One-Size Doesn't Fit All: Variability in Neurodivergent Brains

Everybody talks about learning styles. It's everywhere. It's in um teacher credentialing systems. Learning styles is not supported by the research. What is supported by the research is multimodal. What you don't wanna do is say, Oh, this kid is artistic, so everything's gonna be visual Every neurodivergent person has a unique mix of strengths, challenges, and needs. But too often, the systems meant to support them take a one-size-fits-all.

So how can we better understand and respond to learner variability, whether we're supporting someone in the classroom, at home, or out in the world? What changes when we stop focusing on deficits? Start seeing potential. Barbara Pape from the Learner Variability Project at Digital Promise is here to talk about what. Truly support the whole child. How this approach can help foster a sense of belonging?

And what families and educators alike can do to create environments where neurodivergent learners thrive. And that's straight ahead on episode 265. I'm Emily Kircher Morris, and this is the Neurodiversity Podcast. Neurodiversity Podcast. One of the coolest things that has come out of doing this podcast Writing my books is the chance to travel.

I come away with something new. Maybe it's a new strategy. And sometimes it's a different perspective on someone's lived experience. And those moments really stick with me. Over time, hearing from so many neurodivergent people and the folks who support them has deepened my understanding of what truly works and just how different our experiences can be.

If you're part of a school, a clinical practice, or a parent group, and you're planning professional development or training for next school year, I would love to chat with you about how I might be able to support your community. I do a lot of in-person sessions Just head over to the contact form at NeurodiversityPodcast.com and reach out. Previously on the Neurodiversity Podcast. There's certainly a lot of stigma around it.

communicate and are social. And just the outdated ideas like that we don't have theory of mind, that we don't have empathy, like those are Come. Completely disproven. Not that no autistic person experiences those things, but like as a whole, it's not a trait of autism. But they're still talked about in basically every book. And I actually saw a really cool paper by Autistic.

that was basically going through the language used in autistic research and how stigmatizing it is. Some holistic researchers are saying, well, we don't want to remove that language because it's no longer, it's, it's scientifically objective if they're not allowed to use that language. They're like, we see it and it's like, yeah,'cause you stigmatize us and you aren't taking our real life experiences into account. That's episode 226. Find it wherever you get your podcasts.

Barbara Pape is Senior Director for Digital Promises Learner Variability Project. She led a three-year national survey on learner variability, ed tech, and She wrote the paper defining learner variability, hosts a monthly webinar series, and co-developed the IEP project, which focuses on strength-based whole-child approaches to writing IEPs.

Barbara's working on a PhD at the University College London, earned a master's in education at Harvard's Ed School in Reading and Literacy, and launched her career as a middle school teacher. Barbara, it's great to talk to you. Thanks for being here. Thank you so much. I'm honored to be here.

So, you have done so much to elevate the conversation around learner variability. If you can walk us through what learner variability means and why it is such a foundational concept for how we think about Educating young people today. Sure, I would I would absolutely love to do that. Uh let me start out by saying that the concept of learner variability really emerged from Todd Rose's book, The End of Average.

uh where he talks about uh there is no average learner. And so when you teach to the middle, you're actually not teaching to anyone. There are several other concepts that came out of the book that we used uh to, and I wrote the paper uh defining learner variability and the way that we use it. One of those uh concepts, by the way, is context.

that uh a learner's variability can change according to context. But in in a a straight definition of learner variability uh is that it's the recognition that each student has a unique set of strengths and challenges. And that's really important when you're talking about the neurodiverse community. It's strengths and challenges. Across a whole child framework, I'll explain that in a little bit, that are interconnected and vary according to context.

Uh the a line from the paper I wrote on uh learner variability, I'm glad to send it to you as a as a resource. that I use the head nod metric when I uh present. And so when people e they a lot of head nods, you're like, oh, okay. So I'll use this again. And that line is when you understand learner variability, you see a design challenge, not a student problem. Once again, that's a direction that we want to go, uh, particularly

with uh students who are neurodiverse. It it certainly applies to everyone. Mm-hmm. The other way, by the way, to visualize, if if you want to do this in a visual way, learner variability, think of that iconic iceberg uh visual, right? So the tip of it is what we typically see of a student. You might see a student who is falling asleep. is distracted, is dancing around, is you know, w that's the behavior that you see.

