29/10/2023
Some of the most anxious young people I have worked with do not look “anxious.”
I have worked with children with PDA who have been described as arrogant, bossy and controlling.
Once when I was doing an observation of a child with a PDA profile, the SENCO pointed out to me that this young person was, “walking around the playground liked he owned it!”
What she was failing to understand was that this child was masking, his strutting around the playground was his way of protecting himself from the demands of socialising and communicating with other children.
Another time during an observation, the young person I was there to see starting loudly humming the Mission Impossible theme tune during an English lesson.
He got louder and louder and was eventually sent out the class. Mission Accomplished – the demands of the English lesson were avoided!
When speaking to the teacher and parents after the observation, I was explaining how anxious this young person was, and his teacher replied, “He can’t be that anxious – he was singing in class earlier!” The boy’s mum immediately replied, “Yes!! He sings when he is anxious!”
Anxiety is sometimes extremely well hidden, and can look like other emotions or feelings, so it is essential to remember this when we support neurodivergent children.
To learn more about how to support young people with a PDA profile, check out my book The Educator's Experience of Pathalogical Demand Avoidance which you can find on Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/4vj6d3sv
You can also check out all of our training courses here: https://p-ast.co.uk/PAST - Positive Assessments Support and Training
Pic Credit: Missing The Mark
