Everyone talks about learning disabilities & the best intervention but no one is talking about how the first thing you need to address is Education Trauma
So let’s talk about how education trauma relates to back to school, school refusal and success with overcoming learning disabilities whether you homeschool or have your child in school.
Whether your child is dreading school (and maybe you are too), shutting down or there’s school refusal – we need to talk about education trauma.
Kids with learning disabilities don’t just struggle with learning and keeping up, there is a massive detriment to their self-esteem the longer the learning disability goes unaddressed.
Education trauma is the thing that can keep kids stuck because the erosion to their self-esteem means they stop making sincere efforts or any effort at all believing they are beyond help.
Their identity becomes “I’m dumb’.
These kids might look like they are defiant or perfectionistic because they would rather not try than have to face the feeling of failure once again whether that is when they pick up a book and try and read or attempt to write something on paper.
Self-preservation becomes their #1 priority.
So What Do You Do?
A lot of things that seem counterintuitive.
Like pulling back from excessive academics, schoolwork and practice.
This might mean reducing school hours such as part time hours at school, homeschooling (or doing less academic work with homeschooling) and doing more real world learning that reduces education trauma and provides confirmation in their ability to learn.
I can’t tell you how many kids did better when returning to school after moms reduced or paused schoolwork.
The key is to build the lower brain levels and cognitive capacity which does not require doing actual schoolwork or traditional academic practice found in school or tutoring.
If your child is in school – yes IEPs can be an excellent way to temporarily reduce overwhelm and stress.
The key is to build those weak connections so the IEP does not cause atrophy in cognitive skills that are already weak.
One of the first steps I take with kids who are in shut down mode is work on building nervous system resilience so their system doesn’t go into fight-or-flight the minute they see writing or reading.
Because when you are traumatized, you are constantly scanning for threats and often finding confirmation of your fears even if they are invalid.
I do a combination of somatics (bottom up) with neuro-technologies & body-based practices as well as top down strategies like educational therapy that help the child to see confirmation that they are in fact able to learn.
This wires their brain to try.
Educational therapy is not tutoring or drills. The 1:1 relationship between therapist and child isn’t a backdrop to the cognitive work – it is a critical part of the cognitive work.
Educational therapy is cognitive therapies (think physio therapy for the brain) combined with 1:1 sessions with an emotionally connected adult who creates a container of safe learning experiences that both creates manageable cognitive challenges that results in feelings of success.
This fosters a new relationship with learning and their intellectual abilities where the child can lower their guard enough to actually engage – to try the hard thing, tolerate the discomfort of not knowing, and stick with it instead of shutting down or performing.
If they can trust their therapist enough to be seen struggling, they start to trust themselves enough to struggle without falling apart.
Interested in learning more about educational therapy and how it can help your child?
Start by booking a neuro-functional assessment where we go beyond labels and look at the root cause of what’s causing your child to struggle with learning and how to overcome it.