But when you understand learner variability, the full iceberg, uh, when you understand learner variability through the lens of a whole learner, uh, you see the why behind the behavior. And this is what gives us the knowledge. and strategies to personalize instruction.

curious like what are some of the things that we might notice when we look for learner variability in our students? Like what are some of the traits that maybe we should be considering that um might need some adjustment in the environment or in in how we are instructing them.

Absolutely. I'm gonna explain a little bit about uh uh what we did with this knowledge on learner variability is create a free and open source web app called the Learner Variability Navigator. And it is based on a whole child framework that includes

Content specific, uh, information, cognitive uh skills that's like attention, working, mentor, metacognition, social and emotional learning, and also student background. Are they getting enough sleep? Are they living in adverse conditions? So Think of these columns and how they intersect. And let me give you a real prime example on that. And this is how we can adjust. If you have a student who's struggling with working memory and they come in at first thing in the morning

And you don't know why. Once again the iceberg. You just see that behavior. Um and so when you hover over our factor of working memory, all of these other factors are listed on in these columns. When you hover over the working memory factor, you'll see other factors that connect to that. One is phonological awareness, and that could indicate dyslexia. Mm-hmm. That might be why this student's working memory isn't working.

However, if you've also created a a sense of belonging and you built relationships with your students, you also know this amazing sixth grade student has an equally amazing mom who works the night shift. Sixth grader has to get younger siblings out. And on our LVN, our Learner Variability Navigator, you also see that sleep is connected to working memory. Yeah. The thing I do also want to mention here is that we not only have these factors.

types of learning that researchers say matter for learning to occur. And our learner models, by the way, are from pre-K to twelfth grade in math, literacy, and portrait of a of a learner that that's twenty first century skills. We also have strategies. Teachers call it the goodie bag. So if you click on working memory, we have a a slew of strategies that teachers can use to help in that area. Uh if there's a connection between sleep and working memory.

we would have you would be able to see strategies that connect those two factors of learning. Just as a little side note, a lot of our audience are also parents, maybe not necessarily educators, but advocates for their kids. Yeah. Is this something that if they were like trying to think of accommodations or supports like to share with the school that they could even access and use, or is it really more just for on the educator side?

Well, it was built for educators. However, we have had experiences of teachers using it with parents and it has been highly successful. We're thinking of uh, you know, are there other ways uh to bring in uh family engagement? What about students uh to give them the agency to understand what it is that they need to learn, right? Or what could be having an impact on their learning. Uh so we haven't gotten there yet, but we're we are thinking about it.

And and absolutely, you know, when you um go to see the learner variability navigator and you click on working memory. There's a one page description of what it is. It's like w P D as a one pager. Nice. So even if you're a parent, you know, you you could read it. We try not to use too much jargon. Mm-hmm. You know, the education nomenclature. Uh, but it is there a little bit. So um that's where we're thinking, how can we make that more uh parent friendly?

I love that. You know, and I think you mentioned this already, but how much this learner variability project really is focusing on the whole child and helping educators shift toward a strengths based approach. Can you talk a little bit about the ripple effects that this has for educators as they support their students um and how that framework really works in practice like for those neurodivergent kids.

specifically about how it is able to pull in those strengths which we know is so important for kids.

So here's um let me give you an example and and this is uh based on an experience my son had in fourth grade. He's an adult now doing great, has dyslexia, ADHD. And um his fourth grade teacher did not have access to this, but but but i I always use this as an example. So here was uh my son who um was very uh high in comprehending, right?

and uh but had severe dyslexia. So decoding, you know, reading is that equation, decoding plus comprehension equals reading. So he was very high in comprehension. You know, his challenge was the decoding. But he also really liked to work with peers. Well, how do you do that? So with a learner variability navigator, if you look at some of our uh the strategies there, you would see that.

