If you’re a homeschooling mom with a child who is diagnosed with a disability or you’re feeling concerned/unsure about some behaviors that are being exhibited by your child that might not be considered “normal” in today’s culture, this episode is for you…
Resources mentioned in this episode:
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Connect with Ally:
Ally’s Suggested Resources To Help You Learn More About This Topic:
https://tiltparenting.com/podcast/
https://www.understood.org
https://www.toolstogrowot.com
https://childdevelopment.com.au
This episode discusses:
Ally’s story as a teacher & a homeschool mom of 3.
What to do if you sense your child might be exhibiting symptoms of a disability.
Tangible tips to help equip you in homeschooling students with special needs.
The education system and it’s role in assisting student’s with a disability.
Why IEP’s were designed.
Goal setting.
Discipline and control when homeschooling a special need’s child.
Don’t have time to listen? Here’s the Episode All Typed Out:
Lets face it…Being a homeschooling mom who also works from home can be pure chaos! As you’ve probably already noticed, despite the occasional laugh track, life isn’t a sitcom and everyday struggles are rarely resolved in 30 minutes with commercial breaks to keep your sanity in check so the right strategies and mindset are vital for becoming more productive and less overwhelmed with all the things life throws at us. Enter the Simply Freeing Podcast…Episodes for the highly passionate, busy work at home, homeschooling mama ready to break away from cultural norms and raise life long learners. So let kick stress to the curb, throw chaos out the door and order in some peace and simplicity…with a cup of coffee, or 3.
Jackie: Hey Ally! How are you?
Ally: I’m so good! Thank you! Thank you so much for having me on the show!
Jackie: Thank you for joining. Can you briefly share a little bit about your background and what you do?
Ally: Yeah so I am a second generation homeschooler and I went to college to become a teacher because I thought it could bring some magic from homeschooling into the classroom. I didn't last long there because I like to do things my way a little bit and I ended up working in independent study charters here in California so I got the opportunity to start working closer with homeschooling families which eventually, over the course of a decade, led to working with them more privately as well.
Now, I am a homeschooling coach an advocate and I have several courses about things like getting rhythms established in your home and ultimately, I just love supporting homeschooling families in finding and building a home school that really serves them and their unique people in their home.
Jackie: That’s wonderful! We have similar values for sure! Once you have the experience of being a classroom teacher, it makes it easier to appreciate the joy homeschooling brings! er
Ally: Completely agree!
Jackie: I mentioned in episode 5 that I do believe that we are over diagnosing our children in classrooms. In my experience that is because we want to give them more time to take the standardized tests. I don't like that there's this big push to diagnose and give a child a label when in many cases they actually don't need a label.
So what happens when we now have children at home that that might be exhibiting symptoms of some sort of a disability? What would you recommend a parent do? Now, I know you have some children that have some struggles so I wanted you to just briefly talk about that.
Ally: So I have three beautiful wild children that I adore and are as unique as could possibly be as we all know right? Our kids are all so different. My first born has what we call the ABC diagnoses. He's got a bucket of diagnoses that he received only age of two and had some added. Those include ASD, autism spectrum disorder, SPD, sensory processing disorder, ADHD, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, all kinds of wonderful alphabet diagnoses. In the schooling system, that would indicate a lot of things. There would be a lot of adjustments made. His life would be very much run by those alphabet diagnoses but in home-schooling we get to create a world that's very supportive of him so that those diagnoses don't impede his progress and growth in any way shape or form, which absolutely every homeschooling parent can do.
In my experience with a lot of these diagnoses, testing is pushed for kiddos in the system because there is a pace and a cadence that they have to follow. When they are in the system, as much as teachers love and adore their kids and want to give everything they can to their group of 30 to 40 children, we have to keep a pace going and so when a kiddo is just not quite ready developmentally, which is absolutely normal and OK or needs to approach something in a different way, teachers are often left with no other option than to have them get a diagnosis of some sort so that they can get in the system in a way that works. It's almost like these diagnoses are coming, like you were kind of alluding to, they’re kind of coming as a way to gain the system.
