From Salt Lake City to Ogden, Park City, and St. George, NACD has provided thousands of children with customized, science-based educational and developmental programs. Whether a child has been diagnosed with autism, down syndrome, ADHD, learning disabilities, or simply needs help reaching their full potential, NACD offers individualized programs designed to help each child maximize their abilities in both education and life.

How Utah Families Are Finding NACD—From Across the Globe

Despite being headquartered in Utah, many of our local families have discovered NACD through referrals from parents in other countries. Families in the United Kingdom, India, Australia, Brazil, and beyond have firsthand experience with NACD’s impact and frequently recommend us to families in Utah through Facebook groups, special needs communities, and word-of-mouth referrals. Parents from all over the world recognize the effectiveness of NACD’s approach, often before Utahns do.

It’s incredible to think that families on the other side of the world actively refer Utah families to NACD—yet many local parents are unaware that they have access to this life-changing program right here in Utah. NACD’s international headquarters is located in Washington Terrace, a short drive from Salt Lake City, Ogden, and Park City. We also have an additional evaluation site in St. George, providing in-person services to families in Southern Utah. In addition, families throughout the entire state can work with NACD remotely via video conferencing.

For families seeking the best possible educational and developmental resources for their children, NACD is already trusted by families across the globe—and it’s right here in Utah, available to you.

NACD: A Utah-Based Resource for Child Development & Education

For Utah families searching for the right educational and developmental support, NACD is a local resource that provides world-class expertise. Unlike one-size-fits-all therapy programs, NACD takes an individualized approach, designing a custom program for each child based on their unique strengths and challenges.

We work with children who have:

• Autism Spectrum Disorder
• ADHD & Attention Issues
• Learning Disabilities
• Down Syndrome
• Speech & Language Delays
• Processing Disorders
• Brain Injuries
• Accelerated & Gifted Learners
• Homeschooling Families – Watch Our Free Homeschool Seminar

In addition to working with children with developmental and learning challenges, NACD also helps homeschooling families, typical children, and those struggling with behavioral challenges reach their full potential. Whether a child needs help excelling academically, improving focus, addressing behavior, or enhancing processing and cognitive skills, our individualized approach is designed to support their education and overall development.

NACD & Utah Scholarships

We know that finding the right resources for a child’s education and development can be overwhelming, especially when cost is a concern. That’s why NACD is an approved vendor for the Utah Fits All Scholarship, making it easier for families to access our services. We are also an approved vendor for the Children First Education Fund, providing additional financial support options for families.

You can find NACD listed as an approved vendor on the Utah Fits All website here.

For Utah families looking for individualized educational and developmental support, NACD is a world-class resource that has been hidden in plain sight. Families from all over the world trust us—now it’s time for more Utah families to discover what’s available right here at home.

Learn More & Get Started

Want to see if NACD is a good fit for your child? Learn more about our Get Started Process or contact us at info@nacd.org to schedule a free informational call.

Check out real success stories, expert insights, and more on our NACD YouTube Channel.

Don’t miss out on this life-changing resource that’s been right here in Utah all along!

The post Utah’s Best Resource for Child Development & Education appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

by Bob Doman

Many parents of special needs children, as well as children with attention and learning related problems, mistakenly believe their children are receiving a good, real opportunity for development and education from the schools. With rare exception neither public nor private schools are equipped to provide these children with a real opportunity. What does opportunity look like, and how do we help the children realize their innate potential?

A sad reality is that the typically perceived potential for all our children, and particularly our special needs children, is not truly based on their innate potential, but rather it is defined by the very limited opportunities provided by public schools, and most private schools, and the outcomes they produce.

Opportunity Defines Potential and Determines Outcomes

The range of individual function in a typical or special needs classroom is tremendous. In a typical classroom the reading, math, and other educational levels range in years, not months; but everyone is generally placed in the same curriculum and at the same spot in the curriculum. The instruction is based on the month and year of where the class is in the curriculum. In addition to the huge range of educational levels in the classroom, the level of individual processing abilities (short-term and working memory levels, the ability to process and understand the information) varies tremendously, as do the individuals’ actual knowledge base, and learning strengths and weaknesses. Our children are all unique; and the more targeted their education is to their specific needs, the more effective.

The greater the developmental and learning challenges, the greater the variability of function, the more specific their requirements, and the greater the need for targeted intervention– “targeted” as in designed for the individual child and administered one to one.

