Winning Friends and Influencing Kindergarteners

There's a little girl in Ellie's class who constantly calls her by the wrong name. She calls her Lily every time she sees her. At first Ellie came home and told me about it and then when I was volunteering I heard her myself. I corrected the girl and she said, "oh yeah" but did it again a little later in the day and then again when I was dropping Ellie off this morning. I can't tell if she is joking around or if she really forgets. Ellie just rolls her eyes when she does it. Despite calling her the wrong name, the girl seems to really like her and wants to play with her a lot.

We've been going to a playgroup recently that brings together kids who have special needs and typical kids so that the special needs kids can learn and be influenced by the typical kids. It was put together by an acquaintance of mine who has a child with Down's Syndrome and a typical child. It's been very cool to watch Ellie be around kids who are different than she is and to hear the questions she asks. Most of the kids have Down's but not all and I heard that some more autistic kids might be coming in the future. It's also interesting for me to see the kids play together. Ellie sometimes grumbles about going but she grumbles about a lot of things so we'll keep going.