My Lego story "was I building Lego, or was Lego building me"

[allanp]

I would like to share with you all a real life Lego story.

When I was a child, I was born parcially deaf. It went completely un-diagnosed. I could not hear words properly which meant that when I was leaning to speak, I would repeate words in a very distored way (which was how I heard them). Nobody could understand what I was saying. This lead them to suspect that I was maybe a bit simple. Things only got worse when I was sent to a bad school where I was bullied very badly. It was so bad I could not concentrate on my work. I was so concerned about trying to fit in with this group of bullies just so they would'nt bully me. But I would not do the things they do to others. Combined with my stupid souding voice, things got worse and worse. I had no friends, my grades were low and my shcool reports were bad. The school itself was so bad they could not see any of this bullying. The headmaster of the school even contributed to it. When I fell and split my head open, the head masted looked at me with blood all down my face and simply called me stupid. When I got sent to him for hiding from everyone under a table he said that if I wanna crawl around the floor like a bug then he would spray me with bug spray until I didn't move any more. As a small child, it was terrifying. Yet my poor communication was so bad I could not tell anybody, even my family what was happening. There was talk and plans to move me to a different school for special needs children. I felt completely lost in a maze with no way out. I felt a low that was, well, lets just say it was total. No 7 year old, or anybody, should ever be made to feel that way and so help me if I ever see it again i'll.......

It was around this time that I really started to get into Lego Technic. I had been building with it for one or two years and I loved it. I could build these models without much help and using the knowledge of the way things worked by building Lego Technic I soon started to build MOCs with complicated gear trains and steering and suspention and motors and all kinds of things. For the first time I did something that I wanted to show off. For the first time I didn't feel stupid. My mom saw the kinds of things I was building and that they were good. I was learning, without even knowing it, how to solve problems, how to be patient, spacial awarness, hand-eye co-odination, mechanical physics and even mathematics when figuring out gear ratios. I was learning fast. Very fast. It was then that things started to change. And oh boy did things change. My mother realised then that I was no dumb kid. I was smart. But why the inability to speak properly? Why the low grades? She took me to see someone and my hearing problems were diagnosed. Until then they didn't know I had hearing problems and did not fully realise my other problems in school either. How could they, I couldn't tell them. Progress with my hearing and speech were slow, but it was there.

My speech was getting better but there was still the problem of the low grades. My parents were not content with it all being down to not hearing the teacher properly. They went to the school and wanted to know more. Make no mistake, my parents were always kind, loving and attentive, they just didn't have a reason to believe anything was wrong until now. My parents were told that there might be a slight problem with bullying but not to worry and they said that to solve the problem they were gonna no longer allow me to play outside at break times. Problem solved. My dad went berserk at the teacher! "You make out like my son is the bully, he's the victim here. Why are you gonna punish him by not allowing him out side at break times. It should be the bully that is not allowed outside, NOT MY SON!" My parents ammediatly stopped looking at me for the reasons my grades were low and looked towards the school. They asked what kind of school can't prevent an 8 year old from bullying another 8 year old to the extent that I was failing everything. What kind of school punishes the person being bullied and not the bully. They wanted answers. They did not get any and so went to the board of governers. This matter was getting bigger and bigger until they decided that they had enough. They took me out of that school and refused to send me back there. The school begged and pleaded and did all kinds of things. They even gave me a phony report card that had the word "excellent" in every subject, no need for improvement which was obviously not the case. You see the board of governors was involved now and they could not be seen to have a child being taken out of the school by his parents as the consequences for them would be big. Just how big, nobody could have guessed, but i'll get to that later.

My parents sat me down and said that they were sorry for all that has happened (to this day I maintain they have absolutely nothing to be sorry for) and asked me to make a decision. They said "you are gonna have to be brave and tell us if you want to be moved to a different school. If you do then it will be your decision alone, and we will make it happen. whatever you want" They told me everything about how I would have to make all new friends (not that I had any in school) and that my old school would be investigated from a high level and that would all revolve around me. Non the less the decision is yours and yours alone. Were gonna listen to you from now on, forget everyone else. Just you son. So I made my choice. Soon after that I started a new school, this time a roman catholic school. It was the best school ever. My grades shot up. I made the first friends i've ever made there. Friends that would remain friends for years to come. I left that school to go onto high school with the second highest grades in the entire school. And also because it was a roman catholic school I got to go to a school that I would not have been able to go to before. It was there that I met life long friends, took an IQ test and discovered I was in the top 0.1%, got 10 GCSE's and where I also met a girl that I am still with today and someday I would love to call her my wife.

During those years I was in that good primary school it turns out that my old primary school was indeed investigated due to my deciding to leave. During that investigation they found many other things they did not like concerning many other pupils aswell. I do not know the details but what they found must not have been good as EVERY SINGLE MEMBER OF STAFF WAS FIRED. That school is completely different now. Completely restaffed and restructured it is now, thank God, a good place to go to school.

