EHS senior Niomi Ndirangu visited Skelly students on Feb. 23 to teach them about epilepsy. Ndirangu was crowned Miss Kansas Outstanding Teen and part of that honor is participating in a social impact initiative. She chose epilepsy education because it is a topic that hits close to home. When she was five years old, she was diagnosed with partial complex seizures. She chose to share the information with Skelly students because that is the elementary school she attended when she was younger.
Ndriangu read the “My Thinking Cap” coloring book to students to teach them about the brain, seizures, and how having epilepsy does not prevent them from achieving great success in life. There are over 50 million people worldwide who have epilepsy.
Through the story, students learned that a neurologist is a doctor who focuses on the brain. The brain has four main parts: frontal lobe, parietal lobe, occipital lobe, and the temporal lobe. The brain contains hundreds of billions of neurons, which talk to each other using electrical signals. When those neurons are working in unison, they are called brainwaves. Seizures occur when there is a disruption to those signals. The “thinking cap” is what the story calls the EEG cap that neurologists use to monitor brain activity to try to identify what is causing the seizures.
Students listened to the story and Ndirangu answered their questions. She also showed them her Miss Kansas Outstanding Teen crown and sash and talked to them briefly about her involvement with that program.
