S2 E14: Dyslexia, Screening and Understanding Neurodivergent Brains: Nicole Bateman chats with Matt Hancock

In the final episode of Season 2, host Nicole Bateman is joined by Matt Hancock, founder of the Accessible Learning Foundation. Together they discuss Matt's experience of school before he knew he was dyslexic, his advocacy work, and the importance of understanding neurodivergent brains in the education and criminal justice systems.

Episode Highlights:

Personal Experience and Late Dyslexia Diagnosis:

• Matt shares his personal experience of being dyslexic and how it shaped his life.
• The significant impact of his late diagnosis at 18, after entering Oxford University.
• The emotional and psychological benefits of understanding one's neurodivergent brain.

Teacher Training and Neurodiversity:

• The need for comprehensive teacher training on neurodiversity and how better understanding of neurodiversity can help teachers manage classroom behaviour and improve educational outcome.

The Accessible Learning Foundation:

• Matt’s initiative to promote early identification of neurodiverse conditions in schools and the criminal justice system.
• The foundation’s dual focus on influencing policy and providing direct support to schools and prisons.
• Success stories, including the implementation of neurodiversity leads in every prison in the UK.
• Encouraging listeners to write to their MPs to support neurodiversity screening and teacher training bills.

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Check out our sponsor The Super Sensory Squad who support kids in understanding the eight sensory systems and emotional regulation using their penguin squad at: www.thesupersensorysquad.com and www.instagram.com/thesupersensorysquad

