Singing With Barney

For my gen ja generation, BARNEY evokes a slightly different image than for the current one.  Ours is not large and purple but thin and white.

Barney was the dot the i and cross the t deputy who was a counter point for the wise and caring Sheriff Andy Griffin.  Whereas the excitable Barney might want to incarcerate a jaywalker, Andy would find a way to make a positive life lesson for an escaped convict who somehow found himself in Mayberry.

A common point the mostly over 40 crowd heard during our training for Road Test Examiners was "Don't barney them", which to us meant that we were allowed to have a little grace when scoring those taking the automobile road test.  I shudder to think what that allusion might mean to a younger generation.  "Yes, you did stop on the freeway in front of a semi with air horns blaring,  I love you, you love me but we're not a hap py fam i ly',"

Yesterday I spent another day at Woods Edge Learning Center.  This time with 7 high school age students and me as one of 7 staff.  We began with a group activity.  The students have a lounge area in their classroom equipped with a large display screen hooked up to a special computer.  We began, as most classes I've been in here seem to, with looking at a calendar displayed on the screen to identify the current month and day, then switch to a site to check on today's weather.

After that we go to a program which has children books read by celebrities.  The reader would introduce themselves, then proceed with the story while the screen displayed the illustrations.  Our first treat was Betty White reading THE DIRTY DIRTY DOG, which must have been written when Betty was a child because, really, where do you find coal chutes into houses or coal mounds in rail road yards to play on today?

The next story, read by James Earl Jones, had rather abstract pictures describing the story of the black race from villages in Africa to slavery to Martin Luther King, using a theme of the sound of a drum.  Mostly silence from the uninterested kids.

Then the real treat began.  A BARNEY VIDEO!  I have never seen Barney except when flashing through channels on cable and now I'm watching it with high school aged kids.  The interesting thing with most autistic students is that you cannot really tell if they are actually watching anything displayed on the large screen.  But Barney brought out a chorus of sing along sounds.  Unintelligible but loud.

Tiffiny, whose usual MO is to talk or sing to herself all day, sometimes in a very high pitched baby girl voice, sometimes changing to a lower voice with a few words understandable such as "and a happy new year", was quite animated as well.  The others joined in with their "UMMS"  and "OOHS", and sitting behind them watching all of this I actually started chuckling to myself.  The combined sounds from the students were louder than the audio.  I'd think I'd be afraid to watch Barney by myself, but this was fun.