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It’s as easy as riding a bike.
To our family, that was one of the dumbest sayings ever. Riding a bike was as far from easy as was possible. While Eric and I, of course, knew how to ride bikes, we had three kids who couldn’t ride two wheelers.
Finally, a couple of years ago, it clicked for both of the younger kids and they were off riding. This left Noah, our son with high functioning Autism, still riding the large, three wheeled Schwinn that we had previously purchased for him. While that was a blessing that he could ride with us, we could often see the defeated look in his eyes as he went up a hill and had to use all his might to manage to get that huge thing up the hill while the others went up on two wheels.
If it seemed difficult to teach him how to ride on two wheels when he was younger, it seemed impossible to teach him to ride once he was a teenager weighing over 100 pounds and coming in at 5’9″ tall. Still, I couldn’t help but pray for a solution that would get him on two wheels.
During one session of Googling about it one night, I found a national organization called iCan Shine which focuses on teaching people over eight years old who have special needs to ride two wheelers. I gasped! Could Noah really learn to ride? How could this organization teach kids who have never learned? I sat there with a mix of excitement and skepticism.
I found that the program would have a week long camp (75 minutes per day) about 90 minutes from our home. It seemed too far away, but as soon as I told my Mom, she vowed that we would find a way to make this work. I excitedly told Noah, and he wasn’t so sure because he was afraid. I may have put some bribery into place. We planned for our camp week after securing him a spot.
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The First Days of Bike Camp
Each day had five sections of camp, with six kids in each section. Noah’s section had three kids with Autism and three kids with Down’s Syndrome, some older than Noah and some younger.
Right away, they had the kids on their special roller bikes, with a regular wheel in the front and a special roller in the back. The kids all rode for just about 75 minutes straight, with extremely short breaks, each with two volunteers walking along side of them. Only one child in the group got his volunteers running that first day.
This is where I admit something. I watched Noah on that special roller bike, riding slowly, and I felt defeated. Could he really learn to ride in just five days?
On the second day, I found out that one of the girls in his group was taking the camp for the second time. As I watched Noah still slowly riding along, I had to try to calm myself. We had talked about how amazing it would be to ride. What would we do if he wasn’t riding at the end of the week?
The highlight of the second day was watching Noah ride a tandem bike with the bike technician. (Tuesdays in the camp are called “Tandem Tuesday,” as each camper gets a chance to ride around several laps with someone.) He loved to feel the speed of them riding around on the gymnasium. I loved seeing it, but it also broke my heart a little. He was just not progressing.
On Tuesday night, I was busily getting ready to go away to Savvy Blogging Summit, and sobbing. How could I leave and not be there to comfort him on Friday when he wasn’t riding. My heart was breaking.
Wednesday at the Bike Camp (aka The Time When I Wasn’t There)
I finally decided to go to Savvy anyway, and my Mom promised that she would be there to comfort him, if he needed it, as my parents had already planned to take him to the last three days of camp.
While I drove to Cincinnati, my Mom called me about half way through the camp session.
“He isn’t going to learn to ride this week, is he?” She sadly asked. Now that she had seen him shakily riding on the roller bike, she understood my concern.
“No,” I said glumly.
She shared with me that two of the kids in his group had been moved outside because they were now riding on two wheels as of that day. I was glad for them, but sad for us. We talked briefly, and then planned to talk later in the evening.
Twenty minutes later, she called again.
“Hello.”
“He’s riding!” She exclaimed.
It seemed unreal. Could this be true?
“They put him on a two wheeled bike and he has ridden four laps around the gym so far.”
I cried and cried.
She said they would be taking him outside to ride now as well. He proceeded to then ride for around 20 minutes straight.
He got off his bike at the end of camp and told my parents, “I feel like I could take on the whole world now.” I found that out while I was at dinner before the conference and could only wordlessly show the text from my Mom to Dana, who also got teary-eyed. (I actually had a lot of other people at Savvy Blogging Summit who gave me hugs or even cried when they found out he was riding!)
Over the next two days of camp, Noah transitioned to the Trek bike that we got him that met the suggested guidelines of the organization. And he rode and rode.
Noah, who has now been riding for about two and a half months, is the fastest bike rider in our family. His success not only gave him the ability to ride a bike, but it also gave him a whole new confidence and independence.
God bless the people of the iCan Shine organization, as well as the camp that met in Valparaiso, IN. You gave our family and our son a gift that we can never repay. Thank you for making my son feel like he could take on the world.
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Amazing Grace says
Congrats Noah! Never give up, never surrender! (quote from Galaxy Quest)
Our son also has high functioning autism. He was the first one dx in our county and the struggles that we faced with the school system were unbelievable. Toilet training, riding a bike, driving a car, etc. took longer for him. At first he did not do well in school. I remember when he was in 6th grade and he came home with his report card and I cried and cried. It was the first time he had a good report card. We have been through it all and somehow we have persevered and he is doing well in college (keep your fingers crossed). He graduated from high school with honors and now he is in college majoring in Engineering and Computer Science.
Angie Kauffman says
Thanks for the encouragement! It’s so nice to hear from someone who has been there and came out successful on the other side. 🙂
Lisa says
Freely admit – this post made me cry! That is just so beautiful … well done Noah!
Kris @ Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers says
Love, love, love! If I’d been at Savvy, I’d have cried and hugged you, too. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a photo of Noah. He looks so much like you.
Angie Kauffman says
That’s funny that you thought he looked like me, Kris. Nobody has ever told me that. He actually looks just like Eric, except Eric has darker hair. Once when Noah was really far away from me in the grocery store, I thought, “Eric’s at the grocery store!” Oops!