How does the public education system determine potential and define opportunity?

Perceived potential defines what is determined to be appropriate educational and therapeutic opportunity, as defined by the public educational system. The potential is based on expectations and prognosis, while the prognosis is based on the past failures. The past failures in turn are the reflection of the realities of limited opportunity, the result of budget restraints and previous outcomes.

The Reality of School Aides

If your child is “fortunate” they are provided with a 1:1 aide. Parents generally mistakenly believe that the aide is providing a targeted program designed for your child. This is rarely the case. Often the aide assists your child in walking through a dumbed down version of the school curriculum or a version of the “special” curriculum. Aides generally assist and prompt the child through whatever is deemed appropriate work, rather than providing targeted teaching. They are not teachers and are not expected to be. They aid, as in assist, which often impairs rather than facilitates real education and often results in prompt dependency.

Physical, Speech, and Occupational Therapy

Many parents believe that their children who need specific therapies need to attend school so that they can receive the therapy they need. The reality is that one or two twenty to thirty minute sessions of “therapy” per week is not enough to produce significant change and certainly does not define a real opportunity. Very few school therapists would really define what they are providing as adequate. But, once again, outcomes predict potential and thus determine what is considered an appropriate opportunity. Sadly, the same criteria has been used by insurance companies to define appropriate opportunity, and thus limit how much therapy they will cover. Fortunately, most children with developmental issues do not need rehabilitation therapy; they need developmental opportunities that generally do not require a therapist.

Neuroplasticity

All individual development reflects and is the result of neuroplasticity, the process by which the brain changes in response to stimulation. The foundation of neuroplasticity is targeted input delivered with frequency, intensity, and duration.

Targeted input refers to specific input, specific as to the child; and because every child is different, the program needs to be designed around a comprehensive understanding of the whole child. All children are complex; and the more specific issues the child has, the more complex they are, as are their needs.

Labels

When schools started providing “special” services for special needs children and those with attention and learning challenges, the need existed for them to have administrative labels, so as to classify the children. The labels and classifications served as a means for the system to lower expectations and an excuse for the system to fail. One hundred or one hundred thousand children labeled as dyslexic or as having attention deficit, as an example, are all different and are categorized and stigmatized by a symptomatic label. They don’t have a disease, let alone an incurable disease; and they are all different. If they are all perceived as the same, then their needs are perceived to be the same, and their opportunities dictated by the expected outcomes. All the children with these labels are unique and complex, as are all labeled children, each with a multitude of different significant pieces that need to be understood and addressed if they are to be given a real opportunity to achieve their unique potential.

The Whole Child

You cannot successfully address a piece of a child without a comprehensive understanding of the whole child.

Who are the world’s greatest authorities on a specific child? The parents.

It is impossible to understand a child and provide a child with a real opportunity without the parents being in charge, the parents who know the whole child and who are ultimately responsible for the future adult. A dysfunctional 30-year-old child is not going to be living with their old teacher, or school principal, or therapist; they are going to be living with their parents or in some form of institution

What is the whole child? To understand the whole child, you must know and understand their history from birth to today– their birth history, their medical history, their developmental history, their educational history, their social and behavioral history. Who they are today is a reflection of their entire history and much more, including: any and all neurological/structural and physical issues, their sleep, their diet, current medical issues, behavior issues, social function, how they are on days when they don’t feel well or didn’t sleep well, what their relationship is with their parents, siblings, grandparents, extended family, friends, with their church or other organizations, what is fun, how do they engage themselves, how much screen time do they have, how is their vision, their hearing, their auditory and visual processing, short-term and working memory, do they have any executive function, exactly what do they know and understand, what are they afraid of, what do they like, what do they hate and on and on and on. All of these factors and many more need to be part of the consideration as to what they, these unique children who have never existed before on the planet and never will again, need. How do we target them?

How do you look at a label and determine what is appropriate for any child? You simply cannot define potential nor adequately work with a piece of a child without understanding the whole child.

Public education may pay some lip service to parents, but parents are generally perceived as the people the school sends the child home to at the end of the school day.

