ANOKA, Minn. — Story time with Sloan Peterson is like story time with any other second grader. It sometimes involves fire-breathing, rainbow-spewing dragons.
Tuesday Sloan read from book two of Dragon Masters, a 21-book series that Sloan claimed as one of her favorites.
Sloan can read in both print and braille. She started learning braille when she was 3-years-old.
"At that point, I didn't even know that not everyone did it," Sloan explained, referring to learning how to read in braille. "I'm pretty sure I just thought it was normal."
"Sloan has a brain tumor on her optic nerve. It has destroyed a fair amount of her vision," Sloan's mother Danika said. "She is completely blind in her right eye. Her left eye tests somewhere between 20/400 and 20/800."
That means that what others can see at around 400 feet, Sloan would need to be at 20 feet to see.
However, Sloan was never one to complain.
She's actually developed a passion for braille so much that she is one of nine students selected as a finalist for the Braille Challenge in her age category.
The international competition tests blind or visually impaired kids in reading comprehension, spelling and proofreading.
Sloan said she was both excited and nervous to be a representative of not just her school, but also Minnesota, as she is the only finalist from the state.
"I don't know... I'm the only kid from Minnesota for one, so that's just...confusing," Sloan said, squirming in her chair. "There should be more kids!"
That's something Danika has expressed surprise in as well.
"I guess with the school for the blind here in Faribault, I thought we had a likelihood of having more students," she added.
Danika said she's thrilled to see Sloan excel at most things she does.
"She is in a normal classroom, she has a brailler and a video magnifier, she participates in normal lessons, she does normal kid stuff," she said. "Her peripheral vision is a little damaged as well, but she can do just about anything if she can get close enough."
Maybe she'd even win this competition. Sloan said she'd be interested in placing third place or higher. However, her eyes are on the real prize.
"I'm not most excited about the test, I'm most excited about the pizza pool party!" Sloan said.
The Braille Challenge final competition takes place in Los Angeles June 24-26.
Best of luck, Sloan!
Watch more Breaking The News:
Watch all of the latest stories from Breaking The News in our YouTube playlist: