For many children at The Bridge School Morningside, school has not always fitted easily. Some children need more movement. Some need more time. Some need quiet, structure, repetition, visuals, sensory support or another way into the work. Some read differently. Some communicate differently. Some learn beautifully, but not always in
I have been thinking a lot about how much information parents are expected to carry when their children need extra support. Not only the appointments, assessments, school meetings and admin, although there is plenty of that. It is the constant remembering that wears you down. Who has seen which report?
A few years ago, many neurodivergent families were having the same conversations in isolation. Parents were searching for answers. Educators were trying to understand. Professionals were working hard to support children and adults, often without seeing the full picture. Most of us were finding our own way through a system
From 11 to 17 June, Neurodiversity Pride Week comes to South Africa for the first time as part of a global movement spanning more than 50 countries. At its centre is 16 June, a date already tied to the fight for access to education, now sitting alongside a different question:
I have always said that if I could have dinner with anyone, dead or alive, it would be Leonardo da Vinci. Also, ideally, a very good translator, because I have questions, and I refuse to waste a once-in-history dinner opportunity nodding vaguely across five centuries of linguistic confusion.
A fuller, more humane guide to helping different brains study in ways they can actually return to. Most study advice is written for learners who can sit down, start cleanly, stay focused, tolerate the page, and show what they know in neat little boxes. Plenty of learners cannot do that.
There are television characters you enjoy, and then there are the ones you recognise. The first can make you laugh, quote lines, and carry a whole series on timing and charm alone. The second settle somewhere deeper. They remind you of children you have taught, children you have raised, children
I ugly-cried at the final episode of The Middle. Not a quiet little tear. Not even a respectable cry. My face gave up entirely, my nose blocked, and I sounded like a wounded donkey. It was not my finest hour. The strange thing is, I should have expected it.
As The Middle climbs the Netflix charts again, one character is landing very differently this time. Brick Heck was always memorable. The whispering, the intense focus on his interests, the social misfires, the way he seemed slightly out of step with the world around him. When the show first aired,
Many parents carry a reasonable assumption about children and reading. If a child loves stories, surely literature at school should feel easy. After all, this is often the child who devours films, discusses characters endlessly, invents complex narratives, and analyses plot twists with surprising sophistication. Yet for many learners, the
I want to share something that has been sitting heavily with me, because it speaks to a much bigger problem than just one situation. For the past while, I’ve been caring for a young neurodivergent girl who has fallen through more cracks than I can count. Like so many
Almost four years ago, when I began reaching out to parents through my writing, one article found its way to someone who needed support for his own children. We started talking, quietly at first, about learning, about schools, about what happens when the system doesn’t quite fit the child
A Facebook memory popped up the morning we received my son’s matric results. A photo from fifteen years ago, taken on his first day of Grade 1. Same boy. Same face. A very different moment. The timing felt almost pointed. By the time that photo was taken, we already
There’s a particular stretch of time between Christmas Eve and New Year’s where the calendar gives up. You wake up unsure what day it is. Breakfast turns into snacks. Bedtimes drift. Everyone’s a little fried, but no one wants to admit it because we’re supposed to
If you have a daughter who walks through the front door after school and immediately dissolves into tears, or shuts herself in her room, or clings to you without knowing why — you’re not imagining it. This is one of the clearest patterns in autistic and ADHD girls. They don’
By Nicola Killops There is a quiet crisis in South Africa: gifted children falling through the cracks because so few people truly understand what giftedness looks like. We tend to imagine giftedness as perfect grades and calm confidence. We picture a child who intuitively excels at everything. Meanwhile, real gifted
Every few months, someone warns of the “tidal wave of neurodiverse diagnoses” — as if we’ve all caught ADHD like the flu. The implication is that difference has become fashionable, that acronyms are the new accessories. Relax. The wave didn’t arrive. We finally turned around and faced the ocean.
by Kate La Trobe MSc, BCBA and Nicola Killops, Educator and Gifted & Twice-Exceptional Specialist We were those kids: bright, talkative, imaginative, distracted. The ones teachers described as “full of potential if they’d just apply themselves.” We did apply ourselves — just not to what made sense to other
For as long as I can remember, I’ve carried the label too sensitive. Too emotional. Too reactive. Too quick to take things personally. And for just as long, I believed it. If you grew up neurodivergent — or simply different in how you think, feel, or move through the world
Parents whisper it like a confession: “He’s a bit different.” “She’s… quirky.” “We don’t want to label her.” And I always think, you’re not protecting her from the label — you’re protecting yourself from the truth. Because the truth is more complicated. It means admitting the
Social cues are tricky things. Most people don’t even notice they’re reading them — a glance, a shift of tone, the twitch of an eyebrow. But for many children on the spectrum — whether that’s autism, ADHD, giftedness, or the complicated mix of twice-exceptionality — those little signals are
Two months from now, my son will walk out of school for the last time. I should feel light, relieved, ready to exhale. Instead, I’m burnt out. Not in the ordinary sense, but in the way that comes from years of treading water — never drowning, but never allowed to
Remember the excitement of turning 17? For many of us, that learner’s license was our first taste of freedom. Learning to drive in the ‘90s was a rite of passage — slightly terrifying, yes, especially with minibus taxis treating lanes as suggestions — but still something we looked forward to. We
Let’s talk about something that trips up even the most switched-on parents (and I say that with total empathy, because I’ve been there too). When we see our kids responding to the world with intense emotions, deep questions, and what feels like a turbo-charged imagination, it’