Reactive vs Proactive

Schools apply a reactive management strategy to the child’s development and education, meaning that the goals and thus the applications are not based on a long-term vision of what can be based on appropriate opportunity, but what is based on limited opportunity. Examples range from a perspective that the child really doesn’t have the potential to be functional in reading and math, therefore the “reading and math” programs provided aren’t really expected to produce a long-term result of someone who can actually read and understand math. If the perception is that a five-year-old really isn’t going to be able to speak and use language, then augmentative communication is the reactive approach. If the perception is that the child will never be an independent walker, then the reactive approach is not aimed at that goal, but rather life in a wheelchair or possibly a walker.

To work with a child proactively means that you are doing things today understanding and anticipating the long-term effects. What is seen as potential dictates the steps needed to achieve it and to work proactively, not reactively.

Shared Vision and Goals

Everyone involved with a child needs to share a common vision and goals. The primary voice in determining the vision and goals needs to be that of the parents. Parents can be assisted in this process with the help of those who have worked with and through families and their whole children for many decades.

A Better Way: Plan B

Home/Family Based Whole Child Comprehensive Programs

NACD (National Association for Child Development) has for over forty years been at the forefront of redefining opportunity and potential and has developed a toolbox of over 3000 specific techniques that can provide targeted intervention within the home and applied by parents, siblings, and caregivers. NACD focuses on providing individualized, home-based programs to children with special needs, those with learning and attention issues, as well as “typical” children, optimizing opportunity, changing perceptions and outcomes. This approach offers several advantages over public schools:

1. Individualized attention: NACD programs are tailored to the specific needs of each unique child, rather than labeling and plugging the child into an “appropriate” curriculum.
2. Home-based programs: NACD programs are best done at home five days per week. Each comprehensive targeted program maximizes neuroplasticity through short, intense activities that can be provided many times a day, rather than a couple of times per week.
3. Flexible scheduling: Parents can choose when to work with their child, which allows for schedules that work best for the family. It also provides the opportunity for targeted social interaction outside of the school walls. It’s not the quantity of time that a child spends in the company of other children, it is the quality and structure of the time. The reality is often whether or not a child can survive the social world of schools, not if they have learned how to appropriately interact and have developed positive social skills and lives.
4. Holistic approach: The NACD program focuses on the whole child, not just their academic needs, by addressing health and nutrition, motor skills, cognitive skills, speech, social and emotional development, behavior and much more–the whole child, and the whole child within the context of the family. NACD is constantly developing, exploring, and assessing new methods and treatments, bringing state of the art information and resources to bear on the child’s issues and needs.
5. Targeted input, delivered with the needed frequency, intensity, and duration by the people who know and care the most defines a new opportunity and changes outcomes.
6. Tri-annual evaluations and ongoing support, coaching, and interaction help keep everyone on target, working effectively and efficiently, and moving together to achieve the vision.

Learn more about how the NACD Program helps parents homeschool children with special needs:

      Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 36 No. 3, 2023 ©NACD

The post Homeschool & Special Needs Children appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

by Bob Doman

Whether you have a gifted or typical child, a child with learning or attention issues or special needs, parents need to understand what their role is, and the role, if any, of schools.

More and more parents are realizing that the one size fits all education—just plug them in and let the chips fall where they may—just may not be doing the job for their children. Some parents are ready to explore the options and are looking for a long-term plan, while others want to help their children catch up or give them a boost so they can return them to school, but at the top of the heap.

This may be the time for a change.

Questions every parent should ask themselves:

Is parental involvement in a child’s development important?

Absolutely, and the more the parents are involved with their child’s development and education, the better. Parental involvement is the single greatest factor affecting a child’s development, education, and future.

Can parents be educators/teachers?

Parents are the child’s first, best, and most important educators/teachers. Who teaches children to understand and speak their language, a foreign language? Who teaches your children how to take care of themselves from feeding themselves to toilet training, to dressing, bathing, and grooming, etc.? Who teaches your child how to behave appropriately? Who teaches your children how to throw a ball, set the table, do the dishes, mow the lawn? Who teaches your children about family, respect, compassion, responsibility, faith, religion, and probably at least the basics of reading and math and more and more and more? The truth is that on graduation from high school, measuring what your child has learned as opposed to what they were “taught” and have forgotten, the odds are that what the children actually learned from involved parents significantly outweighs what the schools “taught.” Your child’s future as an adult is more a reflection of lessons learned from parents than schools. 

Who knows your whole child best?

Involved parents know their child the best and are the only people who know their whole child.

