The fourth-graders signed words when their hands weren't linked together in friendship or occupied in a science lesson.
Kjersti Wheeler, 9, and Andi Lentino, 10, have much in common. But because of one difference -- Andi needs special education -- the girls might never have met.
Andi attends Carroll Springs School, the only one in Carroll County exclusively for special education. Kjersti attends fourth grade at Eldersburg Elementary School.
Thursday, Andi and four of her classmates visited the Eldersburg fourth-graders for a lesson on the difference between solids, liquids and gases. They held up bottles of colored water and quizzed each other on what form of matter was inside each bottle.
"It just seemed like the human thing to do," Anne Niedzielski, the speech pathologist who arranged it, said of Thursday's visit.
"We're all going to deal with these handicaps someday, if it's our niece or nephew, or if it's us. We have to teach children not to be afraid."
Debby Phillips of Finksburg, who accompanied her 10-year-old daughter, Sarah, a Carroll Springs student, said that "handicapped people sometimes are presented in a mysterious way. I think it helps the community at large to be able to see that handicapped people are not very different from themselves."
Eldersburg fourth-grader Chrissy Pfaff blew up a balloon, then let out a gentle blast toward a surprised Andi, who scrunched up her face and giggled.
"That's a gas," said Chrissy.
"Gas," Andi replied. She learned her lesson well: The next time Chrissy put the balloon back to her mouth, Andi scrunched up her face in anticipation.
The visit put a human face on the disability unit in the fourth-grade health curriculum and gave the disabled students a chance to be with regular students their age.
In preparation for their visitors, the fourth-graders in teacher Stacy Phillips' room watched a videotape of a day in the Carroll Springs classroom.
While watching, over a period of days, Kjersti decided she liked Andi, the good-natured towhead.
"She's always happy on the tape," Kjersti explained. "She just smiles a lot."
Two years ago, Ms. Niedzielski was working at Carroll Springs School, and her son, Stephen, was a fourth-grader at Freedom Elementary. Inquiring about his homework one night, she learned that the fourth-grade health curriculum included a unit on disabilities.
Why not introduce the fourth-graders in her son's class to children who face those challenges, she asked herself.
Her son's teacher, Ann Thompson, agreed. This year, Ms. Niedzielski transferred to Eldersburg Elementary and started the same program with the fourth-grade teachers there.
Most special education programs in Carroll County are in the regular school buildings, so that students are able to get as much interaction as possible with others their age.
Students are placed in Carroll Springs when their parents and school officials decide their needs warrant it.
The school's enrollment varies from year to year. This year it has 58 of Carroll's 23,000 students.
The students all have some intellectual impairments, but many also have medical problems and need nurses nearby to help with feeding and breathing tubes.
Some Carroll Springs students begin to attend regular schools gradually.
For instance, Andi has begun to go to her neighborhood school, Sandymount Elementary, for an hour three mornings a week.
The children mingled harmoniously Thursday, but Kjersti and Andi bonded like sisters.
Kjersti, who said she wants to be a teacher when she grows up, led her new friend around the room, talking and occasionally signing words that Andi could not say well.
They touched the pads of their index fingers together to say "friends."