Depending on how long he has had the cane, he may have started relying on the sounds. A swimming noodle would not do the trick and shows very little understanding of blindness by school personnel. IOW, they took his eyes away. I doubt they would gouge out Johnny's eyes because he looked up a skirt, or cut off Johnny's arm because he hit someone.
That is not an excuse to allow Dakota to use the cane as a billy club,
The adults in charge should have been able to figure out an appropriate punishment.
I’ve read the whole article and it seems to indicate this:
Dakota fidgets with his walking stick while riding on the bus. While doing so, he hit someone else, likely the person next to him.
It wasn’t intentional, that I can tell. For the safety of the students and to avoid lawsuits from other children’s parents if their kids were injured by the stick, they substituted the noodle. It was temporary. I don’t think they knew what else to do to try and get him to stop fidgeting with the stick. I don’t know if that is even possible. A blind kid sitting motionless on a bus with activity of other kids all around him, and he’s supposed to sit perfectly still because he has a long stick in his hand. Right.
I would have suggested they get him one of those fold up walking sticks. Maybe his parents could have gotten him a fold up walking stick.
But, they didn’t. They went with the noodle. The parents complained, the school met with the parents, the school gave the ‘cane’ (walking stick) back.
Everyone is happy now...... UNTIL IT PUTS SOME KID’S EYE OUT.
They should go with the fold up walking stick.
P.S. I know the article makes it seem like he ‘intentionally’ hit someone. Especially because they said they punished him for bad behavior. But I think the behavior is that he keeps waving around the stick.
After all, he could hit just as many people with the noodle as he could the walking stick, if he was intentionally striking other children. So giving him the noodle would not seem to solve anything in that case.
Anyway, that’s my opinion.