Do teachers, therapists, psychologists, and doctors know your whole child?

No, they temporarily deal with pieces of your child, not your whole child. How often have you had a new teacher or any other professional for that matter go out of their way to ask you, the experts, about your child?

Who needs to be in charge and steering the ship, those who only think they understand your child, looking at pieces, or parents who know their whole child?

Parents. Those dealing with pieces of your child never do or can understand your whole child.

Whose vision of the child should be directing the outcomes?

Parents, your child is your child. Those working with your child should be helping you fulfill your vision.

Have parents been largely encouraged to abdicate their roles to the professionals over the last 50 years?

Yes, the trend has been to let the professionals take charge. Parents are often perceived as irrelevant or even as interfering pieces of the equation.

Are the teachers, schools, psychologists, etc. responsible for your child’s education and future?

These folks will often tell parents that they, the experts, are responsible, and you need to trust their training, their vision, and that you and your child need to follow their direction. The system doesn’t grade the teachers, psychologists, and therapists based on how your child does, they grade your children. They, the professionals, don’t fail, your child does. While they are well meaning, their role is limited and transient. Transients working with pieces of your child are not responsible for your child’s future. If they fail in their job, your child won’t be living in their basement when they’re thirty.

Should schools be viewed as a tool in the parent’s toolbox that they can choose to use or not, and if so to what extent?

For many families today, school is an option, not a foregone conclusion. Some families do not have a choice, but for those who do, school needs to be perceived as optional—there if and when needed.

If you take your child out of school, how hard is it for them to return?

In most states if you decide to take your child out of school, you can do it tomorrow. Just let the school know that you are going with another plan. In a few states it is a tad more involved, but not much. And generally, to put them back in requires nothing more than contacting the school. For some children a placement test may be part of the process; but every child can attend public school when the parents choose, with the possible temporary exception of children who have been expelled. The bottom line is that it is rarely an issue to remove your child from school or to put them back in. 

Ultimately who is responsible for your child and their future?

You are!

Do children with learning and attention problems, with special needs or the gifted require schools to address their specific individual needs?

The reality is the educational system is not able to individualize and provide for “typical” children, let alone those with greater needs. Children in need of specific therapies need those therapies multiple times per day, not once or twice a week for 30 minutes. That is what the school can provide, not what the children need. At best schools can plug children into different levels of their curriculum or change the pace, but they do not and cannot create curriculums to fit individual children.

Is group/classroom, or set curriculum an efficient, effective way to educate?

Group/classroom instruction is a means to mass education but is by no means the best way to educate an individual. Individual targeted education is by far more efficient and effective, and the younger the child the more important it is. Two minutes of targeted 1:1 education for younger children or those with special needs can easily be more effective than an hour of group, set curriculum-based education.

Do children need to attend schools for their social development?

Social interaction in most schools occurs at minimally supervised times, such as recess, in the hallways and restrooms. If your child is not learning how to interact socially at home, they will often have social issues at school. And school provides a great opportunity for bullying, and the greater your child’s need for positive social interaction, the greater the targets they are for exclusion and bullying. There are many supervised social opportunities that exist outside the school setting that afford better opportunities for social engagement than school, including church groups, Scouts, 4H, community sports, and martial arts, not to mention family, extended family, and so on

What education can and should be: home-based education

Many parents who had previously just assumed that their children had been receiving a good, if not quality, educational opportunity are starting to pay attention. “Virtual” schooling gave many parents a better look into their child’s curriculum than ever before; and many were rather shocked at how inappropriate much of it was for their child and how far it was removed from fitting or targeting their child.

The reality is that mass education, schools, and set curriculums are not producing good or what should be considered acceptable results for most children, even if our children apparently are doing well. The United States in 2018 ranked 30^th in math, 8^th in reading, and 11^th in science internationally. So much for the myth that we have a great educational system. It is certainly nothing to brag about. And to maintain perspective, think about what countries might rank above the U.S. and how good their educational systems actually are.

Many families are beginning to really examine school as they now see it to be and are considering alternatives. At the same time many work and home situations have changed; and as a result, more and more parents are finding that they can work from home for at least part of the day, or that they can do fine on one salary,weighing a new car when the old one runs just fine against assuming a more active role in their child’s education and future. If one parent could be home educating the children, even if for part of the day, it opens alternatives that may not have been perceived before. We tend to forget what was, but to gain perspective, in 1967 49% of mothers were stay-at-home moms. That number dropped to 23% in 1999 and has climbed a bit, but is still only 29%.

