#181: It's Not the Curriculum, It's the Brain: A Cognitive Psychologist on Why Reading Programs Fail

What do you do when the school waits until the night before the last day of school to tell you your child is failing — and it turns out they broke his own IEP to do it? 

Dr. Amy Moore joins Cheryl this week. She's a cognitive psychologist and former teacher who left the classroom to research why struggling kids kept getting missed. She's also raised three sons — now 27, 25, and 21 — all neurodivergent, all homeschooled differently based on what they actually needed. 

They get into the real story behind pulling her oldest out of school in 6th grade after a last-minute email about 20+ missing assignments his 504 plan should have flagged much earlier. From there, Dr. Amy breaks down the difference between neurodiverse and neurodivergent, why social-emotional learning programs in a classroom of 30 can't replace what happens one-on-one at home, and how to tell if your child is dealing with a content gap or a skill gap when something isn't clicking. 

You'll hear about: 

• The night her son's school broke its own legal accommodation — and what she did the next morning
• Why co-regulation (not curriculum) is the missing piece in most SEL programs
• How dual enrollment programs like Colorado Early Colleges let homeschoolers earn college credit for free
• Why a major meta-analysis found a leading reading approach wasn't moving the needle — and what she says actually is
• Her advice for any parent who's terrified an IEP means they can't homeschool

If you're staring down a diagnosis, an IEP meeting, or a kid who just isn't clicking with the curriculum you picked — this one's for you.

Connect with Dr.Amy:

www.thebrainymoms.com

www.amymoorephd.com

www.instagram.com/thebrainymoms

Ready to homeschool but wondering where to start?

📘 Grab my book, So You Want to Homeschool? Everything You Need to Know Before You Start

🎓 Need a step-by-step plan? Check out Cheryl's mini-course, How to Work and Homeschool 

📚 Still wondering, "What do I actually teach?" My guide walks you through exactly what homeschool families focus on by age and subject.

If this episode encouraged you, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a friend who's considering homeschooling.

Transcript

Choosing Homeschooling The Hard Way

SPEAKER_00 0:02

I didn't plan to homeschool. I started asking hard questions, realized how little control parents actually have, and made the hard decision to leave a government job to homeschool my kids. Now I interview other homeschooling parents to learn how this all works. I'm Cheryl, and this is the Homeschool How to Podcast. Let's learn this together. Today's guest is a cognitive psychologist raising three neurodivergent sons. And honestly, when she talked about spotting attention and memory gaps in her own kids, I saw my own son in it too. Stick around because this one might change how you look at your kids' struggles.

Meet Dr. Amy And Her Story

SPEAKER_00 0:37

And if you need a place to start on what do I actually teach? I have put together a guide for that. The link is in the show's description, or head to the homeschoolhow to.com. Okay, let's check in with Dr. Amy. Welcome. And with me today, I have Dr. Amy. Dr. Amy, how are you? Thank you for being here. I'm doing great, Cheryl. Thanks for having me. So, how many kids do you have?

SPEAKER_02 0:55

Let's start out with that. Yes, I have three kids. They are all grown, 27, 25, and 21, all boys. Aww. And yeah, how did you educate them through those years? So let me just preface it by saying I was a teacher and an educator before I became a psychologist. So initially I felt very strongly about a traditional education for my children, because that's sort of how I was indoctrinated in a teacher education program, right? So we started out doing kind of a combination of private schooling early on and public school. And then as my kids got to middle school, we realized we weren't, their needs weren't being met in the way that they needed to be. And so we started considering alternatives. And so that's when we brought in online schooling and homeschooling and unschooling. And so we did whatever our kids needed at the time. They're they're all a little bit neurodivergent. And so we just wanted to meet their needs individually.

SPEAKER_00 1:57

Why don't you break down that term for us? Because I know it was only fairly recently that I had kind of heard the term and, you know, really started to understand what it meant, but I'm sure you can

What Neurodivergent Really Means

SPEAKER_00 2:07

still enlighten me on it as well.

SPEAKER_02 2:08

Yeah, I mean, it's a little bit controversial. Some people love it, some people hate it. Um, and it gets confused with neurodiverse all of the time. And so neurodiverse just means that all of our brains are different. That word neurodiversity represents the whole spectrum of brains that could ever exist and have ever existed. So they're all just a little bit different, like thumbprints. Brains are sort of like thumbprints. But neurodivergent means that there is some sort of neurodevelopmental diagnosis, learning disability, something formal that changes the way the brain is able to think and learn. And so that's different from the norm. Not that there is a norm, but we use that word for lack of a better one. So that would include things like ADHD, dyslexia, autism spectrum disorder, dyspraxia, anything neurodevelopmental. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:05

Well, that yeah, because usually we don't really coin in dyslexia. And I I've had someone on who had a child with dyslexia, dysgraphia, and dyscalculea, which were all new to me. So it's so interesting to learn about all of these facets, especially if we're homeschooling our kids, because sometimes we just don't even know what to look for. You just think they're sort of being difficult, or hey, this is just coming on a little bit later. And a lot of times that's the case, but sometimes it's not. So it's definitely really good for us to to talk about this. Now, I love too what you said before about we just did what our kids needed at the time. And like that, I don't know. There there are so many parents that are just like, I don't know if this is a good idea, if homeschooling is really for us. And they think like if they make the decision in first grade, they have to stick with it. But like giving us the grace that no, it might change and that's okay, and we'll roll with it, whatever's best for our child. So, what did that look like for you guys as the years went on? Like, would you take one child out, or if was it we're gonna take all three at the same time? And how did they transition?

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Yeah, so well, first of all, I always say when you're making that decision, it's not like donating a kidney, right? It's not permanent. And so you just try what you think will be best for your child and your family at the time, and you have the flexibility to drop back and punt if that didn't work. So just know that that is the state of things.

The 504 Plan Breaking Point

SPEAKER_02 4:28

So our oldest was um in sixth grade, and um, the night before the last day of school, I got an email from one of his teachers saying that he had over 20 missing assignments, and if he didn't turn them in by midnight, he would fail. And this is a child who has ADHD and some other diagnoses. And I think a child without ADHD could probably not get 20 plus missing assignments done between 6 p.m. and midnight, nor would I ever make a child try. But certainly a child with ADHD with an in-place IEP and 504 plan could not do that. And so my husband and I walked into the principal's office the next morning, which was the last day of school, and said this is not aligned with our child's 504 plan that we were just hearing about this at the last minute. And they called an emergency meeting, and we walked out of that meeting saying, You can't meet our child's needs, so we're going to. And we disenrolled him, got in the car, looked at each other, and said, Well, now what? And so that was our first step into okay, how are we going to school this child from home in order to meet his needs?

SPEAKER_00 5:45

And so that's how I just have to interrupt you for a second. Did they that was the first time you ever heard he owed 20 assignments? I mean, that's well, right.

SPEAKER_02 5:54

And and one of the accommodations on his 504 plan was that we would be told when he had more than two missing assignments.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

And that the consequences were failing. Like it's not just like we made him clean the chalkboard, like we have. We probably don't even have chalkboards anymore. But like we're failing him, but we've never notified you before. And this is sixth grade? Yes. Like we're not talking about an 11th grader that would have all of their stuff together by now, getting ready for college. This is a child. I mean, this is that's just crazy in its own right. I but I digress. Okay, go on. No, it was.

SPEAKER_02 6:30

I mean, I I my mouth was, you know, wide open saying, This is uh nearly unbelievable to me that you could so egregiously not follow a legal document. Yeah.

unknown 6:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:43

And and even if it wasn't a legal document, just the it's just caring for this child. It's a child that they're this far behind, something's going on. We have to reach out to the parent before the last day of school with this consequence. Okay, so did you take all three out at one time? No.

SPEAKER_02 6:59

No, our other two were doing fine at the time in their schools. And so we only took our oldest out. We actually did an online program for him the following year. That was a struggle because I I too have ADHD. So try being an ADHD mom and a mom with ADHD and sharing an office with your ADHD child. So that was a struggle. And, you know, he also had Tourette syndrome, so he made lots of noises, and I have sensory processing issues. So I was overstimulated by all of the noises that he so it was a challenging year. We eventually found him another space in the house and made a little office for him. But then he ended up going back to school for high school, and that was his choice. Our middle child sailed through traditional schooling all the way through. And then our youngest was really struggling in high school emotionally. And we said, your mental health is more important to us than grades. And so come on home. And so he actually graduated from our homeschool at home. And so we did a combination of unschooling. I farmed it out to the community college for lots of his credits, right? I'm okay, go sign up for some classes and then great, you get homeschool credit for that. And it was really fun being able to have the flexibility in his schedule to allow him to do a couple of internships and really work on his emotional health with a therapist and just individualize all of those educational needs all at the same time. So it was really beautiful. And if I had to do it all over again, I would homeschool all of them from day one. But it's a different time and I have a different philosophy about it as a psychologist than I did as a traditional educator when my kids I was teaching second grade when my oldest was in second grade. So I had a very traditional mindset at the time.

SPEAKER_00 8:52

Well, why don't you tell me

Unschooling Flexibility And Mental Health

SPEAKER_00 8:53

like tell us a little bit how that changed your philosophy on it and going from teacher to psychologist? Because I'd like to hear about that journey too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:02

So I was a teacher and then a curriculum coordinator and early childhood program director. And as I worked with teachers and children and families, I kept saying, We are missing something. We are doing what seems like all we can do to help all of these kids, but we are continuing to miss something. And I kept making a note of I should research that someday, types of ideas and concepts and things that kept popping up in my mind. And so I finally said, okay, I'm going back to school. I'm going to get my PhD in cognitive psychology. I'm going to figure this out. I need to know what's happening in the brains of these struggling children. And so that's why I made that transition was really I wanted to be able to dig into the research, but I also wanted to be able to impact change from, you know, a bigger scale or a, I don't know, a higher level than I could do at one school or in one program. So that's how I made that transition. And then, you know, I I think that my husband and I became, you know, disillusioned with cultural indoctrination that we were seeing in the schools and really taking the power away from parents to impart our our beliefs, our religious beliefs, our political beliefs, our just our beliefs about society in general and what we wanted our world to look like. And I don't think that that belongs in the school. That belongs at home. And so we we were really frustrated with what that was starting to look like and now completely does look like.

