Selvidge Middle School Plans for Students to 'Kinect'

Students at will soon be able to ‘Kinect’ in an unconventional new way through a grant provided by the Special Education Foundation of St. Louis.

As part of the Partnership for Kids program, educators at the junior high in Ballwin expect to receive a grant of $1,029, which social worker Jackie Mellis and therapeutic teacher Laurie DeJohn plan to apply part of toward an Xbox Kinect gaming system. Purchased new, the system bundle typically costs between $300 and $400, depending on the model.

Released late last year, the Kinect uses a small video camera to read users' movements and interact with the game on TV. DeJohn said those particular features could be valuable for "The Club," as kids call it, with its aim of helping students obtain a sense of belonging, advancing social skills and gaining acceptance among peers.

All Selvidge students are welcome to join the weekly, after-school club, including socially and physically disabled students who have difficulty with interaction or fine motor skills. Since the Kinect camera reads various parts of users' bodies for its interface, DeJohn said students won’t have to worry about holding a controller.

“The kids get referred to us from the counselors and staff, but we check with the counselors before because we wouldn’t want kids in the club who might bully,” Mellis said of the Partnershp for Kids, which began in 2006. “Some of the kids we started off with didn’t have friends to eat with in the cafeteria [and] were kind of lonely. And a lot of the kids have friends now. They’re getting invited to birthday parties for the first time.”

DeJohn said she expects to receive the grant funding and purchase the equipment in the comings weeks, at which point she also will solicit input from students to help select games that are both fun and valuable. Sports, fitness, and dancing games are among the Kinect's best-selling games to date.

When applying for the grant, students in the club sent letters describing how the group has helped them grow and develop throughout middle school.

“I think some of their words are very touching,” DeJohn said. “To kind of summarize, most of the letters talked about how much it meant to them to have friends, feeling like they can be themselves and just be accepted and have fun.”

One student wrote that the club had helped her gain more friends than she'd ever had in grade school. Another cited a desire to have a physical classroom activity on days with bad weather.

Mellis said those enhancements to "The Club" also should help the students' success with classwork.

“Research shows that afterschool clubs generally help their attendance,” Mellis said. “These kids, once they feel more included, part of the social scene, I think they’re more motivated to come to school.”