In the Movies

Today Axel was able to participate in a very special event! It recently came to the attention of some of the school staff where he attends that there were no safety plans or training set up for local first responders in the event they encounter a situation with a communication problem, such as with a deaf child or adult. Today there was a filming of a training video for just such a scenario.

I didn't get to watch the entire filming since we had to stay out of the way, so I don't know all the specifics. I was pretty much just asked to bring Axel and what time to be there. LOL Axel and his classmates have been practicing this in school so they all knew what was going on. I was only able to get a few pictures of the process, but it was really fun!

In the video, a group of deaf children and their mothers are a park. The children are playing and the mothers are sitting on a bench visiting when one of the children runs up to let them know one of the kids is badly hurt. They need to call 911 but how do you do that when you're deaf and calling from a cell phone? How does the 911 operator respond? (these are the things addressed in the training.) The first responders arrive, and the boy tries to tell them where to come to find the injured child. The child is treated, loaded up in the ambulance, and off they go.

Axel just had a small part in the production, but it was still very fun to participate!

Standing around discussing specifics. At one point I was given a shotgun mic and told, "Just point it at stuff". Unfortunately I didn't get to keep it very long because I couldn't do that AND keep an eye on what Axel was up to. Doggone it! I was excited to have a piece of equipment in my hand.

The filming of the first scenes were done, now it was time to film the rescue vehicles arriving. Because the call was placed by a deaf caller, they don't know what type of emergency they're responding to, so everyone comes!

When all the filming and technical stuff was done, a limo showed up to take all the actors to McDonalds!

Oh how he loved he limo! We were riding with a couple of the deaf students along with several hearing siblings and Axel's primary teacher.