In this episode of Stress-Free IEP®, Frances Shefter speaks with Polly Mayer, Associate Professor of Education and Director of the Masters of Arts in Educational Therapy Program at Notre Dame de Namur University. Polly brings a wealth of experience, having spent 25 years as a classroom teacher and now dedicating her career to teaching educational therapists. Polly’s journey into educational therapy began with her curiosity about neurodiverse students and how best to support them in academic settings. As a parent of a neurodiverse child herself, Polly has a personal understanding of the challenges and rewards of special education.
Episode’s Key Takeaways:
Polly’s Personal Experience with Special Education: Being the parent of a special needs child (now successful adult) complemented her professional training
The Inclusion Model is Not Just for Students: Both teachers and students benefit when the general education Gen Ed supports neurodivergent learners
The Difference Between Educational Therapy and Tutoring: Often commingled in definition, educational therapy is more learning-based, while tutoring is more subject-based
Training to Be an Educational Therapist: The certifications involved in becoming an educational therapist and how a parent or guardian can find a qualified one
How to Set a Student Up for Success: “Be the scientist of your own learning” — strategies for effective learning
Frances Shefter is an Education Attorney and Advocate who is committed to helping her clients have a Stress-Free IEP® experience. In each podcast, Frances interviews inspiring people to share information, educate you, empower you and help you get the knowledge you need.
Voice-Over: Do it all alone with your host, Frances Shefter, principal of Shefter Law. You can get more details and catch prior episodes at www. Shefterlaw. com. The Stress-Free IEP®video podcast is also posted on YouTube and LinkedIn, and you can listen to episodes through Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, and more.
Now, here’s the host of Stress-Free IEP®, Frances Shefter.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Hello, everyone, and welcome to the show. So today’s guest, we’re going actually a little bit different than usual, um, because Polly Mayer, she’s an associate professor of education and the director of the Masters of Arts. educational therapy program at Notre Dame de Namur University. And so why I say it’s a little bit different is because Polly actually teaches educational therapists, which is such a great, um, [00:01:00] I don’t know, I thought it was just so great because now we can see like what makes a good educational therapist and so forth from the teaching standpoint.
So Polly, please introduce yourself a little bit more, let us know, let everyone know a little bit more about you.
Polly Mayer’s Background and Journey
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Hi, so I’m so happy to be here, Frances. Thank you for having me. Yes. So I was a classroom teacher for 25 years. Like many people in the profession, I came from education. That’s not the only way people enter into the educational therapy profession, but it’s definitely one of the pathways.
Uh, and I’m the parent of a neuro diverse. Um, so I have a daughter who is a young adult now who herself is a special education teacher with a master’s. So I always encourage people to take the long view because it’s a journey. Um, so, and she’s an incredible teacher and a wonderful person, and I have another daughter who is an assistant district attorney.
So I have two. Daughters who are in service to their communities, which is pretty exciting. So anyway, long story short, I was [00:02:00] curious about the children who, quote unquote, hid under the table when it was time for reading. I felt like my teaching program, as wonderful as it was, did not prepare me just teach neurodiverse students and I wanted to figure out strategies to reach them, to make them feel comfortable, safe, and most importantly, succeed academically.
Someone told me about a wonderful educational therapy program at Holy Names University. And I had the privilege of attending, getting my master’s there, starting to work as an educational therapist. I was the director of an educational therapy clinic at Raskob Learning Institute at Holy Names University in Oakland.
California. I worked there for 10 years and while keeping a very small, I like to call it boutique private practice, and then was invited to become the director of the program that Marion Marshall, whom I know you’ve had on your program, so incredibly led for decades. And I’ve just [00:03:00] had the delight in teaching future educational therapists and sharing my passion for supporting families, guardians.
Relatives and people themselves in the classroom setting from elementary school through graduate school. Because a true learning challenge doesn’t necessarily disappear with adulthood.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly.
Challenges in Special Education
Frances Shefter, Esq.: It’s, you know, it’s interesting because there’s been like such a theme of people that have become educational therapists, especially and how most of, as you said, we’re teachers and Didn’t know how to teach special ed kids.
And we had the same thing with reading specialists. They had a degree in reading and they still didn’t know how to teach kids with dyslexia, which just blows my mind that it just, how far behind the schools as ahead as we are in the States, how far behind we are. In education and what our kids need and how to teach them.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Absolutely. A colleague of mine just [00:04:00] posted on their social media space. Um, that if it doesn’t work in tier one, tier two and tier three will not fix it for our students. So it really needs to be integrated in. And I’m so delighted that special ed teachers are now realizing that this inclusion model is not just for the students.
It’s also for the. Professionals, the teachers, to include themselves in the Gen Ed setting to really support our neurodivergent learners.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: I love that you say that the tier one, tier two, tier three, because so many schools for those that don’t know is the interventions. And a lot of times schools like, well, we need to try tier two interventions first or we need to try tier three interventions.
And you’re right. A lot of times it’s the same interventions, just more of it. And If it doesn’t work the first time, it’s not going to keep, you know, like it just, it’s not going to work. Yes, absolutely. And there’s a lot of times that I’ll talk to clients and, and [00:05:00] potential clients about how much the school can do and how much the school can’t do.
Um, and the cost of having the school do it. you know, providing the services in the sense of now your child’s being pulled out and missing other instruction.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: That is, you named it. It is. So the more work, because what I love, the wonderful thing about educational therapist is we never stop learning. And the more that I learn about, um, the field of helping folks with neurodivergent succeed academically.
Is that access access is the critical component and really helping to, um, alleviate some of the stigma, the internalized and externalized stigma that our students in special ed often feel in, you know, Classroom settings. So pullout has has just some wonderful gifts and it has some issues as you named [00:06:00] because participating with their peers.
Once I got out of the classroom, I realized that Um, most of learning is social and that it is the peer relationships, the powerful communities that are built in classroom settings that really help accelerate learning for all learners and taking our students out of that is really a disservice in many cases.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Yeah, that’s so true. It’s it’s and I know you’re you’ve been in the education world as long as I have. It’s not a little bit longer and looking back of like when it used to be that A. D. H. D. Was considered a home problem. It’s not a school problem. It’s attention problem. That that that’s a home thing.
It’s not, you know, um, and even the social skills with autism as well. It’s like, those are social skills. It’s not a school problem.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes. So, yeah. So a lot of the best practices and I use that word advisedly because I don’t like the hierarchy in it, but the idea come from special education. and [00:07:00] have been integrated.
When I was a gen ed teacher, I was so excited to learn about the things that special ed teachers were doing and integrate them into my classroom for everybody because it’s that, that old cliche, a rising tide lifts all ships. And there are a lot of students who are so good. It’s that duck metaphor where everybody looks like they’re swimming along beautifully, but somebody’s paddling really, really hard underneath the surface.
And I And that if you are offering really beautiful universal design for learning, you know, scaffolding it for everybody, you will help those students as well, who often as they proceed in academics are identified with what I like to call like a stealth dyslexia, which suddenly appears in middle or high school or college.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Right. Yeah. No, I see that often because it’s a lot of times kids or, you know, what the, the, person that is, has the dyslexia is so bright in other ways that they can, they [00:08:00] cover it up so easily.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Absolutely. Our students are incredible compensators. So in the educational therapy program at Notre Dame de Nemours, I make a real, there are wonderful programs.
I don’t want to California has three wonderful programs. University of California, Santa Cruz Extension, but their professional education has a wonderful educational therapy program. Cal State University, Northridge also has a master’s in educational therapy. Santa Cruz’s doesn’t have a master’s, but there’s a pathway to come to NDNU afterwards if you want the master’s.
So I want to really honor my colleagues in the field here in California because the idea is that we’re helping folks who come from different places. Oftentimes folks come into a therapy programs because they have a family member. There are career switchers. They’ve really been working. They’ve, you know, they’ve got the binders for those IEP meetings.
You’ve seen them, Frances, with all the records. And they think, I want to know more about this. Another really exciting [00:09:00] place is the paraeducators, who are so dedicated to the students with whom they work in classroom settings, who would like to come into a program to learn more about it. So there’s all kinds of different entry points.
Um, not necessarily education, teachers. But I want to sort of focus in on the teacher part because I was so humbled when I became an ed therapist. I thought, Oh golly, how hard can this be? I teach 30 kids. I’m going to be working one to one. And it was really a lesson in humility because in a classroom setting teachers, if a child is a little bit dysregulated or oppositional or just having a tough time, you can sort of just give them a little space, work with another student, move across the room.