SPEAKER_00 10:33

Yes. Because that if your sons are in their 20s, this, you know, this was a decade ago. And it's so it's interesting to hear, like, yeah, how long has this been kind of showing up? You know, we send our kids to school as parents. We don't really ask to look at the syllabus and what books will they be asked to read, and you know, what are you discussing in class? You you never thought you had to. You know, now with SEL, that's been a couple of podcast episodes that I've I've had people on to talk about. That's a whole beast in itself and what it's labeled as and looks like on the cover to like what it actually gets into, the social emotional learning about that, which you probably as a psychologist are are very familiar with, I would imagine, right?

SPEAKER_02 11:14

Well, sure. And, you know, I think that the schools are their hearts are in the right place by creating these SEL programs. I certainly know that, you know, the counselors and the school psychologists have great intentions, but the reality is that doesn't happen in the classroom either. By the time a child needs emotion regulation tools in the classroom, it's too late. They already need to have had them. They already needed to be internalized, they already needed to be nurtured, they already needed the co-regulation that comes from having a parent loan you their regulated nervous system. And so it's just it it's failing because it's not a group effort. It's a one-on-one dynamic. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

You can you explain that a little bit more? And maybe uh that sort of has to do with uh I don't know, your philosophy changing on from from being in the classroom to now seeing it from a psychologist standpoint.

SPEAKER_02 12:14

So no, I don't think it's my philosophy changing. I think it's the misunderstanding that I'm seeing. So we kids need to

From Teacher To Cognitive Psychologist

SPEAKER_02 12:22

all right, let me back up. So if we look at a graph that would show the amount of co-regulation, which is an adult's, it's the phenomenon of sharing our regulated nervous system with another person. Emotions are contagious, emotional states are contagious. And so if you look at a graph that shows how much emotion regulation an infant or a toddler has compared to how much an adult has, right, the gap is huge. And so what that means is that we aren't born with the ability to regulate our own emotions. And so that has to be developed initially through co-regulation, through a regulated parent. And I don't use the word calm because it's not about being calm. It's about being regulated and present and open and flexible. And so you can appear calm and be dysregulated, or you know, you can be super energetic and look dysregulated, but you're not, right? You're still flexible cognitively and emotionally. And so that process starts with a loving, trusting, tuned relationship with a parent, typically, or a caregiver. It happens one-on-one. And so a single teacher cannot loan a regulated nervous system to 30 kids at the exact same time. It just doesn't work that way. And so the a single teacher can model what regulation looks like. A teacher can teach some breathing techniques or grounding techniques, and those are important. We need tools in our toolbox. But by the time a child is dysregulated, it's too late to use a tool. When a child is in meltdown, when they're in fight or flight, it's too late to use a tool. The only thing that helps is presence and safety. And so that's when we come in as the adult and offer that regulated nervous system, that co-regulated phenomenon, co-regulation phenomenon. And so the dynamic just doesn't exist in a classroom the way it exists in a parent-child relationship, a little bit in a therapist, you know, client relationship. But it has to be, it has to be grown and nurtured at home.

SPEAKER_00 14:37

It just What about for the kids who don't even have that at home? I mean, and then they're going to school where they're not getting it there either. Is there like any hope for them? I'm like, I'm like kind of talking about myself, but not really talking about myself. Is there hope for us as homeschooling parents trying

Why SEL Falls Short In Classrooms

SPEAKER_00 14:55

to figure this out with our own kids?

SPEAKER_02 14:57

Well, sure, because as adults, we have a fully formed prefrontal cortex for the most part. And so we have stronger executive function skills, right? So we are able to plan and reason and make decisions and weigh choices and execute one of those choices because we've said, okay, here's the best one to do. You know, we have stronger working memory. We can hold those options in mind. So when we have those strong cognitive skills, then we're able to learn the emotion regulation skills. That's just not something that a two-year-old or a four-year-old or a six-year-old has the developmental capacity for yet. Right. So that's the difference. So, yes, you end up taking your cognitive ability and applying it to learning some emotion regulation. It's harder.

unknown 15:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:53

Today I regulated by screaming in a pillow, but I waited for her to like be 45 minutes into her crying. At we're at age three, almost four. And I was like, I'm not gonna leave her because I'm not gonna make her think she's abandoned right now. I will just keep making dinner. Because I didn't want to like coddle her either. Cause I was like, then she's gonna learn every time she has a tantrum for no reason that she gets, you know, which maybe you could tell me that it's probably it's probably what you're supposed to do, so that they know they're loved. But I think I had already maybe hugged her, and I'm like, okay, this is just going on and on and on now. But after about 45 minutes, I was like, mom's, I'm gonna need to go to the bedroom up for a minute, scream at a pillow, come back, and I'm all right. But yeah, it's hard. It's hard when you're learning. And then I'm thinking of a classroom when you have 30 kids that are maybe, you know, on the brink of tantrum that can't play out well for the kids that do get nurtured at home and are just there to actually learn.