Looking back I wonder, was I building Lego, or was Lego building me. Either way i'm glad that one christmas, when I was 5 or 6, a present was opened from my nan (to my older brother actually) and it was an 8838 Shock Cycle. From then on Lego Technic would always be, and I suspect always will be, top of my list. Thankyou.

Edited September 13, 2009 by allanp

[Thee Pirate]

That was a good read, thank you for sharing. My mom works as an ASL interpreter in the California Public School System... I know it's not quite the same, but still. Just saying...

It's awesome to see how Lego was pretty much responsible for your success today, thanks to your parents noticing that the school system didn't really care about your well being.

[allanp]

Thankyou

[Alywin]

At least one thing is demonstrated:

One smart at LEGO building (not just playing or collecting though) must not be a dumb person overall.

[ziljin]

Wow, that's an amazing story. But I am going to guess you are quite old or (your state/country/etc has different education requirements), since elementary schools (at least in NYC) have been requiring vision and hearing tests for 15+ years.

If it isn't too personal, could you mention the school's name? I would like to see if I could read up on how terrible it was for curiosity's sake.

Edited September 13, 2009 by lego40k

[allanp]

Wow, that's an amazing story. But I am going to guess you are quite old or (your state/country/etc has different education requirements), since elementary schools (at least in NYC) have been requiring vision and hearing tests for 15+ years.

Well I am 24 now and I live in England. Things may have changed but the first hearing test I remember was the one at the doctors, not school. I've only ever had one test at school and that was in secondary school so would have been a bit late by then.

If it isn't too personal, could you mention the school's name? I would like to see if I could read up on how terrible it was for curiosity's sake.

When I went there it was called Tividale junior and infant school. It's called something else now. I was somewhat reluctant to say the name as I do not wish to deter people from it, it's completely different now. It also underwent the "fresh start" scheme.

http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/Database/S...Freshstart.html has some information on that but is wrong when it says that another school was the only primary school ever to have undergone such a scheme as my old schools own website states that it also went through the same procedure.

[Bill VonDoom]

Thank you for sharing, that was quite an emotional read.

[Reaper052]

This is so sad a story, I can't even think of any real good comment on it .

Reaper052 :skull:

[Rocky]

That was a nice story that you shared with us. It was very touching. I'm glad that everything turned out for you and that lego had such a big impact on your life.

[nintha]

That was a vary touching story and I'm glad everything turned out good for you and I'm glad you shared it with us. (And I'm sorry if this sounds like everybody elses comments.)

[allanp]

That was a vary touching story and I'm glad everything turned out good for you and I'm glad you shared it with us. (And I'm sorry if this sounds like everybody elses comments.)

Not at all thankyou for the kind comments.

[Front]

Thank you. I was touched by your story. Thank you. May no child ever have to go through something similar. Well, sadly many probably does all over the world.

[Erik Leppen]

I think it is very brave of you to tell all this personal stuff on the internet. But I was surely touched - but I'm glad it finally turned out all good and you're a happy person now :) But as I'm reading this, the credit doesn't go to Lego, it mainly goes to your parents! They're the ones that made the right decisions. How Lego comes into play in the story is of course great but as said, partly coincidence. I think I'm going to save this link in case I want to show others what building with Lego can do to a person.

But I'm wondering - do you still have trouble hearing? Or have you completely learned how to cope with it? It's OK if you don't want to tell of course, since it's quite a personal question...

Edit: oh and by the way, the title is really perfect. You should really really store this story somewhere by the way.

Edited September 15, 2009 by Erik Leppen

[allanp]

I think it is very brave of you to tell all this personal stuff on the internet. But I was surely touched - but I'm glad it finally turned out all good and you're a happy person now :) But as I'm reading this, the credit doesn't go to Lego, it mainly goes to your parents! They're the ones that made the right decisions. How Lego comes into play in the story is of course great but as said, partly coincidence.

Oh yes the main credit should of course go to my parents no doubt about that. But you know during the time I was at that first school nothing excercised my brain as much as building MOCs did. Lego taught me how to use my brain more than that school! No child reading this should give up school to play with lego tho! If/when I have kids, they're getting tons of lego

I think I'm going to save this link in case I want to show others what building with Lego can do to a person.

I guess that was partly the reason for my posting this story

But I'm wondering - do you still have trouble hearing? Or have you completely learned how to cope with it? It's OK if you don't want to tell of course, since it's quite a personal question...

My hearing improved as i've got older. It's now only just below average and is not a problem. My speech is fine apart from the black country accent

Edit: oh and by the way, the title is really perfect. You should really really store this story somewhere by the way.

Thankyou I will.

[Matt Dawson]

My hearing improved as i've got older. It's now only just below average and is not a problem. My speech is fine apart from the black country accent

As someone with Asperges Syndrome, I sympathise.

Even I have trouble with the black country accent...and I've visted the area many times...

[allanp]

As someone with Asperges Syndrome, I sympathise.

Even I have trouble with the black country accent...and I've visted the area many times...

Nah bet yow cun understond every word om sayin cor ya!