In an ed therapy session, you and your student are working together side by side and the intensity is, is quite something. So the lens and [00:10:00] sort of the practice of ed therapy is often different. And as sort of not an unlearning, what I say to teaching teachers is that they’re going to bring all their experiences, but it’s a different lens.
You’re looking specifically at one person’s experience in a classroom and seeing where their strengths are. You get to slow the whole process down in a way that unfortunately our teachers aren’t Really able to do in a classroom and you get to do a little bit of the foundational work that may be missing for your client to help them sort of get a much better structure of learning if I can use sort of a but there you go.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: No, it’s true because it’s the same thing. Like I’ve had kids that are middle school and just diagnosed with dyslexia. And I, I tell them flat out, I’m like, look, yes, you could pay me. I will go to the school. I will get you an amazing IEP with great services. But reality is [00:11:00] a middle school does not have the resources.
they don’t have the teacher staff to actually truly give your child what they need. Yes, if a child needs a reading help, they have to provide it. But there’s that, that, that balance there of now they’re going to miss some of their PE class or some of their art class or some of their math class or whatever it is being pulled out for it.
And it’s not going to be the intensity that your child needs to really bring them up where they need to be. Because I would say most of the time, The teachers that are providing the services, not to knock teachers at all, but they have, they’re limited. This is what they have to teach and how they have to teach it.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes, absolutely. And, and Frances, you know this and can speak to this, but my understanding is it’s pretty darn rare. The, the luxury of being able to work one to one, even when students are working with specialists and they’re wonderful specialists in the public schools and the independent schools, there’s some incredible people in the.
in the [00:12:00] field helping our neurodivergent learners. It’s usually in small groups, two to three. And there is a whole social aspect of learning, which we sort of alluded to earlier. Middle and high school, forget it.
They
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: are so sensitive and rightly so. It’s so developmentally appropriate to care more about what your peers think than your teachers and your parents.
Sorry. It’s true, but it’s reality. We know that. You know, and I think for older students who have experienced really unpleasant, um, unpleasant experiences in classrooms, there’s a lot of scar tissue and unpleasant is a euphemism. Some of them have experienced trauma in classroom settings. And I think we really want to celebrate, really celebrate.
And I think I’m excited, um, about this. Educational therapists come also as a way To offer hope [00:13:00] to these what Mary D. Sklar calls, um, wounded learners. This idea of, um, of a student who’s so defended, right? And the one to one offers them a safe space in which to take risks, which is where you’re doing some learning, right?
That famous zone of proximal development. without the peer gaze.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly. And it’s true. I mean, I say it all the time with middle school. Um, when I talk about what I taught and what I’ve taught, I said, I would go back to teaching anything except for middle school. I would scrub toilets before I would teach middle school again.
And I don’t do toilets, you know, because I just, middle school’s tough. I love the kids,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: right? Yes, absolutely. And, and most ed therapists, and certainly I was like this after I completed the program. And the lovely thing about the educational therapy program is it gives you a toolbox of strategies. You learn about, you know, The etiology, the [00:14:00] resources, the interventions for different learning differences.
Um, you learn about assessment, you learn about the principles of neuropsychology and education. Um, you have an opportunity to practice as a net therapist with training wheels. That’s the capstone class where you do an internship. You can. Learn reading strategies class, a math strategies class, tech and special ed.
So there’s a whole sort of giant toolbox. I started with K3 reading intervention as many people do. Older students tend, not always, but tend to be a little more complicated in general with learning differences because it’s been so tough. Um, and I shared absolutely middle school. I wouldn’t have touched it with a 10 foot pole.
And then there was my clinic, my clinic, the clinic for, um, students attached to an elementary and middle school for students with learning differences. And I fell in love with them. Middle schoolers are fearless. They are whole [00:15:00] hog, ready to roll the enthusiasm. Once you can tap into that, a passion or an enthusiasm.
The students are just ready to go. And I, I just adored them.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And I can see that on a one on one basis, but having 30 of them with all those hormones. A
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: hundred percent. It is. I have such deep, deep, the farther away I get from classroom teaching, um, the more respect I have for teachers. The work is incredibly rewarding and incredibly draining.
I mean, it is this roller coaster of experiences. Yes.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: I used to talk about it all the time when I was a teacher about, you know, basically you get the summer off. I’m like, you don’t understand. End of June, middle of June is when the summer, you know, school year ends. Now I have to make all of the doctors and dentists appointments.
Cause I didn’t do them all the school year and I need to decompress and get myself back into like, okay, I can [00:16:00] feel human again. I don’t have anything worried about it. Guess what? By the time we get there, I’ve got like two or three days till I have to be back to the new school year. You
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: know, like it just.
It is the rest, restore, recover, which as parents, we want our teachers to have access to that time. And also there was something I love attending the learning and the brain conferences there in San Francesco. I think New York also has one. Um, and I heard a speaker talk about, Oh, Mary Helen Imordino Yang is a neuroscientist.
I believe she’s at one of the UCS here. She may have moved around, but she talked about the default system of the brain, that when you’re doing those different things, you’re still processing. And I tell my students that. And actually, um, you know, there’s a lot of work around this in the space of learning where, when students get frustrated, instead of forcing them to finish whatever the task is, take a break, do some jumping jacks, take a Time your break, right?
Because you [00:17:00] want him to come back. Um, don’t get lost in a big fun video game, but that that that sort of resetting really helps, um, an open sort of the neurological, the neurological pathways, right? For thinking, do we all as adults? We do this too. We hit a wall. For me, it’s with tech
Frances Shefter, Esq.: and you know, it’s funny that you say that because it brought me back to, um, when I took the Kaplan course to take my LSAT for law school and how it was like, if you’re struggling, especially on the logic questions, cause they can be so intense.
And if you’re struggling, you need to stop, go to the next one and come back. And I remember when I was taking the exam, I was struggling, struggling, struggling. And finally I did stop. I went and did the other one. And when I came back to it, I was like, Oh, There it is. You know, just taking the brain off of it just gave me that time.
Now, unfortunately, I took too much time, so I ran out of time, couldn’t finish it. But it was just like that reality check of [00:18:00] we all get so focused on like getting it done, getting it done, getting it done. Whereas sometimes if you take a step back, it’s going to take
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: you half the time. Absolutely. And educational therapists can go into IEP meetings.
And I really, one of my lectures is first, do no harm, you know, be very careful to be respectful of all the allied professionals in the room, because everybody’s working really hard for. the success of a student. It may not appear like that on the surface, especially if there’s some history, you know, that families have with a particular school or even an individual.
Um, it’s really important, but, but there’s this way part of the role of an educational therapist is often helping to case manage, maybe a little bit in the background. by creating some relationships with the teachers who are working with their clients to really support them. Because the other piece I think that’s really important, and I know other therapists have talked to with you about this, is that educational [00:19:00] therapy in the one to one session is fantastic.
And if student is making progress in that setting, that’s really helping them feel more confident. But if it doesn’t transfer to the class classroom, it’s really not, not what we want. We want it to transfer into sort of a generalized experience with other students because that’s, that’s really where the rubber hits the road.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Right, exactly.
Educational Therapy vs. Tutoring
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And then, you know, I want to go back a little bit because I know we’ve talked about educational therapy and I know a lot of people is like, oh, it’s tutoring, but it’s not tutoring. Well,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: yes. Well, so So I want to be cautious here, but because many tutors have taken additional classes and have gone to graduate school and learned about learning.
So there are certainly tutors who have pursued um, learning more about the brain and how people learn, right? And when the, when things get difficult. Tutors in general, in general, focus on specific subject areas. [00:20:00] So reading, and they’re really focused on that. An educational therapist looks at a student more holistically and sort of looks under the hood to see what are the things that are making the engine of learning stall.
You know, where is the spark plug not firing? So, so, and And have gone to graduate school to kind of study these components of learning right where they are. And, and as I said, many tutors have pursued this also, but a tutor is generally someone who really knows chemistry and really knows reading and really knows math, and they may.
Not have been exposed to or learned about the, um, the things, the learning issues that get in the way. ADHD, ADHD, anxiety, ADHD, anxiety, dyslexia, ADHD, anxiety, dyslexia, dyscalculia, because there’s so many overlapping challenges that many of our students experience. [00:21:00] And, um, and so, so an ed therapist is really looking at.
a student to see where are they just such, what are their strengths? It’s a strengths based approach to use those strengths to leverage them to support their areas of weakness or challenge.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: So it’s more holistic. Yeah. And it’s not to knock tutors. I know, you know, I used to tutor also. It’s like, Oh, well, I, you know, I teach, I teach high school math.