SPEAKER_02 16:47

Yeah, and and I like I should back up and say, it isn't that they shouldn't try and teach emotion regulation skills. It isn't that they shouldn't have a s a social emotional learning program in schools. I'm just saying that the research is showing that they aren't effective programs. And it's because you need that one-on-one dynamic. You need that co-regulation with someone that you have attunement with.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

Yeah. In order for a program like that to work. Yeah. From some of the guests I've talked to too, it seems to go into a kind of a an agenda-driven way once you're further into the social emotional learning as far as like gender and how do you feel today, and and we don't have to tell your parents, sort of thing. So that's kind of given it what what was, you know, supposed to be something nurturing for every human. Kind of turned into this negative connotation, which is too bad. So, okay, so your kids are I'm gonna say successful now, right? I mean, you're here to for the parents who are like, Yeah, will my kids miss out on things? You know, we think of the prom and the, you know, I don't know, parade. Your kids were in middle school and higher when they were homeschooling, but you know, the homecoming dance and football games and that sort of stuff. For the son that went that was homeschooled the whole way through, do you think he felt that he missed out on anything or did he have more opportunities?

Co-Regulation And Big Feelings At Home

SPEAKER_02 18:09

So for my youngest who was homeschooled in high school, he was duly enrolled in a program so that he could take classes at the early colleges program. And so that program offered optional social events like prom, like homecoming. And so he did, you know, participate in that. He was an extrovert, and so he was very involved in youth ministry, and he was very involved in rock climbing, and he played in the city's youth symphony. So he was able to have social connections outside of the home because we made sure that he got involved in things that brought him joy, that built resilience, that, you know, were passions for him. He's actually a music performance and psychology double major in college now, you know, because those were things that he leaned into.

SPEAKER_00 19:02

Yeah. And can you just explain a little bit more about the dual enrollment? Because I haven't really asked anyone on the show before.

SPEAKER_02 19:09

Yeah. So there are a lot of schools that offer homeschoolers the opportunity to also be enrolled part-time in their school programs so that they can take some of the extracurriculars or they can participate in something specific, some track. The program that our old, our sorry, our youngest was in was it in Colorado, we have an early colleges program. And so that is that is the name of the schools, Colorado Early Colleges. And so you can go full-time as a high schooler, or you can be a homeschooler and be duly enrolled so that you can take college classes with high school age kids those first couple of years. Um then after that, you can go to the actual universities or community colleges as a homeschooler, duly enrolled in those programs. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 20:00

And then are they a little bit cheaper if you take them when you're in high school?

SPEAKER_02 20:03

So in Colorado, it's free. So if you right. So if you enroll or a nominal fee, right? So if you enroll as a homeschooler part-time in that program, you're offered a certain number of college courses per semester for free. If you are full-time enrolled in an early colleges program, then you can take a full schedule for free. And so their goal is typically for you to get an associate's degree by the time you graduate from high school. But they have several kids who have gotten a full bachelor's degree at high school graduation through that kind of program. It's good amazing.

SPEAKER_00 20:39

Think of the money you'd save. Oh my gosh. Okay, now we were chatting uh earlier about the neurodivergence, and and that is you said all three of your children were neurodivergent, correct? And then that's sort of what you went into. Can you talk to me a little bit about what you would tell parents who want to homeschool, but say, you know,

Social Life And Dual Enrollment Options

SPEAKER_00 20:59

oh, my my child has an IEP. I wouldn't be able to give them what they need, you know, the let's just leave it to the school. They have all the programs, my child will be better off. What would you say to that?

