MICHIGAN — Odds are your social media feeds are flooded with cute pictures of children headed into school on the first day.
Some families in West Michigan don't get to make a post like this.
That's because their children are inside Helen DeVos Children's Hospital getting chemo...surgery...or dialysis.
At the start of this school year--the Spectrum Health team puts their heads together to make things a little more normal.
Just like all the other kids-- patients at Helen DeVos Children's Hospital get to hold up these signs with their biggest smiles for their very own first day of school pictures.
"We had backpacks from Sam's Club. And we were able to give out haircuts from great clips and just kind of stuffed the bags with school supplies.” Brian Craig, Hospital Teacher and School Liaison told us. “And it was, it was really nice to be able to just sort of hand a family, all that stuff, knowing they that's probably been on their to do list for the past, you know, however many weeks right as school is approaching."
These patients are not inside the traditional classroom during their hospital stay...so the classroom comes to them.
Brian Craig is one of four teachers for the hospital.
"We paint, we read, we play games, we do science experiments, solve mysteries, and build rollercoasters and do just anything that anything that you can think of.” Craig tells us it takes a little creativity. “If we haven't tried it yet, well, we'll probably get around to trying it."
Their team customize lessons for these children-- broadcasting activities for patients who can't be around others—and teaching right at the bedside of others.
"The kind of conversations you get to have that aren't medical for them is kind of nice,” says Craig. “They're, you know, they're in this world where everybody that comes in has like a, a medicine to give them or, you know, I walked in with a packet of stuff yesterday, and the patient's like, is that medicine? Like, No, I'm just here to bring, you know, some fun stuff for our, for our school program."
Music class is taught by therapists.
And the hospital is outfitted with rooms that aren’t supposed to feel like a hospital at all.
Inside, teachers help kids read, color, problem solve, and laugh.
"For us to be able to help patients kind of bridge that gap between what's going on with them medically, and connect them with their with their school district and help kind of, kind of connect those two sides together is just something that parents really appreciate," Craig explained. "It's nice to bring kind of that the normalcy of school to a patient that's in kind of this spot, that's probably not very typical for them."
Lessons and activities are run through the Dick and Linda Antonini Hospital School Program.
Find out more on how you can help with supplies and programming here.