So I can teach your kid. I can tutor in math. Well. Yeah, you probably can. But if it’s a child with learning differences, you might not be able to because how you’ve always taught it isn’t going to work
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: the thing. Yes. And this is why, like those incredible professors in college who were so brilliant at their topic.
If you were a struggling student in their class, they just couldn’t even understand what was going on with you. And therapists, Struggling students, we love them, bring them, we’re going to find how to help them. [00:22:00] And that’s the piece, I think, um, being an expert in your subject doesn’t necessarily mean you know the different, um, the different, Caroline Tomlinson, I believe, has this metaphor of Finding the on ramp.
So ed therapists help find the on ramp, the differentiation, which a lot of teachers are excellent at doing. And probably tutors, too. But, but ed therapists are specifically trained to look for those on ramps for learners who are struggling.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And so for ed therapists, I mean, is it like anybody can say they’re a tutor?
Is that the same with ed therapists? Or is there an actual degree or license or something
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: of that sort? So thank you. That’s a really good point. Yes. Anyone can say they’re an educational therapist. What parents need to look at is where were they trained? Were they trained in? So the three programs I mentioned earlier are all association of educational therapists approved.
They have reviewed the programs. There are certain classes that the association of [00:23:00] educational therapists really, um, I think are essential, right? These are the classes to make you an ed therapist. We have a very robust code of ethics because at this point it’s certification. We are, as an organization, looking at licensure.
So that is definitely going to be in the future, I believe, of the profession.
Understanding Educational Therapist Credentials
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: But what parents should be looking for is where did the educational therapist train? The higher levels of membership in the Association of Educational Therapists, for instance, the educational therapist professional level is a registered mark, as is the board certification, which is the highest level.
Board certified educational therapists have taken an exam, they’ve done a case study, and that’s the highest level. So if you see a B C E T, with a little R next to it, you know, that person has completed that level of training. If you see an E T slash P, that’s what I have. I didn’t put the R on. Um, it should be there.
It’s [00:24:00] in my signature. Um, that means that, that, that I’ve, Completed that. So I think that sort of asking, I think it’s always good to be an informed consumer about anything. And so finding out if someone is an educational therapist where they’ve been trained the Association for Educational Therapists as a website that improves almost um, You know, on a monthly basis, it gets better and better.
And there’s a find an educational therapist. If you’re looking for someone and you find them on their website, you know, they’ve been through one of the approved programs.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Yeah. That’s good to know.
The Role of Tutors vs. Educational Therapists
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Cause I know, I mean, and, and not knocking tutors or anything. Sometimes it is, you know, a kid struggling in just that fifth grade math.
They can’t get over that hump of whatever they’re learning. Great. A tutor will work, but if your child’s struggling as a whole, then you might want to look at an educational therapist.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: And often, yes. Often, tutors are a great starting place for, for students. Um, it’s the right way to [00:25:00] do it, but for children and often teenagers and often, you know, us college students, you know, there’s an aversion to the things, you know, kids have emotional responses to learning and, Ed therapists understand the emotional components.
We’re not psychologists. We don’t diagnose, don’t give medication, none of that. We’re therapists the way physical therapists or occupational therapists are therapists. We help students practice, right? Like a PT will help you practice something. Um, and our realm is academic. So, so a tutor is a great place to start educational therapy.
I used to say it was like the platinum level, but that sort of sounds again, I’m trying to get away from the hierarchy. It’s not necessarily a starting place, but it is someone who will understand deeply what is involved in the learning. The other piece is ed therapists specialized, right? Like PTs and OTs, you know, this is what they do.
Um, some are reading specialists. Some are math [00:26:00] specialists. Um, executive functioning is a huge area.
Strategies for Effective Learning
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Really, um, I have in my tiny practice now I work with high school students in my private practice and, um, most of the work is around learning how to learn. How do you set yourself up for success? The kind of time management, um, task initiation, how do you get yourself to do something that you really don’t want to do?
Um, one way I talk with it with students, um, both in the ed therapy program and in my, it’s really nice, it’s sort of like the lab, um, but is to say you’re the scientist of your own learning. So you’re going to try on some strategies to see if they work. Don’t try them just for a day. Give it a week, give it two weeks.
Let’s come back and talk about it. Um, but to really help our clients, um, take some ownership and have some agency. You probably see this [00:27:00] Frances in, in your clients. There’s a way that, um, sometimes students feel very passive in the system and don’t feel that they have a voice. And I think that ed therapists can often help students who feel a little bit helpless begin to take some agency in their own learning to get some independence and critically to self advocate
Frances Shefter, Esq.: and get the buy in because we can plan and do whatever we want.
If the kid’s not involved and doesn’t want to, you know, Absolutely. I’ve
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: had to learn with some clients who are really expert at avoiding and getting people to do things, you know, um, well, I kind of got stuck here and I’ll say, Oh, what do you think you want to do next? I had this very aha moment this summer.
We were traveling [00:28:00] and my older daughter was teaching me how to use Google maps. to sort of find your way around. And we were in another city and it was pretty unfamiliar. And I said, well, the blue on the, uh, the dot that’s me is not going where the blue line is going. And my daughter said, huh, isn’t that interesting?
I wonder what you’re going to do. And I went, Oh my goodness, this is exactly what I do with my clients. This is exactly what I encourage my Ed Therapist students to do, is to sit back. Anne Gordon, who’s a wonderful psychologist and Ed Therapist, she says, Never work harder than your clients. So there’s a way that you really, and, and I, I think there is this, we’re in helping professions.
There is an impulse to kind of scoop in and rescue. But we’re not doing our clients or our children and students any service. For by taking away their agency.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: I was going to say as parents also, we still want to make it better and solve the problem, but [00:29:00] your child’s not going to learn how to solve problems if they’re never given the opportunity to solve problems.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes. That concept of productive struggle, right? I just reminding myself, sit back, even with older. Older children, it’s true too, but I always, I always felt so, as a parent of a child who had some challenges in classroom settings, I always wanted to rescue. And that impulse, while, you know, completely understandable, does not help the learning and it helps the student feel more and more disempowered.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly. And and helpless and and that it’s a disability instead of working on the strains. It’s a
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: different way of learning. Um, uh, one of my another colleague, B. B. P. R. I. S. whom would be a great person to interview is really, you know, the stigma associated with learning differently is beginning to dissolve a little bit.
And I think in our culture, in our [00:30:00] American culture, I should say, that’s the one I know. Um, And so just to celebrate that, but to really think about what are the strategies that are going to help you and how to honor difference.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Yeah. So true. Cause our brains all work differently.
Finding the Right Educational Therapist
Frances Shefter, Esq.: So I want to bring it around to like for parents, for any parents that might be listening and they’re going, okay, so great.
Sounds good. But what do I need? How do I know? Like, how would a parent know? Do they need an educational therapist? Do they need a tutor? Do they need something else? Like, what, what’s that, that key for parents to look for?
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: So I think there’s, there’s two things. It’s, it’s, is, is homework a battleground? So, um, I think that really looking at your child’s emotional responses to learning, do they have a fit?
When the math folder comes out, does the teacher report that they’re [00:31:00] having, um, challenge finishing something? So production is often a clue in the early years and any behavioral report that you get from your classroom, um, Ross Green says kids do well if they can. And if they can’t, it’s because of lagging skills and unsolved problems.
And so one of the things to really be kind of aware of like everybody has a bad day. Sometimes I will even admit where I’m not my best beautiful self with my partner. So, but if there’s kind of a pattern where it seems like the teacher saying that a particular subject is. is, is really difficult. If your child reports that they just despise something, um, you know, kind of put your listening ears on, um, one of our founders of Ed Therapy, Dorothy Ungerleider, talks about the third ear.
Um, and so [00:32:00] really, you know, kind of, Think about that. So it’s sort of child report, teacher report, parent observation. It just seems unnecessarily hard. Then there may be not always, but there may be an underlying learning difficulty that could be, you know, I think the first step really is is meeting with the teachers and and talking and an assessment right to sort of untangle this.
Um, where, what areas is the student struggling with and then, you know, start with what the professional, if it’s a neuropsychologist or your psycho ed team, the teachers will say, Oh, there’s this great tutor. Try them, right? Like, listen to the referrals. Um, and, or maybe there’s an educational therapist.
