What do I recomend for schools?

I am sometimes asked to provide recommendations to schools about how best to support students with neurodevelopmental or learning differences.  With over a decade of practice across the lifespan, one thing I can say for sure is that… every school is different.  Every child is different. I have the greatest respect for the inclusive education staff.  I have learnt most of my best recommendations from those on the front line.

I also understand that, in our well educated and time poor world, excess time spent on paperwork is time detracted from hours of hands-on support. 
To simplify, and save everyone from a costly consult, successful support for students will broadly follow these steps.

1. Understanding the student.  What do I know and like about you? What do you need from me?
2. Understanding the preferences and skill of school and family.  What is possible for us to do? What is outside of scope?  Can we build capacity?
3. Prepare the student for transitions.  What does a smooth transition look like? Can we anticipate needs and have the environment ready?
4. Team and rapport building. Do we feel and behave like a team?  How do we invite each other to show up?
5. Adaptions to curriculum and instruction. What adaptions will best engage the student? Does the student reliably understand what to do?  Do they need 1:1 instruction?
6. Promote prosocial engagement. Are the students, staff, and families encouraged to model care and concern for each other?

The answers you seek are likely to be down the path of pondering the above questions.  Supporting students need not be complicated for everyone involved.  It may not require paperwork (haha, I hear some of you laughing cynically already).  However, it does require preparation, good will, and the willingness to side step mindsets such as 'but we've already done that' (it's like breathing, you can't just take one breath and then be done for life).  There are lots of good educators out there making magic happen every day.

While I am always happy to get out my psychometric testing kits and geek out for 20+ hours figuring out someone’s cognitive and behaviour profile, ultimately, my school based recommendations will also follow the above steps.