He would need his books uh to be recorded. So you pick a novel, uh put him on a recorded book, and you do collaborative writing. You do a book club. so that he can come in and participate in a way that he is able to uh participate uh after having read the book in the way that he can read the book, right? Collaborative writing, by the way, uh, is great, uh especially y he also had dysgraphia, right? So if if you you have somebody in there who's very quick at writing and h he was um

His strength was idea generation and whatnot and and talking about it and so someone th everybody could have the conversation and someone who was quicker at writing or typing could get it on the paper. Um and that makes Makes these kids feel like they belong. Mm-hmm. It's a cornerstone of of having learning occur for each kid in the classroom.

You know, I've probably shared this on the podcast before, but one of my favorite quotes from a psychologist is from Alfred Adler and he talked about how all of human life is about striving for perfection and he's not talking about perfection, what he's talking about is growth. Mm-hmm. Every human has this desire and need to feel like they are making progress, like they are growing, like they are moving forward.

And sometimes we forget that and if we focus only on those areas of difficulty or those deficits. it just undermines all of that motivation and agency, like you mentioned, or feeling empowered to be able to do those things. So we have to tie all of those pieces together. I th I think he summed it up and you did as well, uh, perfectly. And how do you how do you go about that? That also goes back to that quote about we wanna look at the design challenge, not the student problem.

Here's the sad thing. So years ago I did a um masters at Harvard in reading and literacy. And I wrote a paper on labeling, right? Mm. Years ago I came up with the idea that labeling it could it has a plus and a minus. It can give you the services you need. It also creates stigma. Mm-hmm. It hasn't changed. Right. And I will share one One idea that my son just recently uh gave to me. I'm I'm working on uh believe it or not, a PhD at UCL, University College London.

uh on how what strategies do classroom teachers need to create a sense of belonging for kids with learning differences and ADHD. I interviewed him as a practice thing to interview.

And here was his and I never thought of this and I I think this is uh really interesting for teachers and parents who are here. I said, Anthony, what what would have helped you, you know, to feel like you belonged? And he said in the beginning of the school year Every student with accommodations, the teacher should have a private conversation with them and ask. How do you want your accommodations to be revealed to your peers? Mm-hmm.

And I never it was uh it it actually made me change uh the focus of my work to be much more student-centered because he said that's where the kids who knew him were fine with this. But uh, you know, when you're uh being assisted to read, uh whether it's through a tech product or through somebody reading to you, you're lazy, this is cheating or whatnot. But to ask the student, because some students don't want to reveal Some do.

Um, but but give the student agency on how they want their accommodations to be presented to the rest of the class. Yeah, I I think that that would be really helpful again, just as far as even building rapport. Exactly.

Talking about just kind of how educators understand all of this and how they implement it into their daily practice, you recently were part of this um national survey, right? Yeah. About how educators are really applying these this learner variability framework. What were some of the most surprising or maybe affirming findings that came out of that strategy?

And also uh kind of on the flip side, like what are what are the things maybe that educators are telling you that they really need in order to better support the learners in their classroom? So we asked the question, what are the barriers to addressing learner variability in the classroom? But I'll be honest with you, you could pull learner variability out and substitute in creating strength based IEPs or anything. And here's what we asked uh the American public.

public school teachers and public school parents. What were the barriers to addressing learner variability? Ninety four percent of um teachers said it was they didn't have enough time. And guess what? Seventy nine percent of parents said the same thing. Um eighty-two percent of uh the general public agreed there was a high consensus. Teachers don't have the time. They also don't have the right professional development.

74% of pa of teachers said this, 57% of parents, and 62% of the general public. They don't have the professional development. Um I I'm gonna add something to that. I was on I moderated a panel with a superintendent of schools and she had a quote that always sticks with me that that sort of she goes, Teachers teach what they're taught. Mm-hmm. If we're not teaching them something, if we're not teaching them the science of reading, if we're not teaching them why learner variability is important.

uh the recognition of strengths as well as challenges, that there's a whole child there you're looking at, not just uh an an academic uh version. The last thing was is uh ninety percent of teachers, seventy six percent of parents, eighty one percent of the general public said teachers don't have the support they need. Mm-hmm. The other thing though, we found this really interesting is we ask teachers How how did teachers decide what instructional strategies to use?

