the class as a talk.” Mr. Berg placed his hand on Danny’s shoulder. “I have no idea what Danny is going to come up with…” he paused and let the tension grow, “but having had a preview of what is in the box, I think you are in for a treat.” Mr. Berg gave Danny’s shoulder an encouraging squeeze and went to sit at the back beside the principal.
The moment had arrived. Danny stepped forward, opened his mouth to speak, and promptly went into deep freeze mode.
For a long terrible minute Danny fought a terror so strong he could neither move or speak. His brain quit, his mouth dried, his throat clenched, his knees shook and the audience before him dissolved into a vague mass that advanced and receded as he looked at
it. His eyes frantically ranged around looking for escape, and if his legs could have moved he would have run from the room.
As he thrust his hands into his pockets to hide their shaking, his scared eyes caught sight of his mother.
She was leaning forward at the back of the room, her eyes on Danny as though willing him to look her way. One hand was patting the top of her chest and as Danny looked her she mouthed, “BREATHE DEEPLY.”
Danny took a deep shuddering breath, and at the same time the hand in his pocket found the lance point. Danny clutched it as a life line and slowly brought it out. The room stopped retreating and advancing and the terror subsided.
“I guess this is what started it all,” said Danny clearly, and he pulled out the point and held it up so the whole class could see. “It’s a lance point I found. It’s called a Scottsbluff point and I found it in a field near here. It was made by a First Nations person 8000 years ago.”
From that moment on, the class was hooked.
Danny spoke about trying to knap a stone point himself and how difficult it was. He reached in the small box and pulled out the collection of rock shards that he’d made in his den. The class chuckled with him when he held up some of the funny shapes that had resulted.
While Danny reached in the box again, he spoke of trying to imagine the person who had made the real lance point, and he lifted up a large roll of paper and shook it out.
A young hunter with one eagle feather in his head band gazed proudly out of the picture. He was standing in a coulee, the rock shards fallen at his feet. One hand still held the piece of stone he had used to knap with and the other held the finished point up to catch the sun. The light sparkled off the translucent edges.
“Did you draw that?” asked Marylise with awe in her voice. “It’s good.”
Mr. Berg moved forward. “That’s wonderful Danny. Let me clip it to the board so we can see it while you talk.”
Pleased, Danny handed the paper to his teacher, and Mr. Berg hung it up.
“I already knew that the stone points were bound onto the end of wooden lances,” Danny continued, “so I had a go at making one.”
He lifted up his lance with his best homemade spear point bound to the end. He showed it to the class. “What I didn’t know,” he explained, “was that the First Nations hunters had something to help them throw these lances further. It has a great name…”
Danny rummaged in the box and with a conjurer’s flourish brought out his polished grooved and knobbed stick. “It’s called an atlatl.”
Danny passed the lance and atlatl to the kids sitting on the front row. “You can look at these,” he said. “Then we’ll go outside afterwards and I’ll demonstrate how they work.”
There was a buzz of excitement as the students passed around the two objects.
Danny held up his hand for silence and looked seriously at the class.
“But the best thing that happened because I found the Scottsbluff point, was that I got to know a real Peigan. I got to know my friend Joshua.”
Danny spoke of his friendship with Joshua and their visit to Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, and he told of his meeting with the old man.
“Joshua calls him ’Naaahsa’. That’s Blackfoot for ’Grandfather’, but he’s not like any grandfather I’ve met before…” Danny hesitated, searching for the right words. “He’s special… He’s an Elder and when he talks… he makes me see pictures in my head…. he tells me things in a way I can really understand them… and this is one of the pictures he helped me see…” Danny looked at his teacher and Mr. Berg walked forward to the edge of the desk and together he and Danny carefully lifted the cardboard box top clear.
The class craned forward and 27 voices gasped in admiration.
Danny had crafted a elaborate papier maché model of Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump.
“Guess you all know where this is,” Danny grinned, and the class nodded and giggled, “because it’s just down the road from here. But this is how it works…”
Danny fiddled in his box again and brought out dozens of tiny brown pipe cleaner buffalo. He placed them as a herd on the upper hillside of the model and reached in his box again. This time he brought out the holy woman. He place her at the bottom of the jump and he explained how she ’called’ the herd and sang to the iniskim.
The class leaned forward over their desks, eyes wide with fascination.
Next Danny brought out more pipe cleaner people. Some were the runners, hiding in the hills and spying on the herd, a couple were on hands and knees, with tiny wolf skins on their backs.
“It’s scary hunting buffalo,” said Danny. “They are so big and so fast and I guess most lances would just injure them and make them even more angry. These people would have to be brave and strong and work carefully together or they’d get trampled.”