Many parents see their options as perhaps more limited than they need to be. The options list often includes public school, charter schools, or private schools, which are often prohibitively expensive and not necessarily better than public schools. Or there are home-based online schools that just plug children into a curriculum and keep them attached to a screen all day. Or traditional homeschool that tends to take up most of the child’s and parent’s day and just replaces one packaged curriculum for another. Packaged curriculums that children are plugged into are the bane of education and disregard our children as unique individuals. They ignore neuroplasticity and the value of targeted input, the child’s interest in and relationship to the input, affecting the intensity of the input and the effect on the brain.

What most folks think of as homeschool is not at all what home-based education started out being or can be. Homeschool as most parents think of it is essentially recreating school at home. A ton of curriculum/”stuff” that no one really expects the child to learn, nothing targeted, nothing specific to the child, and like school, most likely to produce less than stellar results.

What’s the latest U.S. literacy rate?

There is one huge piece missing from school and many homeschool curriculums—the child. What is taught, when, and how should be based on the child, the child’s level of development, their processing ability (link to Processing article), the child’s level of academic function, the child’s interests, the understanding of the needs of the whole child, and the vision. The needs of the whole child go way beyond curriculum, including turning the child on to learning, making them readers, and learning to love learning, learning that they don’t need to be hand fed to learn (they can do it themselves), teaching the child how to think, be responsible, including owning chores, and how to take care of themselves from cooking to laundry. From how to earn, save, invest, and how to learn about and even engage in entrepreneurship, to having an adult rather than peers teach them about appropriate behavior, morality, faith, respect, values, family, etc. Providing them with an opportunity to develop strong processing, short-term and working memory, which translates into greater maturity, better executive function, and simply, being smarter; and to have the encouragement and flexibility to explore and develop their interests, talents, and passions.

Achieving our vision for our children requires much more than classes and grades, and if we understand the reality of the needs of our whole child, we understand the reality that the time and energy required by school or packaged curriculum does not leave the time and energy to put together the whole package, the whole child. Targeting academic education to fit the child is so efficient that the time needed to educate them per day is a fraction of what school or typical home school requires.

The parent’s job is to turn their children into happy, well adjusted, successful, contributing adults who have the tools to succeed at something they are passionate about. Giving birth is just the beginning; the job, the responsibility, and the privilege of parenting involves years of active participation.

Unfortunately, many parents do not start off with a vision. But all parents need a vision of what their child—this wonderful, unique new person—can be. Start with that vision, then actively work with your child, getting to know them and permitting them to learn and understand, and you can then together continue to develop the vision and bring it to fruition.

As someone once said, “Look where you’re going and go where you’re looking.” Take responsibility and take charge.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 35 No.2, 2022 ©NACD

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The post Educational Options 2022 appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

I wish I could say how great it is to be back to normal, how happy we all are to be done with Covid-19; but we’re not. Fortunately, here in Utah things are back pretty close to normal, but that certainly isn’t true in a lot of the world.

As you are evaluating life as it is today, I suggest you take a few moments to consider some options that you may not have considered before. Many of you have been forced to work from home, and quite a few folks and businesses have learned that working from home can be a good thing. Many have discovered over the course of the last year and a half that school and education isn’t all you might have thought it was cracked up to be. Many parents here in the U.S. have had their eyes opened a bit. One rather shocking bit of news was discovering that our “wonderful” U.S. educational system was ranked about 26^th internationally.

Many families are now actively exploring alternatives to the traditional public school. Charter schools and private schools are looking more attractive, as is homeschool. As you explore options, I would suggest that you explore one other option that requires significantly less time per day, is very affordable, and which should produce superior results.

To find out more about NACD Home Based Education, I recommend you watch this video:

Reprinted by permission NACD Newsletter, September 2021 ©NACD

The post Another Educational Option appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

Our interesting times continue on. Through the past year both nationally and internationally we have heard a lot of rhetoric regarding education. A year ago, there was a lot discussion regarding excessive screen time, but “education” for many of our children this past year meant being home and sitting in front of a computer screen all day. There was also a lot of talk about how important it was for the children to be back in the classroom, to get back to how things were. What we didn’t hear mentioned was that prior to the pandemic our children were not generally receiving good or even fair educations, and that most of our children with learning problems or special needs were receiving what can only be described as pretend educations.