Sometimes people will talk with their neighbors. Oh, my child was really helped by this therapist. I mean, Ed therapists work with children from kindergarten through graduate school. I have [00:33:00] another colleague who works exclusively with ADHD, folks with ADHD who are young adults and adults. So, you know, there’s a whole panoply of professionals that are available.
One of the things I’m so excited about the Notre Dame de Namur program is now that it’s 100 percent virtual, we have students from all over the country. And EdTherapy tends to be coastal, but don’t give up hope because there are students coming who are from different parts of the country. Um, and there’s a lot of remote.
educational therapy. So it used to be that it was a pretty rare ed therapist pre COVID who did virtual ed therapy. There were folks who did it, but now it’s much more prevalent. It’s,
Frances Shefter, Esq.: it’s, since COVID, almost everything has been Now it’s acceptable to be virtual for so many things,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: and parents should know that for young Children, I really recommend [00:34:00] K three.
If you can do in person, that’s absolutely the best. And for some older Children, you have to kind of know your child. When I meet students, my private practice is virtual. It really is. Can we connect through the screen? I’m pretty confident I can connect to people through a screen. And there are some students who are just like, Nope, been there, done that, never wanted to be caught on a screen again.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: No, it’s so true because it’s, it works for some and it doesn’t work for some, you know, it’s, it’s sad over here in Montgomery County, they just got rid of the virtual academy. And it’s so, it’s going to be so tough because I have a lot of clients now coming to me because their kid, that was the only environment their kid was thriving in.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: And so now what? That’s really interesting because I’ve heard and my own godson with who is a child with high functioning autism, and he was, I think, in end of high school college during, um, COVID, and he loved it. He felt [00:35:00] so safe socially. He felt like he was in charge. There was a whole thing. And I’m not saying that every child with autism thrives in a virtual setting.
This particular. Um, student did. It was fascinating to me. So, yeah,
Frances Shefter, Esq.: exactly. Yeah, it’s so hard. It’s um, so, so when people are looking and they, they say, okay, I need to find an educational therapist. I know you said, um, you know, there’s a lot of resources you can go and we’ll probably have those links in the show notes of where to find and stuff.
What’s the best way, like when interviewing Educational therapist, what’s the best way to help match an educational therapist with your child to make sure it’s a good fit? So
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: I think that I think that it’s, it’s a both and both the parents and the child or young adult need to like to feel comfortable.
There’s a, so, so trust your gut, right? The brain and your stomach pay attention. When a parent [00:36:00] interviews. or a guardian, interviews, and a therapist. Really see how, how do you feel, right? Um, I think the other thing is what, what do you really lay your cards out on the table? What are you hoping to get in my intake form?
And I recommend that my students do this too in their intake forms. Ask, ask the family or guardians, what’s the goal? Make sure you’re a match out the gate. If you are looking for reading fluency or reading comprehension. And this is someone who really wants to work on handwriting. Probably not. And I’m not saying that’s necessarily true, but I make sure that you have a good communication around what the expectations are.
Um, it is not an instant fix. What I say to my ed therapy students is that ed therapy is glacial in pace. But it sticks. So think about how powerful a glacier is, right? Grinds mountains, [00:37:00] but it takes a really long time. So when, what’s really important is, is, is, as a parent to manage your expectations, because a lot of people think, Oh, well, uh, This is more expensive than tutoring.
It’s going to work like this, right? But, and we’re so used to that in our culture. The gift of educational therapy is to go, I think this is a Norton Gillingham quote, but as fast as you can, but as slow as you must.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: That makes sense. It makes sense. And that’s the one on one you pace as with the child or the young adult.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: And then with your, your child, you know, ask your child to give it a go, right? Give it a go, give it a couple of weeks, see how it feels, see how it’s going. It takes a while to build relationships, but And remember, ed therapists are asking students to do things that are intrinsically difficult, right?
They’re not going to start out. Ed therapists use lots of games. It’s joyful. You know, the dopamine dump in learning is a real [00:38:00] thing, and ed therapists are fully aware of that. Um, but I think parents need to sort of see where’s the expertise of this person. How do I feel? You know, do we have a good relationship?
Um, what, what do they see, you know, really have that initial dialogue. I’m very careful. to encourage students and do this myself to really help manage expectations, both on the ed therapists part, but also on the family’s part that you’re meeting, you’re really understanding because goals change, right?
Kids meet goals. So you set some new goals, but it’s a communication. Peace.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And, and I, you know, I’m just thinking like going back on the parent side of, um, if your child does not like going to a therapy. And after a few times, like they take that step back and double check. Is it that your child just doesn’t want to do the task or is it just not the right fit?
Because if your child’s right, if your child’s not [00:39:00] wanting to go, not wanting to go.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes, absolutely. I would say, give it a go. Agree with your child, have a meeting with your child and say, we’re going to try this and get your child’s, like you said earlier, buy it. So how, you know, it, What do you think is a reasonable amount of time?
I mean, kids really know themselves, you know, one time. No, that’s really not fair to either the child or the therapist or the family, right? But what seems to be the, the buy in, um, the thing and, and for the most part, it kids, It’s back to every child wants, we all want to succeed. We want to do well in school and to really lay out this is someone who is going to help give you strategies to try.
Again, don’t over promise it to the child, right? If a child’s been struggling with reading, it’s not like they’re going to make your eating easy for you. They’re going to teach you some strategies to help with. Right? So it’s how it’s [00:40:00] presented. I’d encourage parents to talk with the therapist about how to present this.
Um, how to talk to their child about it if they’re a little uncomfortable about it. And a hundred percent Frances, if the child after four or six sessions that, you know, I leave it to the parents to decide is really resistant. No, it’s not a good fit. And that does happen. That totally happens.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And there’s nothing wrong with the child.
There’s nothing wrong with a therapist. It’s
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: just a little late. Absolutely. It’s just not a good fit. And the glory of it is in school, right? You always are going to have teachers you resonate more with and ones that you don’t. And that’s kind of something I talk with clients about is this is just to normalize it.
And at therapy, you don’t have to go, you know, it should be a joyful experience
Frances Shefter, Esq.: because it’s, if it’s not, then you’re, it’s, it’s a waste of time.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Well, we don’t learn when we’re not happy.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly. Exactly. So with, I’m just thinking about like one of the [00:41:00] things that was going through my head is that, okay, so you teach at the program to do your master’s degree.
Is there like, if parents are like, oh, this sounds really interesting. I want to learn more. Is there like a course they could take that they can learn the techniques? Well,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: this is something that’s a really good question. I think that there might be in what I have found with students. So I do a lot of before people even apply to the program at NDNU.
I see. meet with them for an hour to talk about what’s bringing them to be interested in it. And then I kind of, for full transparency, here’s the class, here’s when they meet, and I go through the whole, um, program. Each class, I talk about each class, so they know exactly what it is. Um, I, I think that unlike some things like Barton, you know, you can get trained in Barton for reading, um, making math real.
A lot of parents have gotten trained in making math real. Educational therapy is a profession. [00:42:00] So it’s, um, but, so there’s a both and the education for educational therapy, a E T online, all one word. org has a wealth of information about the profession. There’s an, a fact sheet at the bottom of the homepage.
There’s a fact sheet that says exactly all the things that therapists do and, and parents. should see if they resonate with it because it’s exactly so many parents have come come to this because they’re like I’m really interested in it. So, This is definitely something students will say, this is what I’ve been looking for.
I think parents will know if they want to pursue it, but there’s certainly lots of avenues. I think that the Santa Cruz extension program, you can take one class. I don’t think that you have to commit yourself to the whole thing for the certificate. So there are, are definitely avenues. So sort of yes. And.[00:43:00]
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Got it. So if people want to get in touch with you or if they have questions or they want to get into your program, what’s the best way for people to contact you or to figure out how to get into the program?
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: So, Notre Dame de Nemours University, ndnu. edu Um, under education, there’s a, uh, master’s in special education will come up.
There’s an education credential program at NDNU and the master’s in educational therapy is part of that. And then my, my email is just. P for Polly, Mayer, M A Y E R, at N D N U dot E D U.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Great, thank you so much. This has been so awesome and so informative, because it’s just, like, from the other, you know, teaching teachers, um, the other point of view, it’s been so awesome.
Thank you so much for being on the show.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Oh, you’re welcome. I am, I’m thrilled to be here, and it’s, it’s been a delight. Thank you, Frances.
Voice-Over: You’ve been listening to Stress-Free IEP®with [00:44:00] your host, Frances Shefter. Remember, you do not need to do it all alone. You can reach Frances through ShefterLaw. com, where prior episodes are also posted. Thank you for your positive reviews, comments, and sharing the show with others through YouTube, LinkedIn, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, and more.