Kris @ Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers says
It’s probably because I’ve never seen Eric. I get the same thing with Brianna. She looks JUST like Brian and everyone always says so. Then, every once in awhile I’ll get someone who says she looks like me. I’m always all, “Really? No, she looks like Brian.”
Megan is the only one who looks like me, which is funny because she and Josh look very much alike, but to me he looks more like Brian than me.
scrapper al says
I’m so happy for Noah! iCan Shine sounds like a wonderful organization.
laura says
Go Noah! I have a son with higher functioning autism he is 14 years old, he has a hard time learning to ride a bike, he always puts himself down and stops trying. I always try to give him positive support, and it breaks my heart because he realizes that he is different and his own limitations, I’m going to show him this article about your beautiful son noah. maybe this will give him the will he needs and realize hes not alone,
Angie Kauffman says
I would recommend looking into an iCan Shine program near you. They have them all over the country, as well as I think in Canada too. There is a link to the organization in this post. Their system was really amazing. I don’t think Noah would have ever learned to ride without it.
TW says
Can you tell me how much the bike you had to buy was? ICan Shine requires bike purchases.
Angie Kauffman says
You don’t buy the bike from them (unless that has changed), so there is not a set price. Before the bike camp, they gave us guidelines at an information session about what to look for in a bike. We were super into finding a bike that met all of the guidelines and we did. However, most of the people in our camp just brought in bikes that they either already had or that were just standard Walmart/Target types of bikes. Their technicians can do some things to bikes to make them meet the guidelines better.
I suspect that they don’t always get people who are quite as big of rule followers as we were, since when we brought in our son’s bike to get checked out, the technician turned to our son and said, “You seriously need to thank your mom for this bike. Wow!”
I would say that there were definitely $50 bikes at the camp. We traded in the three wheeled Schwinn that our son was using at a bike store and then had to spend another $500 on the Trek bike that we picked out for him. I think that we were definitely in the minority to come in with a Trek bicycle or anything else as expensive as that. As you can imagine, he still has the nicest bike of any of us. If I’m riding alone, I use it instead of my own (which I bought for $60 about 22 years ago LOL).
Jessica says
Could you explain what the roller used was? I’m wondering how it’s different than training wheels and if it’s something I could get on my own. The closest camp I see is 2 1/2 hours away and won’t be until August of NEXT YEAR! 🙁 Was there anything else after that step? Thank you!!!
Angie Kauffman says
Hi Jessica –
I suspect that they will still have more camps announced as next summer gets closer, so there might end up being one that is closer than that to you. I would definitely recommend the camp if it becomes feasible for you.
My son is on one of their roller bikes in the picture where he is on a bike in this post. I looked around online and found several other pictures of them. There is a pretty good picture on this page: https://icanshine.org/ican-bike-indianapolis-in/ You’ll see that the whole bike is made in a particular way, and those are all their bikes, so it’s not something they add to the back of regular bikes.
The difference with the rollers on the back versus training wheels don’t really give the kids any more stability in the middle and they just bounce back and forth on them. With the roller, it gives kids more stability in the middle and it tapers at the ends. It is better at helping them to learn to keep balance.
In the camp, as they get better, they keep moving them to different roller bikes where there ends are more and more tapered, so that as they get better, they are relying more on themselves to keep balanced, though they still have some help in the middle from the roller (but they get less and less help as they change bikes). Then, they move them onto more of their bikes, but with two wheels. Only after they are successfully riding those do they move them onto their own bikes (which you take to the camp with you).
So, it’s not really something that you could recreate at home. 🙁 At least it’s nothing that I could have recreated at home. Maybe if someone had a lot of money and could get someone to make custom bikes for them? But, that doesn’t seem very reasonable either.
Sorry to not have a better answer that you could recreate at home! Definitely keep watching for more camp locations though. Ours was about 90 minutes away, and we actually opted to not go home every day and stayed in a hotel three times that week instead. I know that’s not necessarily feasible for everyone, but that was what we made work.
Jessica says
Thank you so much! That’s incredibly helpful! Most of the posts I have seen state “start with a balance bike.” That suggestion seems a bit ridiculous to me as my son was not interested in a balance bike at all. He didn’t like all the effort for no reward. He does very well on a bike with training wheels but is really at the max. size for being able to use them now, plus it would be great for him to achieve a 2-wheel on his own and have that freedom! However, the balance is of course the obstacle to overcome this way!! We put aside a little money from each paycheck towards a trip fund, so if we have to, we’ll simply attend the camp and stay at a hotel as you did. My son loves hotels (new lights! pools!) so that would be an incentive for him. I really should have looked into something earlier, but this year we were just concentrating on his strengthening his pedal skills. Last year any little crack in the sidewalk and he needed a push! Anyways, thank you again!!!
Alicia says
This is an amazing story and I sit here crying because I feel your pain as a parent watching your child struggle and my wish that my son could have the same success! At 12, my son struggles to ride a bike and it breaks my heart at how depressed he gets watching all his friends ride and he just can’t get the balance down. This gives me hope that it’s not too late!
Charlie says
My son is 13 and just started trying to learn to ride. Same issue with him, it is the balance. He will go about 3 seconds and then bam, the foot drops off the petals. I want him to get to ride for the freedom and to assist with the 1 mile walk to school he has to do.
Verona says
My 13 year old grandson is on the autism spectrum and wants to learn to ride a bike. We looked at purchasing expensive adult training wheels which are too expensive and he also needs a bike. Given his diagnosis and desire, where can we get help to train him given his special needs? He lives in Kennesaw, Ga.
Help.
Angie Kauffman says
Hi Verona –
I would recommend keeping an eye on the site https://icanshine.org/ for their programs as they announce them for next summer. That’s mostly when they do their programs (summer), so I would watch and see what the closest program is to your grandson next summer.
Good luck!
Angie