SPEAKER_02 21:10

Yeah, so that is a really common fear, but nobody knows our children as well as we do, and nobody will advocate for our child like we can. And so when you think about that role that we play in a neurodivergent child's schooling, we're already intimately involved in that process. We're already in there advocating for our child in the IEP meetings, in the 504 plan meetings, because we're the ones that know what our child needs. We're the ones that are working with the child's physician or mental health team or whatever the diagnosis is. So we know exactly what our child needs. And it it becomes many times this battle where we're fighting for what our child needs, right, with the school system. So we can kind of exhale. When we think about what would that look like to bring home? That battle is over now, right? We're not battling with somebody to meet our child's needs. It's we get to do it. And we're completely capable. If our child needs speech therapy, there's speech therapists available. If our child needs occupational therapy, there are occupational therapists available. The homeschool OT, she's a phenomenal resource at Sarah Collins. So those services are still accessible to us or to you, right? And so, but everything else is just implementing curriculum in a way that your child responds to. And that may take a whole bunch of trial and error, and that's okay. That's the beauty of schooling from home because you do have that flexibility of trying things out, seeing what works, seeing what doesn't work, collecting evidence of that. You know, but you also're spending so much one-on-one time that you're able to identify gaps more easily than a teacher with 30 kids can identify. And so you're able to go, you know, my child is really struggling with this math lesson. Is there a content gap here? When I brought my child home from traditional school, were they using a spiral curriculum and I'm using a mastery curriculum? Well, that mastery curriculum assumes that prior content was already mastered. When in a spiral curriculum, it's just going to come back again, you know, again and again. And so you might just need to go back a couple of lessons and reteach those skills. That's called a content gap. You're in the best place to be able to identify those when you're working one-on-one with your child. But you're also in the best place to be able to go, okay, wait a minute. Is there a skill gap that my child has? Right? Can my child hold three-step directions in mind? Can they follow three-step directions? If not, is that a working memory issue? Right. Is my child having a really difficult time sustaining focus for more than 10 minutes? There's an attention issue here, right? You're able to see those things at the nuanced level that we don't always see in a classroom. And so you're in the best place to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_00 24:07

I don't know if my son can do any of those things.

IEP Fears And Finding Therapy Support

SPEAKER_00 24:11

I've just like three steps. I asked him like eight times today to clear his plate and he didn't. So how old is he? Yeah. He's eight. He just turned eight. And attention. Whoo, man. Yeah. No, he probably I tell him all the time, I'm like, oh, they'd have you on medication if you were in the classroom. Because I probably would. But yeah, do you what would you suggest to parents that, you know, are in my shoes? Is it a crazy eight-year-old boy? Is it a kid that, you know, might need extra? And what extra things would he need?

SPEAKER_02 24:45

So if your child already has a diagnosis, if they've already gone through comprehensive, you know, neuropsych testing, then you've got a lot of data already. You know, the neuropsychologist will hand you this 40, 50, 60 page report. And typically we turn to the end where it says, here's what you need to do. But there's a lot of great data in the middle of that report that says, hey, here are the deficits that we found during this assessment. Like we noted that your child's working memory is in the 26th percentile. That's a deficit, right? So that needs to be remediated. That needs to be strengthened. And so that's one of the other reasons why being at home is a great way to be able to say, okay, if you were in the classroom, they would just accommodate this. They wouldn't actually work on finding ways to strengthen it. And so, so that's one thing. If you've already got a developmental uh diagnosis of some sort, you've got a bunch of data already. If not, then that's a great place to start, right? Is to say, I'm having some concerns. I think my child is not, has is at a skill level cognitively lower than he should be for his age. And I'm a little concerned about that. And so maybe I should have him evaluate it. Again, that's how you get data. And so whether that's by getting on a waiting list at, you know, a neuropsychologist or clinical psychologist's office or going to Learning Rx and getting cognitive testing to see if that's what's contributing maybe to what you're seeing at home. So you do have options.

SPEAKER_00 26:16

And then when you were saying that there are services available, are those through the school, like through our our tax dollars, or is it something that we pay for separately or with health insurance? Yes. Simple answer, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:29

Yeah. So the school system has some loopholes because I think current law is that they're only required to provide those services for homeschooled kids in their district if they have the capacity. So we know that those extra service providers are stretched thin in the school systems, right? You may have one or two school psychologists for an entire district. You may have one or two speech therapists for an entire district. And so it's probable that the response would be we don't have capacity to offer those services. And I believe that is still the current regulation. So it's a lot simpler. You can go to court, and I know of families who have, but it's a lot simpler if you can afford it to go through insurance, to get speech therapy, to get occupational therapy or physical therapy or mental health therapy, or, you know, pay out of pocket uh for a lot of that sometimes too. And that's that is the downside of not being enrolled in a public school to get those services for free.

SPEAKER_00 27:40

Right. Yeah, absolutely. I know we had looked into it for speech therapy, and when I emailed them, they were like, Oh, well, can you understand them? Then he's probably okay. And I was like, Well, I'd really like them looked at. And they finally had me come in and I don't know, they was just like, Okay, yep, go home. You're good. Watch some YouTube videos on speech.

SPEAKER_02 28:01

They told you to watch some YouTube videos.

SPEAKER_00 28:04

Yeah, you know, yep, keep I I I think maybe I'd said I I I watched a couple YouTube videos on like maybe have them blow through a straw to like push a cotton ball over table to strengthen some sort of muscles. Yeah, keep doing that. Yep. And they did not want to see me or hear from me again. But not every district is going to be like that.

SPEAKER_02 28:24

No, but there is that dichotomy, right? Like it's very obvious, you know, when someone who is not actively enrolled in their school comes in and says, Can I take time away from these service providers who can't even meet all of the needs of the children enrolled in the school? Can I take time away from them? It does create this bristling a little bit. You know, even if legally, if they had the capacity, they had to do it, you know.