Danny made his model people stalk the buffalo and moved the herd down to the valley funnels running towards the cliff edge. Then, with a yell that made everyone jump out of their seats, Danny pulled a string and cardboard cut-out people hidden behind the rock piles shot up, showing how the buffalo were startled into their fatal stampede.
The class rose to their feet, rushed forward and crowded around the desk.
“Do it again Danny, show us how it worked,” begged Brett Gibson.
Danny looked utterly nonplussed. “I… I’ve not finished, yet. I’ve got more to say… I haven’t shown you all my scrap book yet.” He looked to Mr. Berg for help.
Mr. Berg laughed and slapped him on the back. “The price of being too successful Danny… Didn’t you realize how long you spoke to us all?”
Danny shook his head. “No.”
“It’s nearly lunch time! There’s just time for you to show the class how the model works and we’ll have to dismiss. We’ll look at your scrap book this afternoon, and maybe you could demonstrate the atlatl.”
“Isn’t it a great model, Mr. Berg?” Mike jumped up and down excitedly. “Wasn’t that a great report? How many marks are you going to give Danny? Should be good, eh?”
Danny stiffened.
The class stopped what they were doing and turned to Mr. Berg.
“Hmmm.” Mr. Berg spoke slowly and thoughtfully, “I marked all the rest of you using the five areas we discussed in class. Now let’s see… presentation was the first one,” he grinned. “I guess we can’t fault Danny on that one. He did a different kind of presentation from the rest of you but he spoke like a professional and used pictures and objects. Your talk was really well rehearsed Danny.”
Danny and his mother grinned at each other.
“Should get full marks for that,” said a voice from the back. Several class members nodded in agreement.
“Now, content,” Mr. Berg paused. “You know Danny, I have to give you full marks both for content and for research. In fact…” he looked around thoughtfully, “I think you did more actual research that anyone else in the class.”
“He sure did,” agreed Mike, “with the trip to Head-Smashed-In, and the museum here and stuff, as well as all the books he read.”
“Your organization of facts was excellent too,” continued Mr. Berg. “You went smoothly from one topic to the other and didn’t miss things out.” He paused. “Unfortunately one of the areas I also marked was for writing and spelling. Now Danny hasn’t done a written report so I guess I can’t give him the 20% in that area.”
Danny looked down and shuffled his feet.
“Hey!… That’s not fair,” said Marylise. “Danny had to talk to the whole class,” she looked around at the back of the class, “even the principal,” she pointed out.
“Yeah. That’s harder than writing,” said someone else. “I’d die.”
“Danny did some stuff no-one else did,” pointed out Michael. “That model’s far out.”
Everyone looked accusingly at Mr. Berg.
“You think I need to mark Danny’s finished project a different way then?” Mr. Berg asked.
Everyo
ne nodded.
“OK. I think Danny deserves…. 99%.”
The class clapped and cheered and crowded around Danny.
“Hey, how does it feel to be top of the class for once?” laughed Michael.
At first Danny couldn’t answer. “99 per cent?” he whispered unbelievingly. “99 per cent?” Then he looked up at his teacher questioningly.
“What did I lose the one percent on Mr. Berg? What did I fail at?”
With a big grin Mr. Berg whipped a large black felt tip pen out of his pocket and handed it to Danny. “You handed in your work without your name on it Danny,” he laughed.
And they all watched while Danny, hands shaking, scrawled his signature on the base of the model.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The board meeting in the museum was in full progress. Seventeen men and women sat silently around a large polished table.
Eventually the chairperson stirred. “It’s tricky alright, Charlie,” she said. “If we don’t handle this right and the Peigans decide to make a fuss, it could hit national news.”
“Right, that’s all we need, a confrontation,” muttered a voice from the far end of the table.
Charlie Budzynski shook his head. “No, no, don’t exaggerate. That’s not an issue. This request hasn’t come officially from the Peigan people. It’s just something my son found out and felt strongly enough about to want me to point out to the board. Mind you…” he added thoughtfully, “if we handle it right, it could do us a lot of good.”
“Well, I think it’s ridiculous,” said Mrs. Saunders forth-rightly. “Why should a 10-year-old boy dictate to us what photos we can hang in our museum? Photos don’t hurt anyone.”
“Nobody’s ’dictating’, Mrs. Saunders.” Mr. Berg leaned forward and looked across at the chairperson. “Danny’s in my class, and it was through a Socials project he researched that he came across this information. He’s a bright boy, I was most impressed with his project and the accuracy of his research. I think we should give him and his friend a hearing, then decide what to do.”
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