Jackie: As homeschoolers, we don't really have that support system and a lot of times we're unsure… Does my child have a private problem? Is there something wrong or is this just normal? We don't know what normal is as moms with kids who are just generally energetic and have difficulty focusing sometimes so I’d like to hear a little bit more about what we can do in that case.
Ally: Before I go into the how to’s, of which there are many and I'm excited to share with you, I do just want to have the caveat of… if your momma gut, your momma intuition is telling you that there is something very serious going on, you always need to reach out to your pediatrician. Every state has a different program for kids who are having developmental or neurological struggles so if you have this pull on your heart that there's something very serious going on or if the things that are happening are putting your child's life at risk or in in a category where they're not living a full life… if they're having emotional issues or they are not able to exist in the world comfortably, then you need to seek support. I just want to encourage you to do that if that's your situation.
However, in most cases when I hear these kinds of questions and comments, we go a different route. The first thing is you must not compare your kid to other people. It's really tempting because you feel like you may not know what “normal” is. To look at what all the other kids in your coop or your neighborhood or kids in the in the public school are doing and compare your child to their progress and say, Oh no! We are behind! My kiddo has a problem with reading because we're not reading yet. My neighbor is 6 and they're reading and that's it he's got dyslexia there's something wrong here. In reality, when people reach adulthood there aren't books out there that say, OK this is the book on what 35 year olds should be doing, right? There is no book that says… you're 35! You need to sleep this much. You need to eat these foods. You need to be doing this. You need to be reading that. We don't do that to adults but we do it to kids. A lot of the reason I think we do it to kids is because we are trying to fit into the system where they're trying to make diverse humans fall into one single space but it's not necessary. It is completely developmentally appropriate for some kids to start reading at four and a half and five and some kids not to be ready until seven. That is OK. That is not a sign that something is wrong. It's a sign that your child's brain is developing a different portion of their brain at that moment. Kids cannot take on these more abstract concepts of applying sounds to letters until their brain is physically ready for it so no matter how many flash cards, no matter how many minutes a day you spend on that phonics program that somebody told you always works…if your child is not ready, they're not ready and it's not an indication that something is wrong so you have to stop the comparison game first and look at your unique, beautiful, individual child who is given to you on purpose, who is here for a wonderful reason and purpose and look at them and say OK where is my child at and are they growing each day? What are they good at? Where are they struggling? And start looking at your child as the unique human that they are. That's the first thing because we do compare so much and that comparison causes parents to worry that there is something else going on.
The other thing is to educate yourself. I always tell this story…When I was in first grade, I was going to a private school and my parents got called into a conference and I was like a teacher’s pet, like most teachers were right? Always straight A student, honor roll, gifted program, all of that stuff…My parents get called in for a meeting with my first grade teacher and everybody is there. The whole staff is there freaking out because I had done an entire spelling test backwards. Like a mirror image of the spelling test backwards. I didn't remember doing it. I had no idea I had done it and everybody panicked. Now, I had never done anything like that before. I was progressing well in all of my other studies but for whatever reason they use that as a trigger something's wrong right? And I have seen so many parents do this! Their kids will be six or seven and they start writing something backwards and they're like, oh my gosh! We have to do something! When in actuality, I was just bored. I was bored in that school. I was bored at that moment. It's totally normal for kids to write backwards every once in a while so before you freak out, educate yourself if you are really concerned about ADHD, ASD, SPD, any of those diagnoses. Get some information. Get quality information. Grab a book. Start reading about them and get really clear about what those signs are. A lot of people have images in their head of what autism looks like and of what ADHD looks like and most of the time, with love and honor and respect in my heart, I tell you you're wrong. The image that you have is not accurate. Stop comparing and get quality information. Those are the first 2 places to go if you really are feeling worried. Then, we really just need to focus on our kid’s strengths and who they are and make sure they are growing every day.