According to studies the average American reads at a 7^th-8^th grade level¹; and to gain a little perspective, of 79 countries, the U.S. ranks 9^th in reading and 31^st in math²; and U.S. scores have been flat for two decades. Not too impressive.

Parents, consider taking charge and assuming the responsibility for your child’s development and education.

Targeted home-based education, not packaged, curriculum-heavy homeschool programs can take less time per day than many children spend on homework, and at the same time address and work to eliminate most learning problems, dyslexia, etc. For those children with special needs, it allows time daily for targeted developmental/therapeutic intervention, as opposed to the pretend short visit with a therapist once or twice a week while at school.

Outcomes are determined by the opportunities our children receive. Who’s responsible?

References

1. https://www.wyliecomm.com/2020/11/whats-the-latest-u-s-literacy-rate/#_ftn5
2. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2020/02/28/math-scores-high-school-lessons-freakonomics-pisa-algebra-geometry/4835742002/

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 34 No.5, 2021 ©NACD

The post Taking Charge of Your Child’s Education appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

I work with children all around the world who are having difficulties learning, typically due to issues with auditory processing and working memory. These children come to us with many different labels and diagnoses but when it comes to education the significant factor is processing, the relative weakness of the short-term auditory memory and the correlating weakness of the working memory and executive function. A huge compounding issue, however, is the absolute wrong mindedness of the curriculum approach.

I sometimes think that the people designing the curriculum that I see in countries around the world have never actually worked with a diverse group of students. Not only are these curriculum approaches wrong-minded but there are a thousand different things we could be teaching these children instead of wasting time dragging them through educational approaches that do not make sense.

I can take a year, and have, attempting to alter this wrong curriculum approach to make some sense to a child with a processing delay and we end the year with the child having the weakest understanding of what he just “learned” and very little knowledge of anything else. Why are we doing this? The educational approaches used in the fifties, the much-maligned mastery curriculum approach, taught the basics of reading and math in a very concrete manner. Children, in fact, spent an entire school year mastering individual steps in mathematics. In the meantime, because the teaching of math was clear-cut and we were not teaching five different ways to solve one problem or piling language into what is basically a visual task, there was time for literature and the building of vocabulary as well as learning a great deal about our world.

We read whole books and lots of them. The teachers took time and read to us. It was a wonderfully rich input of language. We didn’t spend time working on written expression until we had a great foundation in literature modeling for us how language should and could be used. We weren’t asked to interpret the motivation of the characters until high school. We weren’t writing paragraphs about how problems in stories compared to each other so much as reading and listening to more stories and poetry. As a result of this enriched auditory environment, we became good listeners and readers with strong vocabularies. This approach allowed and enabled our processing to develop. It gave us time to build better working memory and executive function. There was a lot of what we call input and a lot less output.

Now I can look back on the amount of literature we were exposed to, the level of our vocabularies at a young age, and the habit of reading and understanding what we read, and I marvel at it. Take a look at one of the common short stories for students in those days, stories by Washington Irving. You’ll laugh or cry at the level of vocabulary that was commonly understood by students. Not only did we understand the vocabulary, we were entertained by it.

As we work to try to pull struggling students through a curriculum that baffles many parents, we end up not teaching them so many other things that are interesting and relevant. Children love learning Geography. It’s fun and easy to teach. It’s interesting if taught well and surely it is relevant to this world in which we live. Children love to learn about Science if they can see what it is about and how it works and impacts on their day-to-day life. The world is fascinating and waiting to be discovered by each generation. Children with processing challenges are at little to no disadvantage when it comes to learning so very many interesting things about our world. Why aren’t we teaching it to them in a way that they can learn it? Why are we withholding the world in favor of attempting to teach five different ways to do a long division problem particularly when the child could have learned ONE way to do it in about 5 minutes?

How many great books are the children missing? Listening to books is one of many ways that we build vocabulary, auditory attention and an understanding of grammar. Reading content that is interesting and adds new vocabulary gradually serves multiple purposes. Whether we are teaching Fibonacci numbers in nature which is so much fun, or where a comet goes when it leaves our galaxy, or how battles were won and lost, or what the bones in a whale look like we are teaching a love of learning, a curiosity about the world and an increased ability to think and learn. Intensity has a huge impact on learning. It is an essential part of learning.

