"It's pretty cool. You get to watch the players practice," said Nolan Johnston, 14, from Roseville, at a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. Johnston is a student at Lionsgate Academy. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a Wild practice and participate in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
Parker Snow, a 7th grade student at Academy of Whole Learning, plays with a fidget toy in the Quiet Room space as he watches practice at a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a practice and participated in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
Alec Newhouse, a 9th grade student at Lionsgate Academy, designs a jersey with an atomic breathing Godzilla and his last name on it at a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a practice and participated in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
Dana Jondahl, left, and Alissa Ellingson from the Associated Bank station, point to the camera so students know where to look as they pose with a photoshopped image of Wild's Jason Zucker at a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a practice and participated in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
"Let's Go Wild!" cheered students and teachers at a welcome event before watching practice at a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a practice and participated in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
Parker Snow holds his ticket after entering Xcel Energy Center at a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a practice and participated in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
A student has his ticket scanned at a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a practice and participated in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
Students gather on the suite level before leaving a Minnesota Wild hosted event for autistic students at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Thursday, March 14, 2019. About 70 students from Academy of Whole Learning and Lionsgate Academy watch a practice and participated in several activities. (Jean Pieri / Pioneer Press)
A group of students with autism spent Thursday at the Xcel Energy Center listening to the sounds of pucks colliding with Bauer hockey sticks and sharpened skates scraping against freshly resurfaced ice.
What they didn’t hear: Screaming dads with novelty cups filled with beer; fans wondering aloud what’s gotten into that goalie. Missing was the blaring buzzer or the squeak of ketchup leaving dispensers or sellers hawking more cold beer.
They just heard — and watched — hockey.
On a regular game night, the St. Paul arena would be packed with 18,000 fans. On Thursday, the 70 students, many armed with fidget spinners and blue earphones to block extra sound, were there to watch hockey without distractions.
A typical sporting event with an arena packed with fans could lead to a sensory overload for some with autism. Thursday’s event, dubbed Into the Wild, let the classmates experience and enjoy big time hockey.
“This is a really excellent opportunity for students with autism to have the chance to experience… the excitement of being a Wild fan,” Autism Society of Minnesota Executive Director Ellie Wilson said. “To participate in a way that is just set up perfectly for their success.”
The students, hailing from Lionsgate Academy and the Academy of Whole Learning, charter schools specialised for students on the autism spectrum, participated in a number of events sponsored by the Wild, Associated Bank, and the Autism Society designed to give them a range of educational experiences.
“It’s pretty cool,” said Nolan Johnston, a 14-year-old Lionsgate students from Roseville.
Johnston and the others watched a Wild practice from private suites. They also wrote encouragement letters to Wild players and learned about financial responsibility through activities like check writing and deciding needs and wants in front of a table covered with clothing, toys, and fake pizza.
“It just gives them different opportunities to try something different,” Lionsgate special education teacher Sarah Hauer said. “It gets them out of the technology, out of the computer and the internet. It gets them interacting and building those social skills.”
Students from both schools were mixed into groups, allowing for new friendships to be made and social interaction to be practiced.
They took pictures together at the Wild Hockey Shots experience. As they stood on the mock-ice floor mat in front of a poster of stadium seats, a Wild player joined them via the interactive virtual reality program.