94% of them said experience. 89% said instinct. Um, teacher peers were at 65% and down to 49% was research. We're big on the research aspect of this, right? Mm-hmm. And you know why? When we asked why not research, seventy five percent said a lack of time. Who's gonna read I mean, I'm reading them now. Right. When I taught school, I wasn't gonna read these studies, right?

Uh also the the next one at thirty three percent was paywalls, and that's true. Oh yeah. I mean I have f friends calling me up. Can you give me this paper? I mean, as you know, Amanda and I recently wrote our book and it I've written books before, but it's like I'm not part of a university or higher ed system. Exactly. I try to find it through my local library. They have access to some of those journals, but that's huge.

But I also think it's it's so interesting when you talk about that piece with educators, you don't have the time. Yeah. Like I think the science of reading stuff is kind of filtering down with the systematic instruction of the phonological connection, all of those pieces.

That's starting to filter down into the schools and we're seeing a change there. But when we just talk about other types of variations in learner needs, sure. That's not there yet. Teachers aren't getting that PD. That's not the focus. Um but it is so foundational to the way our kids learn. It isn't just P D though, it's also colleges of education. Oh totally.

They need to have in through their uh not just in service, but through their pre-service training, their their c their college work, they need to understand all of this. I do want one thing on science of reading. So as I said, I got my master's in reading and literacy many, many years ago and yeah that was all in the science of reading. Uh Katherine Snow, Jean Shaw, it was all about phonics and this and that, that every child needs phonics to a certain level. They knew this. Where did it go?

Right. But I mean that's sort of a shame because you lost a lot of your readers that way. Yeah. Totally. And without literacy, that's the um you know, that's the the school to prison pipeline.

Yeah, absolutely. So digital promise really works at this intersection of education and innovation. So I would love your take on how Ed Tech specifically can support or sometimes complicate efforts that we make to address learner variability. So where do you see the greatest promise? But also what should we be cautious about? Right. Well I think, you know, there's i if done correctly, ed tech and AI uh can help give teachers the professional development that they need.

Uh we have a couple of ed tech partners uh where they have taken our API. API is a technical uh it's like a bridge from the uh learner variability navigator to the work that they're doing. And one product Athena, uh, they're using our literacy models in their uh science of reading section, right? And so they do professional development for teachers.

Which is really cool. I just toured the platform and, you know, it's asynchronous. You can do it at home, uh, you know, whenever that the you want to do it, and it is research based. It's wonderful. We have another ed tech product in Columbia, Bogota. Uh they translated it into Spanish, uh the whole L VN and the paper on learner variability, and they are also going to offer professional development. Uh I think that's um You know, when when your ed tech product is evidence based.

not just the tech bros trying to make a profit on on this, right? But actually f and and not all of them are a lot of them are are good and they're really trying to do this. Uh then I think it can work. for P D. For students, it can help teachers personalize instruction. Um, you know, because you have

twenty five, thirty students in a class and if we all have learner variability, how can you really personalize instruction? I mean, so you can use ed tech tools to help elevate in certain areas. There's a a great ed tech product out there, ReadWorks. Um And it provides uh a lot of uh reading activity on there and different articles on different topics. It's it's amazing.

There's also some real hard caveats because it's not good enough just to be faster, which is what AI does. I mean, in a second, boom, you put something in and uh pops the quote unquote answer. The information you are getting has to be accurate and research based. If the tool isn't, you can get something like uh learning styles. Everybody talks about learning styles. It's everywhere. It's in um teacher credentialing systems. Learning styles is not supported by the research.

Um, and it is what is supported by the research is multimodal. Mm-hmm. You know, so it y what you don't want to do is say, Oh, this kid is artistic, so everything's gonna be visual. We won't give him him or her or them, anything that is in writing and whatever. You don't want it to become that simplistic. And so that's a concern that we have, that something like that can can pop up.

