I remember the day very well.  It was late August and  quite chilly outside.  I was coaching a soccer team for  kindergarten and first-graders, and it was the day of our
  first practice.
       It was cold enough to the point where all of the cute   little boys and girls were bundled up in extra sweatshirts,    jackets, gloves and mittens with those cute little straps
  connected to the sleeves of their jacket.
       As was normally the case any time I was coaching a new    team, we took the first few minutes to get to know one    another.  I do this for the kids as much as for myself; it
  often seems that kids don't get along as well with one   another unless they know and remember each other's names.
       On this particular day, I sat the kids down on the   dugout bench---soccer in Austin is played on the outfield   grass at the softball complex.  We went up and down the row
  a few times, each kid saying his or her name and the name of   all the kids to their left.
       After a few frustrating minutes of this, I decided to   put the kids to the ultimate test.  I asked for a volunteer  who thought he or she knew the name of all eleven kids on
  the team and could prove it to all of us right then.
       There was one brave little six-year-old who felt up to   the challenge.  He was to start at the far-left end of the   bench, go up to each kid, say that kid's name and then shake
  his or her right hand.
       Alex started off and was doing very well.  While I   stood behind him, he went down the row - Dylan, Micah, Sara,   Beau, and Danny - until he reached Ben, by far the smallest   kid on the team.  He stammered out Ben's name without much  trouble and extended his right hand, but Ben would not extend his.  I looked at Ben for a second, as did Alex and   the rest of the little ones on the bench, but he just sat   there, his right hand hidden under the cuff of his jacket.
       "Ben, why don't you let Alex shake your hand?" I   questioned. But Ben just sat there looking at Alex and then   at me and then at Alex once again.
       "Ben, what's the matter?" I asked.
       But he still just sat there with a blank, far-away look   in his eyes.
       Finally he stood up looked up at me and said, "But   coach, I don't have a hand," after which he unzipped his   jacket, pulling it away from his right shoulder.
       Sure enough, Ben's arm ran from his right shoulder just   like every other kid on the team, but unlike the rest of his   teammates, his arm stopped at the elbow.  No fingers, no
  hand, no forearm.
       I'll have to admit, I was taken back a bit and couldn't   think of anything to say or how to react, but thank God for   little kids-- and their unwillingness to be tactful.
       "Look at that," said Alex.
 "Hey, what happened to your arm?" another asked.
       "Does it hurt?"
       Before I knew it, a small crowd of ten players and a   bewildered coach encircled a small child who was now taking   off his jacket to show all those around him what they all
  wanted to see.
 
 

  In the next few minutes, a calm, collected 6-year-old   explained to all of those present that he had always been   that way and that there was nothing special about him
  because of it.  What he meant was that he wanted to be   treated like every other kid on the team.
       And he was from that day on.
       He was just Ben, one of the players on the team.  Not
  Ben, the kid with one arm.
 
  by Adrian Wagner
     Submitted by Judy Noble
 from Chicken Soup for the Kid's Soul
  Copyright 1998 by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Patty
  Hansen and Irene Dunlap