How Can We Help Neurodiverse Kids Who Get Deregulated with School Testing and Assessments?

Are Neurodiverse kids can get dysregulated with school testing and assessments? Yes. The cognitive load to mask that can be fatiguing as well. Hmm. Any ideas for prevention or accommodation by the school during tests? You know, that's a great, uh, great, uh, question. Uh, I'm gonna say two or three things that if, if that's an administrator asking the question or a parent asking the question, either one. I, I, I would say it would be helpful to give the child an experience that is not overwhelming the system. So maybe taking a test in an independent room or in a study hall where there's less noise, less distraction, would be one thing to do in doing it intentionally. So I think some schools have already responded with things like that, having a, a quiet space or a place where they can do that. Some schools are, are, are more sensitive and, and preparing for that. But I think there's awareness maybe, uh, giving the child an opportunity to do it before or after school where there's not as much sensory input. Reducing the sensory input is gonna be absolutely important. The other thing is finding the sensory input that can be calming. So sometimes music or, or whatever the child prefers could actually be a soothing strategy. So again, it's, it's being able to identify what sensory input is helpful and what is not helpful. The other thing that I would wanna add there, if you haven't looked up Safe and Sound Protocol, that's what it's called, safe and Sound Protocol. My suggestion is would be to go read about the safe and Sound Protocol and see if it might be something that would help your child or help students in your schools. The safe and sound protocol actually is a fascinating research based how sound can actually help calm some of the nerves. So I could imagine, um, a child taking a test with the sa Safe and Sound Protocol headphones on, so they're actually hearing calming music while they were taking a test. I, I, man, if I could create a study that would be one that I would wanna do. Dr. Uh, Steven Porges, the founder of the, uh, the polyvagal theory. What it actually does is it accesses the vagus nerve and, and the vagus nerve is actually designed to, uh, so to speak, it activates the, the calming nerve. That's what the vagus, right? So it's the breaks of the, our nervous system. And as it calms us down, again, we we're more prone to have sensory safety, sensory calmness. And so I don't feel like I'm in a fight mode or a flee. And so I would strongly encourage something like the Safe and Sound Protocol. It's not complicated to do, but hospitals, people are using, using it. And it could be a very helpful thing.