Here's a something else I was thinking about is coming into this uh this podcast. So thank you for the opportunity. But do teachers actually know how to use the tool? Uh you know, our t our national survey says I need time, support, and PD, but are they uh uh you know, do they know how to use the tool accurately? There's a lot of data that can come out of this that would be that's great and can help inform practice.

But what if you don't know how to use the data? Uh is anybody providing that information in a college and pre-service or in an in-service uh basis? And I know teachers get overwhelmed. They get so many things thrown at them. To varying levels of

value and effectiveness. And it's hard to kind of prioritize those initiatives. But I just feel like this is such an important piece for so many of our kids because again Yeah, and we talk a lot about neurodivergent learners specifically, but learner variability, that's all kids. It is.

It's not just kids who have a certain label or diagnosis. And so, um, you know, finding ways to do this can be really helpful. And one of the things it also really builds on is that sense of belonging for all the kids. Mm-hmm. And I know that a lot of times um neurodivergent students can lack that feeling of belonging.

I I'd love to hear your thoughts on what it looks like to create belonging that's beyond just that surface level inclusion where kids really feel seen and respected and safe to be themselves. Um, I will tell you this that they'cause this is what I'm working on. So I've a little uh I'm developing a depth of knowledge in this area.

There's a lot written about belonging and has been for a very long time. It's a part of the human condition. We all want to belong, right? To something, society, your your neighborhood, your family, your school. There is not enough

information on belonging specifically for students who are neurodiverse. Mm-hmm. And I think that there are gonna be some special attributes to my my son mentioned one of them, accommodations. Mm-hmm. And the other issue is that In the past we haven't included student voice.

We need to and that's one of the things I'm doing with my research. So what are the strategies? I don't really know. I I would think through my research and my work that using a whole child approach It it's it's also moving from the medical model, I don't know, you to the social model, you know you know what I mean there, so that you control for the environment.

It's the design, not the student, right? So how do you design an environment that allows a kids f w who are neurodiverse to feel that they belong? But I think that we also need to recognize that we need to hear from them. The other thing you don't want to do is lump everybody who's neurodiverse in one category because guess what? They all have learner variability.

Totally. My son who would tell you uh uh you know, th the story of his life, uh my daughter uh uh you know, will not. So you know, that is important to uh consider. with a whole child approach, you also are considering that environment, but creating an inclusive and safe environment. So it's not just internal to the student, it's external as well.

You know, it's very easy to create belonging if you're in a book club, if you're a runner and you're in a track team. It isn't easy to create belonging in a classroom that's filled with diverse people. uh in so many ways that they're diverse, right? And so um I think more uh research needs to go into into that.

Absolutely. I'm hoping to fill some of that gap. Yes, yes. You've been involved in education policy for years and your work is obviously very grounded in the realities of classroom practice as well. How have you seen policy evolve or maybe not when it comes to supporting learner variability and neurodivergent students. What ideas do you have about bridging that gap between what the research and frameworks are telling us and what actually gets implemented at the classroom level?

Well, first of all, uh the original 94142 IEP language has never been fully funded. I mean, I think we need to just you know, hard stop right there. Um and so when you're talking about supporting teachers, well, if the if their funding isn't available at the level And the reason why federal funding is important in this area is because that means that every state in the Union will have access to the United States.

uh to that funding. Uh we also had research that was in this area and uh many other areas. That was also important to have a federal base for that because that means that every state in the country will have access. uh to the research that can be turned into practice. Some of the problems are that a lot of research is theoretical, which is nothing wrong with that, but how do you apply it?

I I do think that is what we do with L VN, by the way, is that we curate the research and put it into strategies classroom teachers can use tomorrow. And we need to see more of that out there. You you are seeing some of that in the in the ed tech world. But I also want to say that I mean it just goes back to a couple of points we've already made. Like the science of reading. Why couldn't it turn into practice back then? But you know, it's hard.

