Educator, Advocate for Autistic Children and Mom, Michele Pierce Burns
Michele Pierce Burns is a consultant, fundraiser, writer, and public speaker focusing on autism awareness and acceptance. She works part-time for Celebrate the Children, a State-Approved School for Children with Alternative Learning Styles in Wharton, NJ. She is the proud mother of Danson Mandela Wambua, age 9, and has recently co- written a book with him entitled DANSON: The Extraordinary Discovery of an Autistic Child’s Innermost Thoughts and Feelings (St. Lynn’s Press, April 2009). Michele is currently collaborating with Illustrator Louis Henry Mitchell (Senior Character Designer and Creative Director at Sesame Workshop) on a second book for Danson entitled I Love Everything About You which affirms the belief that every child with autism is a perfect blessing exactly as he or she is (St. Lynn’s Press, Spring 2010).
Michele and Danson have been featured on OPRAH, The Today Show, Larry King Live, and in the documentary Autism Every Day which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2007. Michele volunteers and consults at: Sesame Workshop Healthy Habits for Life and Autism Awareness Project, as a member of the family services committee at Autism Speaks, HALO (Helping Autism through Learning and Outreach), Seeds of Hope Outreach in Southern Africa (dedicated to bringing services and hope to orphans due to AIDS), and at Connor’s House, a home-like community for family-centered care for children with complex health needs.
Previously, Michele was a high school English teacher and co-founded two college preparatory-based charter schools and a summer academy. She holds a B.A. from Wesleyan University (English/Afro-American Studies), a M.A. from Stanford University (Education), and a M.Ed. from Harvard University (Administration, Planning, and Social Policy).She is a certified Yoga and Yoga for the Special Child teacher and a Reiki Master. She is so grateful to share her daily life with Danson and her beautiful husband Michael.
Comment from admin
Time March 17, 2009 at 2:22 am
Danson is my greatest teacher.
He is a brilliant and complex and a sweet and loving child. Although he would say “young man” since he is about to be ten. He is just incredible and, he is incredibly courageous in the way that he pushes through his natural tendencies toward isolation and non-communication because he has very little verbal language.
He is labeled as non-verbal but I never use that term for him because he tries to talk all day long, every day and that term does not acknowledge the tremendous effort that he makes. He does say words. They may not be understood by many people but, in context, we do understand what he is trying to say.
Because he has very little verbal language and because of his sensory overload all of the time, with sounds and filtering out voices and the things he may hear externally or things that we can not even detect, the world is kind of a scary and overwhelming place for him. I say that he is absolutely my hero. He is so courageous because everyday he just goes out there and he keeps trying to connect with people.
Writing this book was all his idea. He said that he wanted to share his
“Holy stories with the world”.
In the beginning, his goal for the book was to begin a dialogue of inspiration. He says in the book
“How is one little life supposed to turn the world to love when there is so much suffering”.
That is one of the things he wonders about all of the time. For his tenth birthday we told him we would take him on a trip, anywhere that he wanted to go. He said two things:
“I want to go to Kenya to be with my people” (his father is from Kenya and he has never been there), and then he said
“I want to go to Darfur to help”.
He is pretty amazing that way. His heart is huge.