Transcript

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Welcome to Conversations with a SEND Mum with me as your host, Nicole Bateman, and it is the final episode of season two today. I am here joined by Matt, who is the founder of the Accessible Learning Foundation. So, Matt, welcome. It's great to be with you. So, first of all, I want to just ask you, what's your connection to the SEND community? Yeah, well it's great to be on, and it's great to be talking to you. I am dyslexic, and I have campaigned on raising awareness of dyslexia and neurodiverse conditions in Parliament for years and years, and tried to change the law, tried to make sure that People, especially children can see that there are people who represent them, who represent them in government and in parliament. Yeah, excellent. It's so important, isn't it? You know, it's important because one of the features, especially of being dyslexic, that I really feel very strongly is that People are too often made to feel like they are stupid or not good enough in some way and it's wrong. And if, if I can counteract that by speaking out about it, like so many other people who've got a public profile do. then we can show that you can achieve your goals if you go for it. And, and I think these days, having a brain that thinks differently is actually increasingly beneficial, even with all the challenges that we face. Yeah, absolutely. I agree. So I want to take you back to your school days. And I just want to ask you, how did you feel when you were at school? Because am I right to say that you didn't have a diagnosis at that point? No, till I was 18. I just felt that I was rubbish at English, rubbish at all languages, and that it just wasn't for me. So I was lucky that my maths is good enough. And so I was never made to feel stupid. I was just told that you're just, no good at English and at language and, you know, that's, it's not true. Good enough at language, at, at talking, it's just the, the reading and the writing part that I find hard because my brain works differently. Yeah, absolutely. And to some of our listeners here, what would you, what advice would you give to parents who have kids that may be feeling very similar to you did? Back in the school days. Yeah. Well, I think having a school that's supportive is so important and getting that early diagnosis is absolutely vital. there are people in the system still who say, no, no, don't diagnose, don't label kids, but the truth is kids label themselves anyway, or they're labeled by people around them. It's far better to know what the challenge is and then address it. But also, because then, you know, a child can tell their story and explain to themselves as much as anybody else why they find some things more difficult. And so it's about self esteem as much as anything. Trying to get, I, I appreciate getting that diagnostic. The formal diagnostic can be incredibly, incredibly difficult, incredibly expensive, but it is worth it. And, hence, pushing for early screening to try to get fairer access, to the formal diagnostic tests and also to give. Parents, teachers and children themselves more of a sense of what they're good at and where they need more help. Yeah, absolutely. And that's, that's why I reached out to you first of all, because I totally agree with that mission of getting that understanding because if we understand our brains and we help our children understand their brains, they can go for their strengths. We can support them where they find challenges and yeah, so I think it's so important getting that. diagnosis and knowing how your brain works so you can thrive. Yeah. And you know, every child has got something that they're good at. And it's the job of teachers and parents to find that and, encourage it and support the, the child to go after it and feel confidence in it. You know, in my case, I was lucky because it was obvious, right? I was good at maths. And so I knew that there was something that I was good at. It isn't always the case. And especially for a child with a neurodiverse condition can find some things really hard. It's too easy to focus on the thing that's hard as opposed to finding the thing that they're good at and that they love. And so, you know, it's all about building that confidence, which is about finding things that kids are good at. Yeah, absolutely. And so tell us about how you went about getting your diagnosis. Well, I managed to get myself to Oxford University based on doing maths, physics, computing, economics, A levels, right? So really focused on all the numbers. But I applied to do an essay based subject, politics, philosophy and economics. And with hindsight, I honestly cannot figure out why I applied to do that. I mean, I'm, I was obviously very interested in politics and went on to study economics. Firstly, to be an economist and then to be a politician. So I did use my, my degree later in life, but I consciously avoided essay based subjects. And then I went for this degree and got in because I could do the number stuff. And I got to the end of my first term and my tutor took me aside and said, Matt, you're, you're perfectly good when you're talking, but your essays are terrible and. I think you're dyslexic. So the university then got me tested. So, you know, and still this happens a lot today. Dyslexia is missed at school. And then there's lots of 18 year olds who get their tests like I did at university, and then it's a penny drop moment for them then. Yeah, absolutely. Like you said, there's a, so I was a teacher, there's a lot of disparity sometimes between the verbal and the written, and actually. In my opinion, I think that there are other ways also to help kids to examine them, to, have other opportunities so that we can use different ways to help kids communicate. Because some kids can communicate very well verbally, others more written, others in other ways. And I think we should also use people's strengths in that way, too. Yeah, and if you think about it, neurodiversity really is about spiky profiles. People who are not neurotypical don't have a similar capability in all different areas of how the brain works. And That is something that you need to understand as their teacher in order to help support them in the areas where they're weaker than, than other, and they might present very weak in some areas and very, very strong in others. You know, we all know examples of that from across the neurodiverse spectrum, not just dyslexia. And It's about having the data. You know, some people say to me, well, what's good screening if you don't have better access to, to diagnostics? Well, firstly, it's a start, but secondly, you can have a fairer access to diagnostics for people who need it. And third, if you get the teaching right, you may not need the formal diagnostic. You may not need that because you may be able to get the right support in, get the weakness up to maybe to their average and feed the area where they're strong. And understanding those spiky profiles is really, really important. And by the way, almost everybody has a spiky profile in some ways. It's just, these things are spectra and it's just some people are spikier than others. So this should apply to everybody. I feel so strongly that it's so much better if everybody goes through screening and learns about themselves and their teachers can then help better teach them and better support them. Yeah, absolutely. So my son's autistic, he has epilepsy, and so in the last four years, I've learned, I've deep dived into the neuroscience looking at what part of the brain is impacted by his epilepsy and all of those things. And I wish that when I was actually teaching, I knew what I knew now. Right. I could actually cater for all the amazing different brains in my classroom so much better right now. And if we as teachers got that training originally, right at the start. So important. You need it right at the start, but we need it for now for all teachers, because almost no teacher's been properly trained in it. A couple of hours in initial teacher training. And, and, you know, people say to me, oh no, but there's only so many hours that you can have in a teacher training module. It's like, yeah, but how can you possibly teach a teacher how to manage behavior without understanding neurodiversity? You know, for some children will react completely differently to a term discipline than others. Some need, You know, more straight line discipline, if you like. Others need calm and space and a non confrontation in discipline in order to be able to both support them and the rest of the class. So that's just, that's not, that's even