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EDUCATION AND AWARENESS
Often, people treat people with physical disabilities badly because they do not know enough about them. People with physical disabilities may look, act, or do things differently and , therefore,they may stand out. This results in people not communicating and staying away from physically disabled people. Sometimes it even goes further, and physically disabled are laughed at, picked on, or even being harassed.
In our lives, we will all come to contact with physically disabled people. Therefore, it is important that we start learning as early as possible. This can be done by showing people some role models who are physically disabled. Also, learning about lives and achievements of physically disabled people in our community is a good way to learn. Finally, children can learn from stories and books.
 TOOLS:
TIPS FOR TREATING PHYSICALLY DISABLED PEOPLE WITH RESPECT:
After interviewing many people who have physical disabilities and discussing with Morgan, we came up with some ways to treat people with disabilities in a respectful way.
Here is the most important tip we learned:
People with physical disabilities do not want to be treated as disabled people, but simply as people!
WE ARE ALL DIFFERENT
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Sometimes people think that people with physical disabilities are different. Of course they are. We all are. Every person in the world is different because we are all individuals. Each one of us has something different- some of us have brown hair, some of us bite our fingernails and some of us are great in sports. People with physical disabilities simply have challenges controlling the way their bodies move.
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YOU CANNOT "CATCH" A PHYSICAL DISABILITY
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There are many causes of physical disabilities. Being nice to people who are physically disabled in not the one! Standing next to or giving a hug to person with physical disability will not make you physically disabled!
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PHYSICALLY DISABLED PERSONS CAN LEARN AND COMMUNICATE
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Sometimes people think that people with physical disabilities cannot learn or communicate. This is not true. Physically disabled people can learn. Many of them sit in our classes and learn just as we do. They can also communicate, even if they sometimes need assistive devices.
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PHYSICALLY DISABLED PEOPLE CAN PARTICIPATE IN SAME ACTIVITIES AS EVERYONE ELSE
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Like to play sports, act or dance? Physically disabled people can do that as well. Because today there are many assistive devices, people with disabilities can participate in activities that others do. They can ski and swim, play tennis or shop in the mall.
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IF YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND -ASK or DO THE RESEARCH
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Sometimes people are afraid or they are intimidated when they do not understand. This may be a reason why some people stay away from people with physical disabilities. If this is the problem, there are many Internet sites that provide information on various disabilities. In addition, you can politely ask a person. When our team interviewed some people with physical disabilities they were very open to sharing and glad that we took interest.
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