In the book, Out of my Mind, Sharon Draper started off the book giving a little background about the main character, Melody. Melody is a young woman who has cerebral palsy. She has a severe case of severe case of cerebral palsy and cannot do anything for herself. Do not let her disability fool you because she is very brilliant. Melody cannot talk at all and it is very frustrating for her because she has a lot to say. A lot of people talk to her like she cannot understand them, but little do they know that Melody can completely understand them and probably is more brilliant than them.
Melody's mom takes her to the doctor to get some assessments done. The doctor says that Melody is severely brain damaged and basically tells the parents that she will not make it in a "regular school". Her mom did not like how the doctor came across and got upset. Her mom strongly believed in her and did end up sending her to a elementary school. Throughout her years of school, it is very easy for Melody and very frustrating because no one knows what she can truly do. She did end up getting an electric wheelchair to make her feel a little more independent. She also got an assistive technology device that helped her have a voice.
Melody was able to perfect all the tests to get onto the quiz team, she did not miss a single question. She helped the quiz team win and make it to nationals. However, Melody did not end up going to nationals because her plane got cancelled. She went back to school with more confidence before because the assistive technology device is a game changer for Melody and now she can express how truly intelligent she actually is.
Out of my Mind is a fiction novel. There were no illustrations in this novel. However, I think that it would have been cool to see what Melody looked like. I really enjoyed reading this book. I am a special education major so I thought it was very interesting and fascinating. The message that I got from this book is that you should not judge someone just because of the wheelchair, but who they truly are. I feel like a lot of people should take this message and run with it because a lot of people look at the disability and not the students abilities. In this case, people looked at Melody's disability and she actually had tons of abilities! The one critique that I would have in it is have the mom ask the doctor why they did not think of an assistive technology piece from the beginning of the book to see what was truly in her head.
-Kole
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