Let’s face it. If a child doesn’t succeed at math and isn’t successful in reading and building vocabulary, then we haven’t succeeded in preparing that child for adult life. In addition, if we don’t present that child with a world that is full of wonders, problems, and a vastness to be explored, we have boxed them in to a smaller existence and more limited possibilities. It is essential for children with processing difficulties to get help improving this processing and while we are doing this it should be the right of every child to be educated well.

We are on the wrong path and a lot of us know that. Let’s fix it. 

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 33 No. 10, 2020 ©NACD

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NACD is a program designed to improve the development of the whole child. So we are addressing cognitive development, physical development in terms of fine and gross motor skills, behavioral development, academic development, and other aspects of your whole child. Our approach to home education (or homeschool) is, for many reasons, different from everyone else’s approach.

Let’s talk about some details. The design of each child’s academic plan is based specifically on where that child is in many areas of development. Why? The plan is designed to take advantage of how that child is able to process, store, and utilize information at the time that the plan is written. As the child’s processing level improves, the plan changes with the child. This allows us to make the most of the time spent teaching so that we are not teaching above the child’s level of processing, but also not teaching below the child’s level. This allows us to keep the child’s interest and allows learning to be easy and interesting.

NACD works with children not only across the United States, but in countries all over the world. NACD home education plans are designed to meet home education requirements where the child lives, whether that is in Ireland or Illinois, Australia or Arizona. The NACD staff monitor each child’s progress on a regular basis to ensure that we are making the gains we and parents expect to make.

Throughout the child’s academic career, the NACD program addresses improving short-term and working memory, as well as executive function. In the early grades, NACD’s academic program typically focuses on developing reading skills and a love of reading; developing a love of math and a perspective that math is really pretty easy; and an interest in learning all kinds of things about the world, including science, geography, and history, as well as learning responsibility and accountability. It’s designed to improve the child’s level of fitness and health. It is also designed to support developing interests and talents.

In middle grades, NACD’s academic program continues to emphasize reading and advancing math skills and understanding, but also includes vocabulary development, grammar, organization of written expression, appreciation of literature, as well as addressing subjects including science, history, geography, technology, and other subjects required by their state, region, or country. There is a continued emphasis on building highly capable skills, independence, and responsibility.

At the high school level, NACD’s academic program continues to be designed to suit the needs of the individual while meeting the requirements of the Department of Education where they live. The plan often includes higher-level math, literature, written expression, sciences, history, and other required courses based on their requirements, but also based on their individual needs and future plans.

For all of NACD’s academic programs, the parent is the key educator. NACD designs individual plans, identifies specific resources, and monitors progress through frequent communication with the parents. Formal evaluations are typically completed on a trimester basis. NACD coaches are available via email, phone, Skype, or Zoom to provide support and answer questions. NACD evaluators provide the evaluations and programs and respond to all questions and concerns on a timely basis.

What NACD home education programs are not:

• They are not a virtual instruction program.
• They are not a one-size fits all academic plan.
• They are not taught by an NACD instructor.

What NACD home education programs are:

• Whole child programs
• Totally individualized programs
• Cognitive development as well as academic programs
• Parent-supportive programs
• Totally responsive to changes in the child programs
• Efficient and effective programs

Additional information:

• The length of the instructional day is based on the child’s ability to process information.
• The instructional day is typically much shorter than other home education plans.
• The instructional day includes physical activities designed specifically for your child, as well as chores.
• The instructional day is flexible so as to fit into parents’ employment needs and other responsibilities and availability of help from family, friends, nannies, and other caregivers.

To learn more, visit our NACD Home Education & Homeschool FAQ

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 33 No. 9, 2020 ©NACD

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In the midst of the pandemic, there perhaps has never been a greater time to actually evaluate the education your children have been receiving and look at some options.

Education has unfortunately become almost synonymous with curriculum. Whether we are talking public school, private school, or even homeschool, the first question asked is, “What is the curriculum?” The perception is that the difference between schools and success is the curriculum. I would like to give you a bit of a different perspective. Let’s substitute the word “stuff” for curriculum.

