Current events study enlivens Y.A.L.E. School

Who says teenagers don't pay attention to the news?

One recent day, students in Nicole McNally's high school world history class were acing their weekly current events quiz.

Sports? Entertainment? Popular culture?

No problem for this brainstorming team.

"Great job, guys," McNally said.

And it was, but for more reasons than getting kids to check out the news of the week.

These students all attend the Y.A.L.E. School in Cherry Hill for children with social learning disabilities in grades one through 12. For the last several weeks, classes in both the middle and high schools have been competing in a weekly current events challenge.

Winning classes from each school will be treated to a meal at a nearby IHOP restaurant.

Getting youngsters to focus on the news would have been goal enough; the challenge's additional benefits have been considerable.

Most of the students are on the autism spectrum. The challenge has helped draw students out of themselves, their teachers said.

"It's a really cool, natural way to get them to socialize," McNally said.

The competition is fostering teamwork among students for whom that doesn't come naturally.

"In the beginning, they were, like, 'I'm going to do this on my own.' Now they work as a group," said social studies teacher Jen Hicks.

Because the topics are varied, different individuals get the chance to shine.

"The kids raise their shoulders and puff out their chests," Hicks said. "'Oh, I know this, and no one else does.'"

She invites her students to own their areas of expertise.

For student Sarah Gold, 18, that would be politics and history. Over time, the classmates learned "we had to work together to win this challenge and get IHOP," said Gold, who plans to order waffles if her team wins.

For questions about the Civil War, World War II, the Cold War, and the Vietnam War, Idoh Liba, 16, is the team's go-to guy. Morgan Losendahl, 17, and Adham Baghdadi, 18, are both sports fans, but Baghdadi said the challenge has broadened him.

"It is educating," he said. "I'm more interested in watching the news."

Christie Prushinski said she has seen a change in son Bobby, 15. Since the challenge, they've had conversations they hadn't had before.

"He never cared about politics," Prushinski said. "If it didn't happen in our house, he didn't care."

Having discussions in class also seems to have matured his perception of events. In past, bad news would have been too disturbing for him.

"Before, he couldn't handle it," his mother said. "Now he comes home talking about it."

The discussion was lively in McNally's world history class as Bobby Prushinski and his classmates voted on the answers to questions including which celebrity was recently kicked out of the Coachella music festival (Justin Bieber) and which American politician announced a run for president on YouTube. (Hillary Rodham Clinton is correct; Grumpy Cat, not.)

The teammates did not always agree, but they have learned that that, too, is OK.

"We're not Congress," quipped Will Johnson, 17. "We can get along."