SPEAKER_00 28:53

Right.

SPEAKER_02 28:54

What is capacity? How is that defined?

SPEAKER_00 28:57

And uh yeah, so there are a few different what about for dyslexia?

Content Gaps Vs Skill Gaps

SPEAKER_00 29:01

I mean, how would a parent even begin to think there might be something wrong with with their reading development?

SPEAKER_02 29:09

Yeah, so it's interesting. Dyslexia is not actually a formal diagnostic term anymore. They have changed that. Um so in the in the psychiatric psychology world, we use the DSM manual for diagnostic coding. And that is called specific, I'm sorry, specific learning disorder in reading. That is what dyslexia used to be. If you're diagnosed through a school system, it's called specific learning disability in reading. And then they'll do the same thing with math, right? Instead of, you know, dyscalculea, it's specific learning disorder in math or specific learning disability in math. And so the interesting thing is there is not one single way to diagnose those. So different clinicians choose their own types of testing. And so there's not a just a single dyslexia test that is the gold standard across the board. Really?

SPEAKER_00 30:03

It's not like when you see the words sort of like backwards from normal, like that's not really it.

SPEAKER_02 30:10

So that is just one very small part of what dyslexia can look like. Wow. And so it, I mean, it just simply means disordered reading. And so where is that coming from? Right. So we actually we want really comprehensive testing to see where that could be stemming from because you could be disordered in reading because you have phonological awareness skills, right? You just didn't have a structured program in early childhood that gave you those early phonological awareness skills and those phonemic awareness abilities. You can't manipulate sounds and letters in our language effectively. And so that shows up then as an inability to read fluently because you just are missing those basic skills that you didn't get, that the instruction wasn't effective. But at the same time, we need strong working memory to read, we need strong long-term memory to read, we need strong attention skills in order to read. And so that's in my research, that's the missing piece that strong cognitive skills underlie that ability to read. And so we can teach all of the reading skills. We can teach vocabulary, we can teach phonics, but if we have a weakness in a cognitive skill, then we have to remediate that too, or it doesn't move the needle. Orton Gillingham reading programs are widespread, right? Those are the programs that most reading interventionists use. And so Orton Gillingham itself is not a curriculum, it's a approach. And so structured literacy programs typically align with the Orton Gillingham approach, and that's what reading interventionists typically use. And so they did this really big meta-analysis a few years ago where they looked at all of the research that had been done on Orton Gillingham programs. And what they found is that those programs, an intervention based on those programs, were not changing basic reading skills significantly. Like there were no statistically significant changes and basic reading skills.

SPEAKER_00 32:21

Using a non-Orton Gillingham approach.

SPEAKER_02 32:23

Well, they didn't compare it to anything. They just took a meta-analysis where they looked at all of the research that had already been done and they looked at the effect sizes and they said, Whoa, what is happening here? Because it follows the science of reading. And so if it follows the science of reading, which says only structured literacy programs will move the needle on reading skills, why is it not moving the needle on reading skills? And so that's why, like, we took a look at the research and said it has to be because these kids have weak cognitive skills that underlie the ability to read. So there's nothing wrong with the Orton Gillingham programs. There's something wrong with the brains of the kids going through the Orton Gillingham programs, right? So if they've got weak attention, if they've got weak working and long-term memory, if they've got weak processing speed, then we can't effectively move the needle on the reading issues unless we address the cognitive issues too. And so it's just super fascinating to even have the conversation about.

SPEAKER_00 33:21

Do you see that it's getting worse now, like cognitively with children than it had maybe 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago?

SPEAKER_02 33:29

So, you know, that's always an interesting question. And I get that same question asked about, you know, are there more ADHD diagnoses now than there were before? And things like that. I just think our awareness and the availability of assessment has grown in the last few decades. Like we understand like how cognitive skills influence behavior, how they influence learning, how they influence emotion regulation. And so we understand those connections. And so more people are aware of it and they're saying, okay, maybe my child doesn't need A, B, and C. Maybe this is the issue. And so maybe we need to have that tested too. So I don't think necessarily that we're seeing weaker cognitive skills

Dyslexia Testing And The Science Of Reading

SPEAKER_02 34:12

now than we were. I just think the awareness and the testing is revealing those deficits, maybe that we weren't seeing as much before.

SPEAKER_00 34:20

And you said that using like an Orton Gillingham approach, like I know all about reading uses that approach. That would be something that you would recommend to someone that is teaching reading and their child may, whether it be hyperactive or borderline ADHD, that would be a system that would work better for them.