Supporting Learning Through Educational Therapy with Polly Mayer
Stress-Free IEP® with Frances Shefter, Episode 67
In this episode of Stress-Free IEP®, Frances Shefter speaks with Polly Mayer, Associate Professor of Education and Director of the Masters of Arts in Educational Therapy Program at Notre Dame de Namur University. Polly brings a wealth of experience, having spent 25 years as a classroom teacher and now dedicating her career to teaching educational therapists. Polly’s journey into educational therapy began with her curiosity about neurodiverse students and how best to support them in academic settings. As a parent of a neurodiverse child herself, Polly has a personal understanding of the challenges and rewards of special education.
Episode’s Key Takeaways:
Learn more about Polly Mayer:
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Stress-Free IEP®:
Frances Shefter is an Education Attorney and Advocate who is committed to helping her clients have a Stress-Free IEP® experience. In each podcast, Frances interviews inspiring people to share information, educate you, empower you and help you get the knowledge you need.
Watch more episodes of Stress-Free IEP®:
Connect and learn more from your host, Frances Shefter:
Read the whole transcript:
Voice-Over: Do it all alone with your host, Frances Shefter, principal of Shefter Law. You can get more details and catch prior episodes at www. Shefterlaw. com. The Stress-Free IEP®video podcast is also posted on YouTube and LinkedIn, and you can listen to episodes through Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, and more.
Now, here’s the host of Stress-Free IEP®, Frances Shefter.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Hello, everyone, and welcome to the show. So today’s guest, we’re going actually a little bit different than usual, um, because Polly Mayer, she’s an associate professor of education and the director of the Masters of Arts. educational therapy program at Notre Dame de Namur University. And so why I say it’s a little bit different is because Polly actually teaches educational therapists, which is such a great, um, [00:01:00] I don’t know, I thought it was just so great because now we can see like what makes a good educational therapist and so forth from the teaching standpoint.
So Polly, please introduce yourself a little bit more, let us know, let everyone know a little bit more about you.
Polly Mayer’s Background and Journey
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Hi, so I’m so happy to be here, Frances. Thank you for having me. Yes. So I was a classroom teacher for 25 years. Like many people in the profession, I came from education. That’s not the only way people enter into the educational therapy profession, but it’s definitely one of the pathways.
Uh, and I’m the parent of a neuro diverse. Um, so I have a daughter who is a young adult now who herself is a special education teacher with a master’s. So I always encourage people to take the long view because it’s a journey. Um, so, and she’s an incredible teacher and a wonderful person, and I have another daughter who is an assistant district attorney.
So I have two. Daughters who are in service to their communities, which is pretty exciting. So anyway, long story short, I was [00:02:00] curious about the children who, quote unquote, hid under the table when it was time for reading. I felt like my teaching program, as wonderful as it was, did not prepare me just teach neurodiverse students and I wanted to figure out strategies to reach them, to make them feel comfortable, safe, and most importantly, succeed academically.
Someone told me about a wonderful educational therapy program at Holy Names University. And I had the privilege of attending, getting my master’s there, starting to work as an educational therapist. I was the director of an educational therapy clinic at Raskob Learning Institute at Holy Names University in Oakland.
California. I worked there for 10 years and while keeping a very small, I like to call it boutique private practice, and then was invited to become the director of the program that Marion Marshall, whom I know you’ve had on your program, so incredibly led for decades. And I’ve just [00:03:00] had the delight in teaching future educational therapists and sharing my passion for supporting families, guardians.
Relatives and people themselves in the classroom setting from elementary school through graduate school. Because a true learning challenge doesn’t necessarily disappear with adulthood.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly.
Challenges in Special Education
Frances Shefter, Esq.: It’s, you know, it’s interesting because there’s been like such a theme of people that have become educational therapists, especially and how most of, as you said, we’re teachers and Didn’t know how to teach special ed kids.
And we had the same thing with reading specialists. They had a degree in reading and they still didn’t know how to teach kids with dyslexia, which just blows my mind that it just, how far behind the schools as ahead as we are in the States, how far behind we are. In education and what our kids need and how to teach them.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Absolutely. A colleague of mine just [00:04:00] posted on their social media space. Um, that if it doesn’t work in tier one, tier two and tier three will not fix it for our students. So it really needs to be integrated in. And I’m so delighted that special ed teachers are now realizing that this inclusion model is not just for the students.
It’s also for the. Professionals, the teachers, to include themselves in the Gen Ed setting to really support our neurodivergent learners.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: I love that you say that the tier one, tier two, tier three, because so many schools for those that don’t know is the interventions. And a lot of times schools like, well, we need to try tier two interventions first or we need to try tier three interventions.
And you’re right. A lot of times it’s the same interventions, just more of it. And If it doesn’t work the first time, it’s not going to keep, you know, like it just, it’s not going to work. Yes, absolutely. And there’s a lot of times that I’ll talk to clients and, and [00:05:00] potential clients about how much the school can do and how much the school can’t do.
Um, and the cost of having the school do it. you know, providing the services in the sense of now your child’s being pulled out and missing other instruction.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: That is, you named it. It is. So the more work, because what I love, the wonderful thing about educational therapist is we never stop learning. And the more that I learn about, um, the field of helping folks with neurodivergent succeed academically.
Is that access access is the critical component and really helping to, um, alleviate some of the stigma, the internalized and externalized stigma that our students in special ed often feel in, you know, Classroom settings. So pullout has has just some wonderful gifts and it has some issues as you named [00:06:00] because participating with their peers.
Once I got out of the classroom, I realized that Um, most of learning is social and that it is the peer relationships, the powerful communities that are built in classroom settings that really help accelerate learning for all learners and taking our students out of that is really a disservice in many cases.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Yeah, that’s so true. It’s it’s and I know you’re you’ve been in the education world as long as I have. It’s not a little bit longer and looking back of like when it used to be that A. D. H. D. Was considered a home problem. It’s not a school problem. It’s attention problem. That that that’s a home thing.
It’s not, you know, um, and even the social skills with autism as well. It’s like, those are social skills. It’s not a school problem.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes. So, yeah. So a lot of the best practices and I use that word advisedly because I don’t like the hierarchy in it, but the idea come from special education. and [00:07:00] have been integrated.
When I was a gen ed teacher, I was so excited to learn about the things that special ed teachers were doing and integrate them into my classroom for everybody because it’s that, that old cliche, a rising tide lifts all ships. And there are a lot of students who are so good. It’s that duck metaphor where everybody looks like they’re swimming along beautifully, but somebody’s paddling really, really hard underneath the surface.
And I And that if you are offering really beautiful universal design for learning, you know, scaffolding it for everybody, you will help those students as well, who often as they proceed in academics are identified with what I like to call like a stealth dyslexia, which suddenly appears in middle or high school or college.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Right. Yeah. No, I see that often because it’s a lot of times kids or, you know, what the, the, person that is, has the dyslexia is so bright in other ways that they can, they [00:08:00] cover it up so easily.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Absolutely. Our students are incredible compensators. So in the educational therapy program at Notre Dame de Nemours, I make a real, there are wonderful programs.
I don’t want to California has three wonderful programs. University of California, Santa Cruz Extension, but their professional education has a wonderful educational therapy program. Cal State University, Northridge also has a master’s in educational therapy. Santa Cruz’s doesn’t have a master’s, but there’s a pathway to come to NDNU afterwards if you want the master’s.
So I want to really honor my colleagues in the field here in California because the idea is that we’re helping folks who come from different places. Oftentimes folks come into a therapy programs because they have a family member. There are career switchers. They’ve really been working. They’ve, you know, they’ve got the binders for those IEP meetings.
You’ve seen them, Frances, with all the records. And they think, I want to know more about this. Another really exciting [00:09:00] place is the paraeducators, who are so dedicated to the students with whom they work in classroom settings, who would like to come into a program to learn more about it. So there’s all kinds of different entry points.
Um, not necessarily education, teachers. But I want to sort of focus in on the teacher part because I was so humbled when I became an ed therapist. I thought, Oh golly, how hard can this be? I teach 30 kids. I’m going to be working one to one. And it was really a lesson in humility because in a classroom setting teachers, if a child is a little bit dysregulated or oppositional or just having a tough time, you can sort of just give them a little space, work with another student, move across the room.
In an ed therapy session, you and your student are working together side by side and the intensity is, is quite something. So the lens and [00:10:00] sort of the practice of ed therapy is often different. And as sort of not an unlearning, what I say to teaching teachers is that they’re going to bring all their experiences, but it’s a different lens.