Jackie: I just wanted to stay here and talk about comparison…that is something that we even do as moms with each other and with you know with home schooling and this person is doing school this many hours and they're going to this coop and their kids look like they're having such a great time and you know where our social media is influencing how we view our home school when it's really just a glimpse of life…seconds of life. An Instagram story can bring a mom down and feel like they're not doing enough and there's just so much comparison in general so when it comes to something like this which is a lot more serious when you think your child might be having a problem and you're not actually doing research on it and you're just worrying and you're stuck in that worried place. I know a lot of people that don't like to google things because they know that it's going to cause them to have anxiety over it and so I think as a teacher professional development is important and I guess as an amateur 20 year olds I never really like understood why I had to keep as you know having the classroom doing all the things and then I had to go take more classes on top of that in New York State we were we were required to do a certain number of professional development hours to learn more and but it really is important for us as moms homeschooling moms to have that to learn more about what we're doing and I think it helps us to just get to a place of better confidence too learning from the right sources about the things that we're not sure about.
Ally: Absolutely. I'd be happy to send you a list of resources for families to go to for this information if that's helpful to your audience. There are some really great and digestible resources out there to give parents a good idea of what symptoms you do want to be paying attention to but even if your child does have ADHD, ADD or dyslexia, there is a lot that parents can do in their homeschool just with their pacing and how they present lessons to support their kiddo because a lot of I don't know if you remember this from IEPs but a lot of what we put in IEPS for students…An IEP is like a special contract of what the teachers and what the school will do to support a child who has a diagnosis…
Jackie: IEP (individualized education plan)
Ally: Yes… a lot of what they put in there is really related to the classroom and the function of being in school, like due dates, time restrictions, things like that… that really have no relevance at home and so a lot of the things that that teachers do are not industry secrets. There is so much that families can do to help their kiddos so if focus is a problem…(and focus being a problem is kind of a relative thing because you need to look at your child's age and their energy level.) I highly recommend that before you ever do table work, you move their bodies. If you have a kiddo who really struggles with focus, move to the point of sweating before you sit down to the table. Your Maslow hierarchy of needs must be taken care of before you can work on cognitive things. If you have a weather situation, things like go noodle, cosmic kids yoga… There are so many ways to help them move their bodies before school.
You can move your body during school too! We don't have to sit in a chair. There is no rule… no law in the world that says you learn better sitting in a chair. That's one of those deschooling things we have so if you're spending a lot of your energy at the table correcting your child's posture or bringing them back to the table bringing them back to sitting down and that's where you're concerned about, my challenge to you would be to say…What is the benefit of forcing them to sit in a chair? A lot of workplaces are moving to standing desks and laptops so people can move about the building. There is nothing about sitting in a chair that helps your child learn. Now, some children learn better sitting in a chair. Those children choose to sit in a chair but if your child is moving about the room, pick up that math book, pick up your read aloud and follow them. Go sit on the couch and let them roll on a yoga ball in the middle of the floor. There is no problem with that as long as they can tell you and you know tell you what the answer is to the question and they are able to show you that they've listened and they've heard. Who cares if they're spinning around dancing. A lot of the times that's more of an issue for a parent right? But parents are feeling stressed about it or it makes them feel distracted and we're so ready to put a diagnosis on a child because we're uncomfortable with that movement. We really need to take some time as parents ourselves and say OK but what is going to support my child's growth best? Sometimes that means we need to grow as parents.
Jackie: I think a lot of that too would be like the discipline aspect like we have this this image of our classroom and you know even in movies and shows the kids are sitting and even if you've never been a teacher yourself we just have this picture of what school looks like and then it becomes almost like a battle like well my child is not respecting me there you know and it becomes a disciplinary issue you can still kind of get out of that if you talk with them and let them know OK we're going to be doing things a little bit differently you know 'cause I feel like a lot of times parents are they’re frustrated with their children there telling them they have to do XYZ they have to sit and do this math page and then they realize this isn't working but then it's like but I'm the one in charge why are they over there? Why are they over on the other side of the room? I'm in charge. You can talk to your kids and explain that it's OK we're going to do things a little bit differently now and then you take away the pressure of you not being the person in charge and I think that that's a lot of time becomes the struggle with parents they don't they don't want to look like they're not in charge they don't want to release that.