In reality a huge part of curriculum/stuff that is thrown at our children doesn’t stick. And truth be told, no one really expects it to. I imagine that most of you have heard the old saying that on graduation day most graduates have already forgotten 99% of what they “learned” over the preceding years. I would substitute “what was thrown at them” for “what they learned,” for if they had in fact learned it, they would know it.

What tends to get lost in all of the curriculum stuff is an education—teaching our children what they need to know to become successful functioning adults, including functional literacy and working knowledge.

Please go through the following educational checklist to gain some insight as to whether or not your child is getting the education they need:

This list of questions largely represents the foundational pieces that can affect a child’s future success. If you answered “no” to only a couple of these questions your present educational plan is doing pretty well. If you have more than four or five “no” answers you child’s present educational plan is not really addressing the foundational pieces and if you have more than five “no” answers you really need to look at another plan.

Perhaps sitting in a classroom for six hours a day and then adding on homework is not actually doing the job. And, what about distance learning? Lets substitute the hours in a classroom to sitting in front of a screen. How is that going to work out?

If you are open to another plan there may be no better time then the present to explore options. It might be time to bring your child back home and discover how easy it can be to actually educate your child and prepare them for their future.

NACD has been designing individualized home-based educational programs for over 40 years. With a targeted academic program and a plan addressing your whole unique child it is possible to turn these no’s into yes’s. With a program designed specifically for your child we can educate and train you to work with your child. We provide you with daily coaching and support so you can generally accomplish at lot more in a lot less time per day then you might think.

If you are really interested in turning no’s into yes’s and producing a good outcome for your child, explore NACD home education.

* If you don’t know what these are its because virtually none of the schools are addressing these foundational pieces.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 33 No. 9, 2020 ©NACD

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We brought our daughter to NACD after adopting her from another country at the age of 7 and trying for four years to homeschool her ourselves. While we were making progress developmentally and academically, progress was slow before we found NACD. Lyn helped us discover specific things about our daughter’s brain and the way it processed information that seemed to unlock her potential. We started doing the things on the program, which at first seemed sort of silly, like patching one eye and ear, massaging with special gloves, and just repeating numbers. All of this was specifically prescribed for our daughter’s specific needs and we trusted the process and followed the program. In the 2.5 years we spent meeting with Lyn every four months or so, our daughter went from having almost no ability to create or participate in conversation at the age of 12 to being a talkative, inquisitive, even clever young lady at 14 1/2. She went from throwing toddler tantrums to being able to control frustrations in a healthy manner and accept when she doesn’t get everything she wants. She went from retaining about 5% of what she read, to now being able to tell us about the things she just read because she found it interesting. She has now taken it upon herself to follow a 1-year bible reading plan, and is on track 8 months later! She went from needing to be told every single thing to do, to being a nearly self-sufficient girl who follows her list, cooks for herself, helps with many chores, and likes to do things with other family members. She is ready now to get plugged in to youth groups and classes, and we couldn’t be more pleased with the support we received from NACD. We will continue to follow their advice and the maintenance program, and we would recommend NACD strongly to any family who has children who struggle mentally. It is a game changer!

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 33 No. 9, 2020 ©NACD

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Are the schools going to be open this fall?

Will our kids wear masks?

Will school be five days a week or three or two?

Are they going to find enough teachers willing to be in the classrooms?

Or is it going to be more distance “learning?”

Most families who experienced this at the end of the last school year know that this is a bad choice. It is mostly kids getting busy work, sitting for hour after hour facing a computer screen, when we all know that kids need to get away from their screens. Children learning to love learning? It is hardly that.

Let’s look at how well our children have been educated to gain a bit of perspective. According to FactsMaps, the PISA (Program for International Student Assessment), which tests kids from 78 countries, in 2018 the United States placed at a very unimpressive 37^th in math, 18^th in science, and 13^th in reading. The U.S. has a literacy rate of 86% and ranks 125^thout of 197 countries. Wow, isn’t that great! Wouldn’t want to miss that, would we?

So much for what we might be missing. In subsequent articles and videos, I will talk more about the benefits of home-based education. For many parents it’s time for a paradigm shift, a new perspective as to what defines an education for our children, and a new perspective on potential.

To see all of our resources on home education and homeschooling, be sure to visit our “Who We Help: Home Education & Homeschool” page here.

You can also view our complete Home Education & Homeschool FAQ here.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 33 No. 9, 2020 ©NACD

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