You’re looking specifically at one person’s experience in a classroom and seeing where their strengths are. You get to slow the whole process down in a way that unfortunately our teachers aren’t Really able to do in a classroom and you get to do a little bit of the foundational work that may be missing for your client to help them sort of get a much better structure of learning if I can use sort of a but there you go.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: No, it’s true because it’s the same thing. Like I’ve had kids that are middle school and just diagnosed with dyslexia. And I, I tell them flat out, I’m like, look, yes, you could pay me. I will go to the school. I will get you an amazing IEP with great services. But reality is [00:11:00] a middle school does not have the resources.
they don’t have the teacher staff to actually truly give your child what they need. Yes, if a child needs a reading help, they have to provide it. But there’s that, that, that balance there of now they’re going to miss some of their PE class or some of their art class or some of their math class or whatever it is being pulled out for it.
And it’s not going to be the intensity that your child needs to really bring them up where they need to be. Because I would say most of the time, The teachers that are providing the services, not to knock teachers at all, but they have, they’re limited. This is what they have to teach and how they have to teach it.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes, absolutely. And, and Frances, you know this and can speak to this, but my understanding is it’s pretty darn rare. The, the luxury of being able to work one to one, even when students are working with specialists and they’re wonderful specialists in the public schools and the independent schools, there’s some incredible people in the.
in the [00:12:00] field helping our neurodivergent learners. It’s usually in small groups, two to three. And there is a whole social aspect of learning, which we sort of alluded to earlier. Middle and high school, forget it.
They
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: are so sensitive and rightly so. It’s so developmentally appropriate to care more about what your peers think than your teachers and your parents.
Sorry. It’s true, but it’s reality. We know that. You know, and I think for older students who have experienced really unpleasant, um, unpleasant experiences in classrooms, there’s a lot of scar tissue and unpleasant is a euphemism. Some of them have experienced trauma in classroom settings. And I think we really want to celebrate, really celebrate.
And I think I’m excited, um, about this. Educational therapists come also as a way To offer hope [00:13:00] to these what Mary D. Sklar calls, um, wounded learners. This idea of, um, of a student who’s so defended, right? And the one to one offers them a safe space in which to take risks, which is where you’re doing some learning, right?
That famous zone of proximal development. without the peer gaze.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly. And it’s true. I mean, I say it all the time with middle school. Um, when I talk about what I taught and what I’ve taught, I said, I would go back to teaching anything except for middle school. I would scrub toilets before I would teach middle school again.
And I don’t do toilets, you know, because I just, middle school’s tough. I love the kids,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: right? Yes, absolutely. And, and most ed therapists, and certainly I was like this after I completed the program. And the lovely thing about the educational therapy program is it gives you a toolbox of strategies. You learn about, you know, The etiology, the [00:14:00] resources, the interventions for different learning differences.
Um, you learn about assessment, you learn about the principles of neuropsychology and education. Um, you have an opportunity to practice as a net therapist with training wheels. That’s the capstone class where you do an internship. You can. Learn reading strategies class, a math strategies class, tech and special ed.
So there’s a whole sort of giant toolbox. I started with K3 reading intervention as many people do. Older students tend, not always, but tend to be a little more complicated in general with learning differences because it’s been so tough. Um, and I shared absolutely middle school. I wouldn’t have touched it with a 10 foot pole.
And then there was my clinic, my clinic, the clinic for, um, students attached to an elementary and middle school for students with learning differences. And I fell in love with them. Middle schoolers are fearless. They are whole [00:15:00] hog, ready to roll the enthusiasm. Once you can tap into that, a passion or an enthusiasm.
The students are just ready to go. And I, I just adored them.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And I can see that on a one on one basis, but having 30 of them with all those hormones. A
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: hundred percent. It is. I have such deep, deep, the farther away I get from classroom teaching, um, the more respect I have for teachers. The work is incredibly rewarding and incredibly draining.
I mean, it is this roller coaster of experiences. Yes.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: I used to talk about it all the time when I was a teacher about, you know, basically you get the summer off. I’m like, you don’t understand. End of June, middle of June is when the summer, you know, school year ends. Now I have to make all of the doctors and dentists appointments.
Cause I didn’t do them all the school year and I need to decompress and get myself back into like, okay, I can [00:16:00] feel human again. I don’t have anything worried about it. Guess what? By the time we get there, I’ve got like two or three days till I have to be back to the new school year. You
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: know, like it just.
It is the rest, restore, recover, which as parents, we want our teachers to have access to that time. And also there was something I love attending the learning and the brain conferences there in San Francesco. I think New York also has one. Um, and I heard a speaker talk about, Oh, Mary Helen Imordino Yang is a neuroscientist.
I believe she’s at one of the UCS here. She may have moved around, but she talked about the default system of the brain, that when you’re doing those different things, you’re still processing. And I tell my students that. And actually, um, you know, there’s a lot of work around this in the space of learning where, when students get frustrated, instead of forcing them to finish whatever the task is, take a break, do some jumping jacks, take a Time your break, right?
Because you [00:17:00] want him to come back. Um, don’t get lost in a big fun video game, but that that that sort of resetting really helps, um, an open sort of the neurological, the neurological pathways, right? For thinking, do we all as adults? We do this too. We hit a wall. For me, it’s with tech
Frances Shefter, Esq.: and you know, it’s funny that you say that because it brought me back to, um, when I took the Kaplan course to take my LSAT for law school and how it was like, if you’re struggling, especially on the logic questions, cause they can be so intense.
And if you’re struggling, you need to stop, go to the next one and come back. And I remember when I was taking the exam, I was struggling, struggling, struggling. And finally I did stop. I went and did the other one. And when I came back to it, I was like, Oh, There it is. You know, just taking the brain off of it just gave me that time.
Now, unfortunately, I took too much time, so I ran out of time, couldn’t finish it. But it was just like that reality check of [00:18:00] we all get so focused on like getting it done, getting it done, getting it done. Whereas sometimes if you take a step back, it’s going to take
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: you half the time. Absolutely. And educational therapists can go into IEP meetings.
And I really, one of my lectures is first, do no harm, you know, be very careful to be respectful of all the allied professionals in the room, because everybody’s working really hard for. the success of a student. It may not appear like that on the surface, especially if there’s some history, you know, that families have with a particular school or even an individual.
Um, it’s really important, but, but there’s this way part of the role of an educational therapist is often helping to case manage, maybe a little bit in the background. by creating some relationships with the teachers who are working with their clients to really support them. Because the other piece I think that’s really important, and I know other therapists have talked to with you about this, is that educational [00:19:00] therapy in the one to one session is fantastic.
And if student is making progress in that setting, that’s really helping them feel more confident. But if it doesn’t transfer to the class classroom, it’s really not, not what we want. We want it to transfer into sort of a generalized experience with other students because that’s, that’s really where the rubber hits the road.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Right, exactly.
Educational Therapy vs. Tutoring
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And then, you know, I want to go back a little bit because I know we’ve talked about educational therapy and I know a lot of people is like, oh, it’s tutoring, but it’s not tutoring. Well,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: yes. Well, so So I want to be cautious here, but because many tutors have taken additional classes and have gone to graduate school and learned about learning.
So there are certainly tutors who have pursued um, learning more about the brain and how people learn, right? And when the, when things get difficult. Tutors in general, in general, focus on specific subject areas. [00:20:00] So reading, and they’re really focused on that. An educational therapist looks at a student more holistically and sort of looks under the hood to see what are the things that are making the engine of learning stall.
You know, where is the spark plug not firing? So, so, and And have gone to graduate school to kind of study these components of learning right where they are. And, and as I said, many tutors have pursued this also, but a tutor is generally someone who really knows chemistry and really knows reading and really knows math, and they may.
Not have been exposed to or learned about the, um, the things, the learning issues that get in the way. ADHD, ADHD, anxiety, ADHD, anxiety, dyslexia, ADHD, anxiety, dyslexia, dyscalculia, because there’s so many overlapping challenges that many of our students experience. [00:21:00] And, um, and so, so an ed therapist is really looking at.
a student to see where are they just such, what are their strengths? It’s a strengths based approach to use those strengths to leverage them to support their areas of weakness or challenge.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: So it’s more holistic. Yeah. And it’s not to knock tutors. I know, you know, I used to tutor also. It’s like, Oh, well, I, you know, I teach, I teach high school math.