before you get onto the pedagogy of the academics. it's unbelievable how little teachers are taught about. neurodiversity and the neuroscience behind it. Definitely. And that's what, so I run the super sensory squad with an occupational therapist and looking at the pyramid of learning, you've got the sensory understanding and sensory regulation is the core before you even get to the emotional regulation. And then it's the higher cognitive things and learning. So if a child is not regulated, sensory wise, emotional wise, they're not going to be able to access learning. So it's literally key. To get an understanding of brains and how it impacts them. And is there a, like a, is there something, work that you're doing to try to get some of that into teacher training? I mean, the way you described it just then is infinitely better than the way I did. And because you've been learning about it and the science shows all of this, we know it as a society. We just somehow have chosen not to pass it on to the people for whom it is, you know, the most important bit of knowledge, which is the teachers. Yeah, absolutely. We have tried. We've got a few doors in our faces, but we will continue to try. And if anyone listening to this podcast has, has ways in, then it's super important. Not me, I'm not listening to the podcast. I'd love to work with you on that. And because I've founded the Accessible Learning Foundation to keep driving this agenda forward as a charity, not only direct intervention in, In schools so that schools that say they want to do this, but say they don't get the budget. Well, we just take that excuse away, but also to keep influencing policy. And I'd love to, to get stuck in, in more detail on how we improve the teacher training program. And you know, there's just been an election. Everybody listening to this should be writing to their new MP putting this at the top of their agenda because I can tell you it really has an impact, especially when you're new. And the more personalized and heartfelt the letter or the email, the better. So if you're listening and care about this subject, I'd really love it if you write to your brand new MP and say, I would really like you to take up this. This is why it matters. This is why it matters to me. And the best thing would be to say, Please can you pick up Matt Hancock's Dyslexia Neurodiversity Screening and Teacher Training Bill? It was originally just dyslexia, and then the feedback I got was like, No, can we have this for all neurodiverse conditions? So I widened it. I'm not in Parliament, so I need one of the other MPs to pick this up and run with it. And it's such an important topic. I really, really hope that somebody does. But if you're listening, you can influence and now is the moment to do it. Yeah, that's really good. Yeah, we will get on that and definitely write to your MPs, and we can make a difference. And together, seeing that through different social media and all of these things, a lot of people coming together to send parents, wanting to make that difference and change. And can make that difference. So I wanted to just ask about the Accessible Learning Foundation. So you are the founder of that. And can you tell me a little bit more and tell our listeners? Yeah. So it's a charity with two purposes. The first is to affect policy. And the second is to affect direct change on the ground. And focus is early identification of neurodiverse conditions in schools and in the criminal justice system. The, the need, well, we've been talking about the need for it in schools. The need is even more acute, if anything, in the criminal justice system. Half of prisoners have a reading age under the age of 11 and without understanding. We were talking about behavior just now, right? Without understanding neurodivergence, you cannot understand prisoner behavior. Thankfully, they've just completed the program, putting a neurodiversity lead into every single prison in the country. I'm really proud of the progress that we've made. And I've met several of these leads and they are brilliant people on the ground, training prison officers to explaining how. They can make everybody's lives easier by understanding neurodiversity. And, and then in schools as well. So we're an unashamedly trying to change things, trying to change the way that society thinks about neurodiversity, trying to change the way policymakers think about neurodiversity, and also trying to change things on the ground. Yeah, excellent. It sounds so good and so important. And actually linking to Slightly to the, to schools, but also to the criminal justice area is the Chance UK, a charity, did a survey this year and it said that 97 percent of kids who are excluded from primary school have some kind of special education disability in university. It's 97. 97, yeah. Which is just, and you can see that, like you said, through the criminal justice system and all of that kind of thing. So having those people in place that you've, you've got to put in place is really important. The neurodiversity leads in the prison. Yeah. And there's some other really interesting studies. On the impact of catering for neurodiverse brains in the workplace where there were, for instance, there was one, there's a brilliant story of a workplace where they were proposing to change the office layout and they did a plan and they announced it. And one of the autistic members of staff went to their boss and said, look, if you change the, I'm not going to be able to work here because there's no. Quiet area. There's no area for me to, if I get sensory overload. So they listened to give them their credit. They listened and they changed the plan and they co designed it, with the autistic member of staff and all of the staff thought that the new design was better. Because everybody needs a sensory detox from time to time. And the productivity or the, I say productivity is too formal a term, but you know, the, enthusiasm for the workplace went up because of the work that was done in order to cater for. a member of staff with a neurodivergent condition. So let's take that lesson and apply it in schools in the criminal justice system across society as a whole. Yeah, absolutely. I love that. That's so good. And I totally agree that these changes, this understanding, if we all in society actually understand how our own brains work and how other people's brains work, it's going to benefit everyone. Yeah. I mean, you made a slip a little bit earlier when you said you want parents to understand how their. Brains work. And, you meant how their child's brains work. You corrected yourself, but I didn't think you needed to because, because it benefits everybody to understand how your brain works. And it would certainly benefit most children to understand how their parents brains worked as well. But that's probably a different, that, yeah, we're getting into therapy there. Yeah, but well, it is, it's family co regulation, you know, it's so important. So yeah, it's dynamic. Yeah, definitely. So just to kind of, just to end, what, what are some ways that people can get involved? You've said about obviously writing to your new MP with the Accessible Learning Foundation, with this mission, what else? Yeah, so write to your MP, tell them your experience. Ask them to pick up the neurodiverse conditions screening and teach training bill and to push that agenda in this new parliament and get involved with the Accessible Learning Foundation, which is there in order to drive this agenda. We want to hear from you and we want to support people to try to improve this. You know, society has got a long way to go and it's only if we all use our voice that we'll be able to get there. Absolutely, and a message for fellow dyslexic people or parents of kids with dyslexia. Well, for me, oh, I'd say, I'd say all of that, that I just said. And then I'd also say, the truth is that if you get the support that you need, then you can make it. You know, I got to the top table around the cabinet table in the, in the country. As a dyslexic, you can do it too. Excellent. Thank you so much. So Accessible Learning Foundation, you're on Instagram, Facebook, all of the channels. Yeah. LinkedIn. LinkedIn. So connect over there. Excellent. And thank you so much for sharing your mission And together we can make that difference. So thank you for, thank you for inviting me. And for the, and for your work on this is really, really, really important. Thank you. Thank you so much for tuning in to the final episode of season two. And I will be back with more guests coming in September 2024. So I will see you and I have a lovely summer.