Ally: I'll bet those parents are listening to me talk about a child bouncing around the room and think my house has no discipline whatsoever. That's kind of the image we have but here's the thing that I realized… I'll tell another story. My son, it was time for a math test at the end of his unit in our homeschooling curriculum and it was a beautiful day outside so we were sitting outside doing our school on a picnic blanket. (I highly recommend if anybody's having bad mood or anything like that, head outside if you can first. It helps so much.) But he was riding his bike and it was time for the tests and I was like, “OK time for the test. Come sit down.” And he said, “Can I just answer the questions from here and have you write them for me?” I write for him probably 50/50 because his fine motor development is a little slower and I know he's practicing that but I never want that to stop him from growing in other academic subjects so unless we're focused on handwriting in that moment, I'm happy to write for him because my my purpose is for him to grow academically in that subject area and so my first instinct was like, you can't ride a bike while we're doing a test. That is not how tests work. Tests need to be sitting in quiet and painful right? And I immediately, in my head was like well wait a minute. No. That's not true. My purpose in this test right now is to make sure that he has fully grasped all the concepts we've covered in the last 10 weeks so why can't he do that while he's riding his bike? So I said to him, “Sure. We can do that as long as you are able to answer the questions.” You know and it's the same with anything... if we have fidgets, those little toys which can help with focus, if he's using his wobble seat, if we're using the yoga ball…as long as those are all being used as tools to move us closer to the goal that we have set, that's the boundary. Once it becomes a toy and he's not meeting the goal that we are currently focusing on, then it gets stopped. We still have discipline. We still have rules and I will say he was riding his bike and he got 100% on the first thirty math problems and then the last one he answered something that I knew was like way off like he knew the answer to this and it was something way off and I was like, “OK. You need to stop, get off your bike and stand there for a moment. I'm going to ask you this question one more time.” He said, “oh sorry. I was trying to hop this thing.” He wasn't paying attention so we did have to stop and do that and I was able to point that out to him. Once you've shifted your focus, like if it's a mindless activity of riding your bike that's helping you focus, great! When you've shifted your focus, it's not serving you anymore. He's learning how to use all of these things as tools. We have very clear boundaries that this is what we're focused on right now and you can use any of these tools… whatever is going to help support you in that goal but once you are using them as a toy and you're not working towards that goal then we have to stop.
You can still have boundaries and still have discipline but you have to think about what the actual goal is because it's so easy for us as parents do exactly what you said and shift the goal to control right? If I control this situation enough… If I control their body, control what they say, control how they hold their pencill if I control enough then the other stuff will come but that's not how it works. We have to look at it and say OK what is the goal in this moment right now? Is my goal for my child to learn how to sit in a chair or is my goal for them to learn how to read this paragraph? What is going to help you get to that goal? Being really, really clear about what it is you're working on in that moment helps you not to go down that control path time which does not move you as a parent or your child closer to your goal. You can control your kids all day long but it doesn't mean they're going to learn.
Jackie: Yes! This is so so good. So much helpful information and definitely send me a list of the resources that you have that would be so so helpful.
Ally: I would be happy to do that.
Jackie: Thank you so much! Is there anything else? I'm trying to make sure we covered everything. Is there anything else that you want to share.
Ally: There are a lot of small things that you can be doing as far as like types of paper you're using and you know putting stickers on pieces of paper so that they know direction. There are so many things you can do. Having checklists, visual checklist so please just do the research and if you haven’t figured out or you're unsure your kiddo is struggling in the area of something like executive functioning, head to Pinterest. You'd be shocked to see how many teachers are going to Pinterest. Type in how can I help my kiddo with executive functioning issues and there's all kinds of really easy, simple, cheap, ways to support these kids. I know the Google trap can be crazy but once you've identified something, please head there an look for those really simple resources. There are so many cool things you can do.
Jackie: That's great! Thank you! Where can we find you?
Ally: https://www.allyadairchung.com/, on Instagram @conscious_family_project. I also have a podcast by the same name, Conscious Family Project and I’m on Clubhouse as Ally Adair-Chung as well. I would love to connect with anybody who has more questions in this area.
Jackie: Great! Thank you very much! It was so so good to have this conversation. I learned a lot and I I know that this is such a valuable topic for so many moms that are unsure. I hope that this was helpful for them too.
Ally: Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate you and all of the encouragement and support you're offering these wonder wonderful, wonderful families so thank you!
This has been an episode of the Simply Freeing Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it and tag @whole9family on Instagram so we can thank you!