October was ADHD awareness month, though it is a salient example of a neurotype that many people are “aware,” but few actually seem to understand. Discussions of ADHD from those who are aware of ADHD but lack nuanced understanding tend to be riddled with buzzwords like “big pharma” and lamentations of “overdiagnosis.” Those who […]
Halloween is fast upon us. For those who participate, it brings with it unique situations in which to put knowledge of the five foundations into practice. Of course, it should go without saying that the potential opportunities from any of these activities never outweigh the harm of encouraging children to engage beyond their boundaries. Halloween […]
“Finally, children are exposed to media that so often takes advantage of the “weird” character for a laugh. How many of the gross neighbors, awkward first dates, and annoying classmates in popular media look like neurodivergent kids and their adult counterparts? How many of their abuses occur with laugh tracks in the background?”
The world is set up in a way that seems to presume linear https://thelogopalace.co/https://www.divergentminds.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Untitled-design-1.pngs/divergent/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Untitled-design.pngelopment. Such presumptions are evident in milestones, curricula, and much more. It makes sense. Straight progressions, in all their simplicity and predictability, allow us to plan for the future with relative ease. While most people defy linearity at some point in some […]
School can be a stressful experience for many children, neurodivergent and not. Parents and other adults who have been through school themselves at some point may find themselves tempted to respond to anxieties with platitudes meant to reassure the child that things will be ok. Often, however, these reassurances take on more of a gaslighting […]
When ABA was https://thelogopalace.co/https://www.divergentminds.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Untitled-design-1.pngs/divergent/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Untitled-design.pngeloped, one of its main goals was to make autistic people appear as indistinguishable from non-autistic people as possible through coerced behavioral changes. In many cases today, ABA therapists and families retain that goal. The “Father of ABA,” Ivar Lovaas, has been quoted saying, “you have to put out the fire first […]
Thirty years ago, the students of Gallaudet University demanded that its newly-selected president resign. She had been the only hearing person among three candidates for the position of president at the nation’s only university designed for Deaf students. The students wondered how a university that claimed to https://thelogopalace.co/https://www.divergentminds.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Untitled-design-1.pngs/divergent/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Untitled-design.pngelop Deaf people into leaders could be so […]
When parents learn that their children are neurodivergent, they are often advised to keep their children away from neurodivergent peers as much as possible. That is horrible advice. Keeping away from neurodivergent peers is only good advice if your goals include reducing a child’s self-esteem and self-understanding. (Although, in that case, “get some less abusive […]
Neurodiversity is a fact. People of all kinds of neurotypes inhabit this world. Like all kinds of diversity, neurodiversity means more perspectives, a wider array of strengths, and increased opportunities for mutualistic interdependence. Yet, many interventions and ideologies still blatantly disrespect neurodiversity. Treating neurodiversity as anything less than a fact does not change the fact […]
Don’t be fooled by watered-down versions of disability history: the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act was radical. Amidst a world that is designed primarily to suit the convenience of able-bodied, neurotypical people, a law that focused on making it accessible to people with disabilities did not float naturally into the public sphere. Its […]
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