So I can teach your kid. I can tutor in math. Well. Yeah, you probably can. But if it’s a child with learning differences, you might not be able to because how you’ve always taught it isn’t going to work
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: the thing. Yes. And this is why, like those incredible professors in college who were so brilliant at their topic.
If you were a struggling student in their class, they just couldn’t even understand what was going on with you. And therapists, Struggling students, we love them, bring them, we’re going to find how to help them. [00:22:00] And that’s the piece, I think, um, being an expert in your subject doesn’t necessarily mean you know the different, um, the different, Caroline Tomlinson, I believe, has this metaphor of Finding the on ramp.
So ed therapists help find the on ramp, the differentiation, which a lot of teachers are excellent at doing. And probably tutors, too. But, but ed therapists are specifically trained to look for those on ramps for learners who are struggling.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And so for ed therapists, I mean, is it like anybody can say they’re a tutor?
Is that the same with ed therapists? Or is there an actual degree or license or something
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: of that sort? So thank you. That’s a really good point. Yes. Anyone can say they’re an educational therapist. What parents need to look at is where were they trained? Were they trained in? So the three programs I mentioned earlier are all association of educational therapists approved.
They have reviewed the programs. There are certain classes that the association of [00:23:00] educational therapists really, um, I think are essential, right? These are the classes to make you an ed therapist. We have a very robust code of ethics because at this point it’s certification. We are, as an organization, looking at licensure.
So that is definitely going to be in the future, I believe, of the profession.
Understanding Educational Therapist Credentials
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: But what parents should be looking for is where did the educational therapist train? The higher levels of membership in the Association of Educational Therapists, for instance, the educational therapist professional level is a registered mark, as is the board certification, which is the highest level.
Board certified educational therapists have taken an exam, they’ve done a case study, and that’s the highest level. So if you see a B C E T, with a little R next to it, you know, that person has completed that level of training. If you see an E T slash P, that’s what I have. I didn’t put the R on. Um, it should be there.
It’s [00:24:00] in my signature. Um, that means that, that, that I’ve, Completed that. So I think that sort of asking, I think it’s always good to be an informed consumer about anything. And so finding out if someone is an educational therapist where they’ve been trained the Association for Educational Therapists as a website that improves almost um, You know, on a monthly basis, it gets better and better.
And there’s a find an educational therapist. If you’re looking for someone and you find them on their website, you know, they’ve been through one of the approved programs.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Yeah. That’s good to know.
The Role of Tutors vs. Educational Therapists
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Cause I know, I mean, and, and not knocking tutors or anything. Sometimes it is, you know, a kid struggling in just that fifth grade math.
They can’t get over that hump of whatever they’re learning. Great. A tutor will work, but if your child’s struggling as a whole, then you might want to look at an educational therapist.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: And often, yes. Often, tutors are a great starting place for, for students. Um, it’s the right way to [00:25:00] do it, but for children and often teenagers and often, you know, us college students, you know, there’s an aversion to the things, you know, kids have emotional responses to learning and, Ed therapists understand the emotional components.
We’re not psychologists. We don’t diagnose, don’t give medication, none of that. We’re therapists the way physical therapists or occupational therapists are therapists. We help students practice, right? Like a PT will help you practice something. Um, and our realm is academic. So, so a tutor is a great place to start educational therapy.
I used to say it was like the platinum level, but that sort of sounds again, I’m trying to get away from the hierarchy. It’s not necessarily a starting place, but it is someone who will understand deeply what is involved in the learning. The other piece is ed therapists specialized, right? Like PTs and OTs, you know, this is what they do.
Um, some are reading specialists. Some are math [00:26:00] specialists. Um, executive functioning is a huge area.
Strategies for Effective Learning
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Really, um, I have in my tiny practice now I work with high school students in my private practice and, um, most of the work is around learning how to learn. How do you set yourself up for success? The kind of time management, um, task initiation, how do you get yourself to do something that you really don’t want to do?
Um, one way I talk with it with students, um, both in the ed therapy program and in my, it’s really nice, it’s sort of like the lab, um, but is to say you’re the scientist of your own learning. So you’re going to try on some strategies to see if they work. Don’t try them just for a day. Give it a week, give it two weeks.
Let’s come back and talk about it. Um, but to really help our clients, um, take some ownership and have some agency. You probably see this [00:27:00] Frances in, in your clients. There’s a way that, um, sometimes students feel very passive in the system and don’t feel that they have a voice. And I think that ed therapists can often help students who feel a little bit helpless begin to take some agency in their own learning to get some independence and critically to self advocate
Frances Shefter, Esq.: and get the buy in because we can plan and do whatever we want.
If the kid’s not involved and doesn’t want to, you know, Absolutely. I’ve
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: had to learn with some clients who are really expert at avoiding and getting people to do things, you know, um, well, I kind of got stuck here and I’ll say, Oh, what do you think you want to do next? I had this very aha moment this summer.
We were traveling [00:28:00] and my older daughter was teaching me how to use Google maps. to sort of find your way around. And we were in another city and it was pretty unfamiliar. And I said, well, the blue on the, uh, the dot that’s me is not going where the blue line is going. And my daughter said, huh, isn’t that interesting?
I wonder what you’re going to do. And I went, Oh my goodness, this is exactly what I do with my clients. This is exactly what I encourage my Ed Therapist students to do, is to sit back. Anne Gordon, who’s a wonderful psychologist and Ed Therapist, she says, Never work harder than your clients. So there’s a way that you really, and, and I, I think there is this, we’re in helping professions.
There is an impulse to kind of scoop in and rescue. But we’re not doing our clients or our children and students any service. For by taking away their agency.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: I was going to say as parents also, we still want to make it better and solve the problem, but [00:29:00] your child’s not going to learn how to solve problems if they’re never given the opportunity to solve problems.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes. That concept of productive struggle, right? I just reminding myself, sit back, even with older. Older children, it’s true too, but I always, I always felt so, as a parent of a child who had some challenges in classroom settings, I always wanted to rescue. And that impulse, while, you know, completely understandable, does not help the learning and it helps the student feel more and more disempowered.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly. And and helpless and and that it’s a disability instead of working on the strains. It’s a
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: different way of learning. Um, uh, one of my another colleague, B. B. P. R. I. S. whom would be a great person to interview is really, you know, the stigma associated with learning differently is beginning to dissolve a little bit.
And I think in our culture, in our [00:30:00] American culture, I should say, that’s the one I know. Um, And so just to celebrate that, but to really think about what are the strategies that are going to help you and how to honor difference.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Yeah. So true. Cause our brains all work differently.
Finding the Right Educational Therapist
Frances Shefter, Esq.: So I want to bring it around to like for parents, for any parents that might be listening and they’re going, okay, so great.
Sounds good. But what do I need? How do I know? Like, how would a parent know? Do they need an educational therapist? Do they need a tutor? Do they need something else? Like, what, what’s that, that key for parents to look for?
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: So I think there’s, there’s two things. It’s, it’s, is, is homework a battleground? So, um, I think that really looking at your child’s emotional responses to learning, do they have a fit?
When the math folder comes out, does the teacher report that they’re [00:31:00] having, um, challenge finishing something? So production is often a clue in the early years and any behavioral report that you get from your classroom, um, Ross Green says kids do well if they can. And if they can’t, it’s because of lagging skills and unsolved problems.
And so one of the things to really be kind of aware of like everybody has a bad day. Sometimes I will even admit where I’m not my best beautiful self with my partner. So, but if there’s kind of a pattern where it seems like the teacher saying that a particular subject is. is, is really difficult. If your child reports that they just despise something, um, you know, kind of put your listening ears on, um, one of our founders of Ed Therapy, Dorothy Ungerleider, talks about the third ear.
Um, and so [00:32:00] really, you know, kind of, Think about that. So it’s sort of child report, teacher report, parent observation. It just seems unnecessarily hard. Then there may be not always, but there may be an underlying learning difficulty that could be, you know, I think the first step really is is meeting with the teachers and and talking and an assessment right to sort of untangle this.
Um, where, what areas is the student struggling with and then, you know, start with what the professional, if it’s a neuropsychologist or your psycho ed team, the teachers will say, Oh, there’s this great tutor. Try them, right? Like, listen to the referrals. Um, and, or maybe there’s an educational therapist.
Sometimes people will talk with their neighbors. Oh, my child was really helped by this therapist. I mean, Ed therapists work with children from kindergarten through graduate school. I have [00:33:00] another colleague who works exclusively with ADHD, folks with ADHD who are young adults and adults. So, you know, there’s a whole panoply of professionals that are available.