The American Federation of Teachers had the cover of uh one of their magazines years ago that says teaching reading is rocket science. And it is. And then they republished it a couple of years back as well. If you can get if anyone can get a copy of that, it was a great piece. But we don't do that for teachers, right? And we didn't make it uh apply in the classroom. I think a lot of that also is with kids uh with sensory integration. How do you bring that into the classroom? I have to tell you.

I'm here in Pittsburgh, my hometown, and uh with the League of Innovative Schools, uh part of the Digital Promise, and we did school visits yesterday. One of the schools I went to was Avonworth School District. And they had an inclusion program that was absolutely beautiful. And and now this is run at the district level. I'm not quite sure where the funding came for it, but They had life skills classes and one of them was they set up a coffee shop that teachers could go to and each of the

ch uh the students had uh uh something to do. One was the greeter, gave you the the menu and s a couple of students who had the communication tools so that they could point to things would ask you what you wanted. Um, you know, so uh and then they all wrote thank you notes for coming. I mean, they signed their name is what it was. But but to integrate that into a school so every student

sees and respects who these students are as people and to give them skills as they move through. These were young guys, like maybe fourth, fifth grade. Um it was such a A beautiful experience to see because we all are variable. Right now I think that the push needs to be at the state and district level, uh, to provide the professional development that is research based.

So going back to that national survey, so teachers have uh the training that it takes to implement research-based practice in the classroom, particularly for kids with neurodiversity. Well Barbara, I am so glad that you were able to join me today, but this does bring me to my last question of our conversation. If you were talking to a teacher or parent of a neurodivergent learner and they were trying to figure out

where exactly their child fit in the educational setting and how to support them, what would you suggest as a starting point? What what is the best piece of advice that you would really want to share with them? I think the foundational piece is does the entire school create a sense of belonging the way Avonworth School District did, where all everyone is invited, everyone has something that they can contribute.

Um, that belonging piece is so foundational to creating an environment that is inclusive. You know, I was a parent of these kids and and I I Felt pretty lucky we were in Montgomery County at the time and Somerset Elementary did a wonderful job. Um, and as he went through s uh school. But uh but I think that's something for parents to to look for and for teachers, I'll be honest. Teachers.

They can create that belonging in the classroom, but it really has to be the leadership of the principal or the district to ensure that that happens. across the school, so it's everywhere. That's the piece of advice I'd look for. Are do do all children feel that they belong, can contribute, can grow and learn?

It's a perfect place to leave it. Barbara Pape, thank you so much for talking to me today. Thank you, Emily, and I so appreciate all the work you're doing and your latest book on neurodiversity. We often think of belonging as something extra, something nice. Plans are in place. But we need to remember that belonging isn't a bonus. It's not an add-on. It's the foundation that everything else is built on. When a student feels like a little bit of a little bit of a

Engage, to take risks, and to trust the people around them. And that applies outside the classroom too. In friend groups, in therapy settings, anywhere a neurodivergent person is trying to grow and thrive, belonging matters. Creating that sense of belonging doesn't require a perfect program or a fancy curriculum. It's in the small, intentional choices we make.

How we honor their perspective, and how we create environments where difference is normalized, not just tolerated, but respected and appreciated. I'm Emily Kircher Morris. I'll see you next time on the Neurodiversity Podcast. Thank you to Barton. If you'd like information about her work, we have lots of links in the show notes. to let you know we're getting ready to open enrollment for our Neurodiversity University Therapist Home.

It's a chance to join other mental health professionals of all different credentials, to share ideas, get some valuable continuing education credits, and help make your practice or clinic more neurodiversity affirming. Look for information in the near future about when that registration window will open. Also, if you haven't done it, please join our Facebook group, the Neurodiversity Podcast Advocacy and Support Group. Link to that and all of our social media spaces in the show notes.

Our host is Emily Kircher Morris. Cory Oric is our office manager and production assistant. I'm the executive producer. Morris. For all of us, thank you for listening, and we'll see you next time. This is a service of the Neurodiversity Alliance.