SPEAKER_02 34:41

So Orton Gillingham programs follow the science of reading. And so the science of reading tells us what do we need to teach in order for our kids to learn to read, and how do we need to teach it in order for our kids to learn to read. So if a program follows the science of reading, which means Orton Gillingham would be along those lines, then that is the best way to teach reading. Yes. What I'm saying is if it's not working, it's not a problem with the curriculum. It's probably a problem with the brain. So alongside using a science of reading-based program, a structured literacy program like an Orton Gillingham program, if it's not working, a lot of times what I see among homeschooling families is they go by a different curriculum. They're like, well, my child's not learning to read. I gotta find a different curriculum. So then they're on their third, their fourth curriculum. My kids still not reading well. They're still not reading fluently. If you keep changing curriculum and your child is still having the same struggle, it is probably not the curriculum.

SPEAKER_00 35:42

It's the brain. And what can they do for that? They can get the testing, but what say they did all that? And yes, you do have an ADHD or some type of neurodivergence. What would the next phase be?

SPEAKER_02 35:56

Yeah. So I always recommend like if you have a neurodevelopmental diagnosis, then you have to address all of those symptoms, right? So whether it's ADHD, whether it's autism, whether it's, you know, a sensory processing disorder, speech and language delay. So address the diagnosis, right? So that's kind of foundational because it doesn't get better all by itself. But those reports are really great to look at because you can dig into, okay, what contributed to that diagnosis cognitively? And then how can I, as a parent at home, work on plussing up some of those skills? And then what formal interventions are available to help plus up some of those skills? That would be the next step. And so at home, I say all families should have a game closet. All families should have a game closet because most games engage cognitive skills. So if you pull out Bopet, let's talk about the cognitive skills that Bopet engages. So you have to remember whether you have to twist, pull, push, bend, whatever, right? So that's memory. You have to focus. So that's attention skills. You have to do it quickly or it throws you out of the game. That's processing speed. You use a little bit of reasoning too, because do you ever play Bopet?

SPEAKER_00 37:14

You have to see, I don't, I must not have good processing skills because that gives me anxiety right now. Just thinking about playing Bopet. Same thing with that card game spit. Have you ever played that? You you like, or maybe it's war. I've heard it called different things. Okay. Or you and the person in front of you have to like rape it down and then you have to quickly smack your hand on the height. That gives me anxiety.

SPEAKER_02 37:36

That build that builds processing speed, that builds visual processing skills. Right. Like, and the thing is we use reasoning skills too because we have to come up with a strategy to be faster than the other person. Yeah. Right. Like, how am I going to get my card out faster? Or how am I going to hold this bop it in a way that makes me only have to move one finger to bop it rather than push it with my whole hand? Those are reasoning skills. Right. So if we have weak cognitive skills, then some of those games are going to be frustrating to play. But I always say that is the best way to engage cognitive skills, right? Just to keep you engaged, board games. And that's a great way to build connection as a family, too. And so you can support like weak processing skills at home, obviously, with alarms and calendars and visuals, especially for kids with ADHD. If it's out of sight, it's out of mind, right? It has to be right in front of us. And so that schedule has to be visible. Those clocks have to be visible. The to-do list. Actually, all of our materials need to be visible, right? Because if they're in a bucket, we don't know that they exist anymore. And

When Reading Programs Still Fail

SPEAKER_02 38:40

so we can do lots of things to support those weaknesses. But the really the only great way and the only research-based way to improve those weak cognitive skills is to train them through cognitive training. And so that's what all of my research is on is cognitive training for weak cognitive skills. That's what we do at Learning RX.

SPEAKER_00 38:59

My life would have been a lot different if I had a BOP it growing up. Here I thought I was just not competitive. I was like, no, I'm just not a competitive person. I'm not gonna play.

SPEAKER_02 39:09

And that could be too, right? There's something to be said for personality. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:14

We we play skip bow a lot. That's it's more my speed. Um, no, I love that though. I there are so many homeschooling families that just do game schooling and they actually educate their children, like primarily through games. So much fun. I haven't gotten there, but we do play games uh a lot and they're great. They're just reading. There's so many, there's games on geography and history and all this stuff now. Math and science. It's it's so cool. We've come a long way from Monopoly.

SPEAKER_02 39:42

But I mean, if you look at Battleship, I mean, that really builds memory and visual processing, right? You have to visualize where those ships are on the board, and you have to remember that. So it's building visual memory, you know, as well. And strategy, right? That's logic and reasoning. So those are all cognitive skills.

SPEAKER_00 40:01

So is there any other advice or anything that we left out today that you wanted to make sure that you talked about or that you think parents should know, especially if they're kind of dealing with this and want to homeschool and are like, I just don't know if I can take this on. I don't want to fail my kid.

