How Luca moved from anxious observer to engaged participant.
For parents and families · School participation and belonging
Educational example: This story illustrates possibilities — it is not a real patient record, testimonial, or prediction of any particular outcome. Every person’s journey is their own.
Luca started Year 2 quieter than he had ended Year 1. His teachers described him as "a little withdrawn." His parents said he had started saying "I can't" about things he used to just try. The transition to a new classroom, a new teacher, and several children he did not know as well had put him on uncertain ground.
Luca has mild left-sided hemiplegia — his left hand moves differently from his right, and some fine motor tasks at school require careful management. The new classroom had different desk arrangements and a different routine. The uncertainty was compounding his existing caution. In Year 2, it felt like starting again.
Most of his avoidance was in moments where he anticipated difficulty or embarrassment — not necessarily where the difficulty was actually greatest. This was an important distinction.
Luca said he wanted to be the kind of person who puts his hand up. His words. He was watching other children answer questions in class and staying silent — even when he knew the answer — because he was worried about fumbling the pencil, or about someone seeing his hand shake when he pointed at the board.
The goal was presence. He wanted to be in the room, not just in the building.
The plan involved three threads: practical strategies for the tasks he was avoiding, work on tolerating uncertainty in unfamiliar situations, and — crucially — helping Luca reframe what participation looked like. He did not need to do things the same way as every other child. He needed to do them in a way that worked for him.
His teacher was brought into the plan with a brief, practical note from the therapist. Small adjustments to the classroom routine — nothing that marked Luca out — gave him more of the predictability he needed.
The first time Luca put his hand up in class, his teacher almost did not notice in time. He kept his arm raised, patient, until she saw him. He answered correctly and got back to work. He told his mother that evening that it had not been as hard as he thought.
About a month later, there was a bad day. A task he had not anticipated — a timed craft activity requiring both hands — went poorly, and another child commented on it. Luca went home and told his parents he did not want to go back.
His parents sat with it rather than rushing to fix it. His therapist said: that was hard. Now let's think about what to do next time. They did not pretend it had not happened.
By the middle of Term 2, Luca was answering questions, contributing to group work, and had a good friend in the class — a child drawn to Luca's very specific sense of humour and his ability to name every type of cloud formation.
He had also started raising his hand without thinking about it first. That was the real change: it had stopped being a decision.
Confidence is not a personality trait that some children have and others do not. It is something that grows in specific environments, with specific kinds of support, over time. Luca did not become a different child. He became more of himself — in more places.
These stories are examples — but your situation is real. Our Recovery Assessment helps your therapist understand your needs before your first appointment.
