Is School Working For You? My Perspective as a Neurodivergent Former Educator
Why does our education system not seem to work for neurodivergent children? Is it working for anyone?
If our learning goals today are centered on creativity and innovation, why are we still following a model based in conformity and standardization?
As a neurodivergent person myself, parent to neurodivergent children, and a former educator I have such compassion for the families and teachers trying to navigate this system. It feels like we’re up against this huge system that can’t support the ways our kids think, and it’s so defeating to think about what do we even do?
So in this episode I really want to get into why the system is set up the way that it is, get real about the implications of following an approach that has different end goals than our own, and talk about some action steps we can take to start shifting the system in our favor. Because what benefits neurodivergent kids benefits all kids.
Conformity and Standardization: The Goals of Our Education System Hiding in Plain Sight
The education system that we know in the U.S. today was built when our country needed people who could run factories, work on assembly lines, manage corporations, and serve in the military.
It needed to produce as many people with these skills as quickly as possible, so the intention of the system was conformity. Standardization. Efficiency.
All were very deliberate end goals, and they served their purpose for the time.
“The problem is that today the system still operates on these same principles. We continue perpetuating this system even though its end goals no longer align with our current time and place in history. As people present in the system today, we need to reflect — is it still working for us?”
The old system actively discourages the end goals that we crave today: the celebration of creativity, unique ideas, and innovation.
It says there's one right way to do things. If you do it this way you're rewarded. If not, you're penalized and made to feel like something is wrong with you. And it’s heavily extrinsically motivated: points, stickers, prizes, pizza parties.
Rarely does it tap into intrinsic motivation: what are people genuinely interested in? How can we excite and elicit curiosity that's meaningful and lasting?
Imagine a School System That Aligned With The Goals of Education
We've been served this default about the right way that school is done. How often do we step back and ask: is that working? What is the goal of school? What are the implications of the way we're doing it now?
Because what I see is a lot of kids who — even if they go through the motions and learn the game of school and succeed in that model — they're unengaged, they don’t particularly enjoy school, and at the end of it all they’re left feeling like, who am I? What do I like? What am I passionate about?
So if the goal of school is to encourage a love of learning, to figure out what we’re passionate about, and to learn what we enjoy… that's not what we're doing in the classroom today.
And I’d say we're actually doing the opposite. We're creating these systems where kids are afraid to take risks. They're afraid to fail because they're penalized if they do.
Imagine if kids had the freedom to explore and dive deeply into what they're interested in, Instead of taking all the subjects just to check all the boxes.
How Does A Child’s Learning Environment Influence Their Performance in School?
“We’re not people with disabilities. We’re people with differences who become disabled by the environments that we find ourselves in.”
Jonathan is one of my favorite thought leaders in the field of neurodiversity, I want to share a quick example that shows why I think this quote from him is so powerful:
A student with dyslexia and dysgraphia is told to write a essay in class. She has creative ideas and complex thoughts to share, but producing them in written form is challenging for her.
So challenging, in fact, that she can’t complete the assignment.
She feels like she must not be smart because she can’t complete it.
She immediately feels disabled, especially when other children in the class are able to express their ideas and thoughts freely and be rewarded for doing so.
Even in that brief story, did you feel how much power the environment had over the way she felt about herself? How much it influenced what she could produce and create?
If she’s only given the option to write that essay in the one standard way, she’s put in such a disabling position. She can’t demonstrate what she’s learned or show off the complexity of her thoughts and her creativity.
Deficit-Based Model
A philosophy in education and even in the medical arena with the premise: how do we identify the problem with the person? How can we fix them and how can we remediate those weaknesses in order to return them to our expectations of “normal.”
This model skips over the strengths, the gifts, the curiosity about the person and can ultimately be a huge disservice to people. We're walking around feeling broken when we're not — we're just wired differently.
Unlike the deficit-based model we’ve accepted as the default that says “how can we fix her?” what if we started looking at “how we can fix her environment?” How can we give all children an equal opportunity to thrive? How can we make them feel proud of what they produce?
What if we shifted to a more strengths-based approach where we offered choices to all kids, and there was this opportunity to select how you want to consume or produce the information?
Instead of “write this essay” it becomes a menu of options: discuss it with a friend, make a graphic retelling, do a PowerPoint presentation.
And it doesn't have to be targeted at one person or at the neurodivergent people either. How about all kids have more flexibility and choice?
How Can I Advocate for My Children Within the School System Today?
What I always say first is: let’s start by getting curious about the kids in front of us, whether we’re the parent or the teacher. What lights them up? How can we infuse those interests into the assignments they find less appealing?
Some of the more current research talks about three things that really help increase a child’s motivation:
Autonomy - the freedom to align the work with their interests and the way they like to do things
Relatedness - making the work something that matters, giving the child a genuine connection to what they’re learning
Competency - feeling successful and feeling good about what they’re doing or creating
It takes a little extra effort, but when we can get curious about what kids are genuinely interested in and give them time to do those things, that’s what sparks this love of learning.
It creates that meaningful connection, they feel that sense of competency, and that just builds the buy in to want to do it more and more and more.
I think it's just so important for us to question the truths we've internalized: is this actually true or is this just messaging I've taken on — why are we even doing it this way?
More Resources Mentioned in the Episode
Shareable Pamphlet for Your Child's Teacher: how they can help create equitable learning environments for all students based on the leading research in the field of neurodiversity
More of my thoughts about that beautiful Jonathan Mooney quote: why language matters so much to me
You Might Also Enjoy…
Still curious about anything we mentioned today? I'd love to hear what's on your mind.
It's really a dream come true to have a platform to discuss these issues that are so near and dear to my heart with you. And I'm just so grateful that you're here with me today and ready to support each other on our journeys.