One of the things I’m so excited about the Notre Dame de Namur program is now that it’s 100 percent virtual, we have students from all over the country. And EdTherapy tends to be coastal, but don’t give up hope because there are students coming who are from different parts of the country. Um, and there’s a lot of remote.
educational therapy. So it used to be that it was a pretty rare ed therapist pre COVID who did virtual ed therapy. There were folks who did it, but now it’s much more prevalent. It’s,
Frances Shefter, Esq.: it’s, since COVID, almost everything has been Now it’s acceptable to be virtual for so many things,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: and parents should know that for young Children, I really recommend [00:34:00] K three.
If you can do in person, that’s absolutely the best. And for some older Children, you have to kind of know your child. When I meet students, my private practice is virtual. It really is. Can we connect through the screen? I’m pretty confident I can connect to people through a screen. And there are some students who are just like, Nope, been there, done that, never wanted to be caught on a screen again.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: No, it’s so true because it’s, it works for some and it doesn’t work for some, you know, it’s, it’s sad over here in Montgomery County, they just got rid of the virtual academy. And it’s so, it’s going to be so tough because I have a lot of clients now coming to me because their kid, that was the only environment their kid was thriving in.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: And so now what? That’s really interesting because I’ve heard and my own godson with who is a child with high functioning autism, and he was, I think, in end of high school college during, um, COVID, and he loved it. He felt [00:35:00] so safe socially. He felt like he was in charge. There was a whole thing. And I’m not saying that every child with autism thrives in a virtual setting.
This particular. Um, student did. It was fascinating to me. So, yeah,
Frances Shefter, Esq.: exactly. Yeah, it’s so hard. It’s um, so, so when people are looking and they, they say, okay, I need to find an educational therapist. I know you said, um, you know, there’s a lot of resources you can go and we’ll probably have those links in the show notes of where to find and stuff.
What’s the best way, like when interviewing Educational therapist, what’s the best way to help match an educational therapist with your child to make sure it’s a good fit? So
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: I think that I think that it’s, it’s a both and both the parents and the child or young adult need to like to feel comfortable.
There’s a, so, so trust your gut, right? The brain and your stomach pay attention. When a parent [00:36:00] interviews. or a guardian, interviews, and a therapist. Really see how, how do you feel, right? Um, I think the other thing is what, what do you really lay your cards out on the table? What are you hoping to get in my intake form?
And I recommend that my students do this too in their intake forms. Ask, ask the family or guardians, what’s the goal? Make sure you’re a match out the gate. If you are looking for reading fluency or reading comprehension. And this is someone who really wants to work on handwriting. Probably not. And I’m not saying that’s necessarily true, but I make sure that you have a good communication around what the expectations are.
Um, it is not an instant fix. What I say to my ed therapy students is that ed therapy is glacial in pace. But it sticks. So think about how powerful a glacier is, right? Grinds mountains, [00:37:00] but it takes a really long time. So when, what’s really important is, is, is, as a parent to manage your expectations, because a lot of people think, Oh, well, uh, This is more expensive than tutoring.
It’s going to work like this, right? But, and we’re so used to that in our culture. The gift of educational therapy is to go, I think this is a Norton Gillingham quote, but as fast as you can, but as slow as you must.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: That makes sense. It makes sense. And that’s the one on one you pace as with the child or the young adult.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: And then with your, your child, you know, ask your child to give it a go, right? Give it a go, give it a couple of weeks, see how it feels, see how it’s going. It takes a while to build relationships, but And remember, ed therapists are asking students to do things that are intrinsically difficult, right?
They’re not going to start out. Ed therapists use lots of games. It’s joyful. You know, the dopamine dump in learning is a real [00:38:00] thing, and ed therapists are fully aware of that. Um, but I think parents need to sort of see where’s the expertise of this person. How do I feel? You know, do we have a good relationship?
Um, what, what do they see, you know, really have that initial dialogue. I’m very careful. to encourage students and do this myself to really help manage expectations, both on the ed therapists part, but also on the family’s part that you’re meeting, you’re really understanding because goals change, right?
Kids meet goals. So you set some new goals, but it’s a communication. Peace.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And, and I, you know, I’m just thinking like going back on the parent side of, um, if your child does not like going to a therapy. And after a few times, like they take that step back and double check. Is it that your child just doesn’t want to do the task or is it just not the right fit?
Because if your child’s right, if your child’s not [00:39:00] wanting to go, not wanting to go.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Yes, absolutely. I would say, give it a go. Agree with your child, have a meeting with your child and say, we’re going to try this and get your child’s, like you said earlier, buy it. So how, you know, it, What do you think is a reasonable amount of time?
I mean, kids really know themselves, you know, one time. No, that’s really not fair to either the child or the therapist or the family, right? But what seems to be the, the buy in, um, the thing and, and for the most part, it kids, It’s back to every child wants, we all want to succeed. We want to do well in school and to really lay out this is someone who is going to help give you strategies to try.
Again, don’t over promise it to the child, right? If a child’s been struggling with reading, it’s not like they’re going to make your eating easy for you. They’re going to teach you some strategies to help with. Right? So it’s how it’s [00:40:00] presented. I’d encourage parents to talk with the therapist about how to present this.
Um, how to talk to their child about it if they’re a little uncomfortable about it. And a hundred percent Frances, if the child after four or six sessions that, you know, I leave it to the parents to decide is really resistant. No, it’s not a good fit. And that does happen. That totally happens.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: And there’s nothing wrong with the child.
There’s nothing wrong with a therapist. It’s
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: just a little late. Absolutely. It’s just not a good fit. And the glory of it is in school, right? You always are going to have teachers you resonate more with and ones that you don’t. And that’s kind of something I talk with clients about is this is just to normalize it.
And at therapy, you don’t have to go, you know, it should be a joyful experience
Frances Shefter, Esq.: because it’s, if it’s not, then you’re, it’s, it’s a waste of time.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Well, we don’t learn when we’re not happy.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Exactly. Exactly. So with, I’m just thinking about like one of the [00:41:00] things that was going through my head is that, okay, so you teach at the program to do your master’s degree.
Is there like, if parents are like, oh, this sounds really interesting. I want to learn more. Is there like a course they could take that they can learn the techniques? Well,
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: this is something that’s a really good question. I think that there might be in what I have found with students. So I do a lot of before people even apply to the program at NDNU.
I see. meet with them for an hour to talk about what’s bringing them to be interested in it. And then I kind of, for full transparency, here’s the class, here’s when they meet, and I go through the whole, um, program. Each class, I talk about each class, so they know exactly what it is. Um, I, I think that unlike some things like Barton, you know, you can get trained in Barton for reading, um, making math real.
A lot of parents have gotten trained in making math real. Educational therapy is a profession. [00:42:00] So it’s, um, but, so there’s a both and the education for educational therapy, a E T online, all one word. org has a wealth of information about the profession. There’s an, a fact sheet at the bottom of the homepage.
There’s a fact sheet that says exactly all the things that therapists do and, and parents. should see if they resonate with it because it’s exactly so many parents have come come to this because they’re like I’m really interested in it. So, This is definitely something students will say, this is what I’ve been looking for.
I think parents will know if they want to pursue it, but there’s certainly lots of avenues. I think that the Santa Cruz extension program, you can take one class. I don’t think that you have to commit yourself to the whole thing for the certificate. So there are, are definitely avenues. So sort of yes. And.[00:43:00]
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Got it. So if people want to get in touch with you or if they have questions or they want to get into your program, what’s the best way for people to contact you or to figure out how to get into the program?
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: So, Notre Dame de Nemours University, ndnu. edu Um, under education, there’s a, uh, master’s in special education will come up.
There’s an education credential program at NDNU and the master’s in educational therapy is part of that. And then my, my email is just. P for Polly, Mayer, M A Y E R, at N D N U dot E D U.
Frances Shefter, Esq.: Great, thank you so much. This has been so awesome and so informative, because it’s just, like, from the other, you know, teaching teachers, um, the other point of view, it’s been so awesome.
Thank you so much for being on the show.
Polly Mayer, M.Ed., ET/P: Oh, you’re welcome. I am, I’m thrilled to be here, and it’s, it’s been a delight. Thank you, Frances.
Voice-Over: You’ve been listening to Stress-Free IEP®with [00:44:00] your host, Frances Shefter. Remember, you do not need to do it all alone. You can reach Frances through ShefterLaw. com, where prior episodes are also posted. Thank you for your positive reviews, comments, and sharing the show with others through YouTube, LinkedIn, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, and more.
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