SPEAKER_02 40:15

Yeah, I think that there is no such thing as a perfect parent, and there is no such thing as a perfect homeschooling parent. And so we have to be willing to say, I'm gonna try this because I think this is what my child needs right now. But if I get it wrong, I'm gonna do a little bit of repair work if I've messed up, right? And then we're gonna try something else. And I think that when we go into things, not just homeschooling, but any strategy with our child children and families, we go into it with a flexible mindset where we say, I don't know if this is gonna work. We're gonna try. Here's why. And so, you know, you try it for two, three, four weeks and say, okay, this is what's working. This is not working. So let's go back to the drawing board and say, well, what's making this successful over here that we could apply to what isn't successful over here? Right. Or let's brainstorm some ways that we can be more successful in these other things and let's try those for a couple of weeks. They might not work, and that's okay. That's just data, right? When something doesn't work, that's just information. It says, okay, doing and doing it this way isn't the way that landed right for my kid or for our family. All right, let's try something else. But that's a

Building Brain Skills With Games

SPEAKER_02 41:29

really difficult mindset to have because sometimes we just hold our expectations so tightly, right? We have taken on this responsibility of saying, okay, now I'm responsible for educating my child. So I have to get it right because I don't want to fail him, right? When we have to look at it as, my gosh, I just took on this really cool challenge with my kid and I cannot wait to see what it looks like. And so we have to turn those worries into wonder, right? Instead of I worry that I won't get this right, we have to say, I wonder if this will work instead. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 42:00

And you just finished a book that comes out in a couple of months. Do you want to tell us a little bit about that?

SPEAKER_02 42:04

Yeah, absolutely. So it's called Um Hearts on ADHD Parenting, Brain-Based Grace-Filled Strategies for Raising Kids with Big Emotions and Challenging Behaviors. Comes out September 4th. And so if you follow me, then you'll get a notice on, you know, every channel that I have on when it's available. I have lots of really cool free resources on my website that come from the book and from workshops that I've given. So amymorephd.com, all the really cool free stuff, like literally that you just say, I want that handout, and there it is. And so all the information on my research is there on cognitive training, cognitive testing, all the cool stuff.

SPEAKER_00 42:45

Okay, and I will link that in the show's description. So check that out. And I guess lastly, what would be your advice? I I because I just got this comment today from somebody was that I don't think I could homeschool my kid because they would just give me a fight anytime I tried to sit down with them for schoolwork. And is is that maybe a sort of neurodivergence too?

SPEAKER_02 43:03

Yeah, I mean, so obviously that coaching, mentoring relationship that we have with our kids has to be in place in order for that to be successful during the day. Um, and it really depends on the age of your child as well. Um, but sometimes we have to get involved in co-ops or outsource some of those courses, right, to something available online. Like open ed has just this huge database of all of this stuff that you can outsource if it isn't working all day, every day with you. And so maybe you start small, right? Maybe only one hour is one-on-one with you. And the other three hours of the day, you're doing it a little differently. Maybe it's independent, maybe it's sibling driven, maybe it's outsourced or online, maybe it's, like I said, with a co-op. And so start small, right? And then work on building evidence that you actually can do this together. And you have to just keep open lines of communication about, hey, wasn't that fun? Hey, that worked great. Should we try

A Flexible Mindset And Next Steps

SPEAKER_02 44:06

it again? Um, and build up slowly.

SPEAKER_00 44:08

Yeah, great advice. And of course, that matters the age for sure. And what and when they're little, it's not even like you need to do four hours. It's it can be more play-based, more fun. Also, they don't have to be held to the standards that they are held to in the school system. So you do have a little bit more, you know, you can take out this, okay, we're not gonna do the the rest of this reading assignment. Let's take out a game instead. And maybe as you're playing the game, can you read this card? Let's see if we can sound it out together. And, you know, they don't even realize that they're learning at that point. But we're so, I guess, focused or or like you said before, indoctrinated to think that everything has to be, you know, every single page of the curriculum. And if you don't complete the page and don't complete all the assessments, that you're not, they're not getting anything out of it, but uh it's just there for a guide. You can use it.

SPEAKER_02 44:54

It's not the boss of you, is what I always say. The curriculum is not the boss of you. And we have to get out of the mindset that we're trying to recreate a traditional school classroom at our dining room table. Might as well just leave them in school if you're trying to recreate school at your dining room table, right? That's the beautiful thing about educating from home. It doesn't have to look anything like what you have envisioned, what you're used to, what you've seen, right?

SPEAKER_00 45:20

Yeah, absolutely. Dr. Amy, thank you so much for being here today. This has been so helpful. There's so much good information. Um, I'm sure I'll think of questions all night long that I wish I had asked, basically, so I can answer them for myself. But I know where to find you, and everyone else can find you there too. Again, the links are all in the show's description. I want to thank you for joining us today.

SPEAKER_02 45:40

Thanks for having me, Cheryl. And did you have you have a podcast too? Did you want to mention that? My podcast is The Brainy Moms. So we're on all social media at the Brainy Moms and everywhere podcast play.

SPEAKER_00 45:52

Awesome. Thank you, Dr. Amy. Thanks for having me. Thank you for listening to the Homeschool Have To Podcast. If today's episode helped you, please be sure to follow the show and leave a review. It's the best way to support the podcast. And if you're just getting started or need a reset, head to thehomeschoolhave.com and grab my free 30-day homeschool quick start guide. Until next time, keep learning, keep questioning, and thank you for your love of the next generation.