What if we have been taught the concept of inclusion differently?

What if inclusion is not a goal to achieve, but a path for all of us to walk? A path that helps every child become as independent as they can be.

I am a speech-language pathologist, and I work with children with delays and difficulties in communication. To work with children, in turn, means working with their families; they are a unit—of functioning, belonging, and responsibility. I often imagine intervention as a walk I take with children and their families, with myself somewhere in between, holding their hands—not to “teach,” but to keep offering different perspectives as we move forward together.

The children I work with are diverse in their needs, personalities, strengths, and, God, those tantrums too. But their parents are, more often than not, many faces asking the same questions in different words.

“What about my child after me? How long will he be like this? When is he going to start school? When will he become normal? Tell me.”

For a long time, I thought I didn’t have an answer to these questions.

But I did.

The difficulty wasn’t finding the answer. It was explaining an answer that demands a different mindset.

Fear is a large part of the being-a-parent pie; twice as much so for a parent of a neurodiverse child, and rightly so. Parenting itself feels at least somewhat familiar—like learning to drive a Swift. It looks difficult, but we’ve seen others do it. We know people we can ask. Raising a neurodiverse child, however, can feel like learning to drive a Tesla. There are no clues about where to begin, whom to ask, or what to expect. It feels like a completely different ball game.

It is then understandable that parents make it their mission to get their child back to “normal.” Classes, therapies, medications—anything that might help their child “come out” of this situation. They hope for mainstream schools, mainstream systems, mainstream lives.

But the uncomfortable truth is that many of these systems were never designed to be inclusive in the first place.

Perhaps that is because we have misunderstood inclusion itself.

This shift in perspective is small, but compounding. It reminds me of adding sea salt to chocolate. It sounds unexpected, almost puzzling, but somehow it transforms the entire experience.

So what is inclusion?

It seems absurd to give one definitive answer because there is no one way to be inclusive. There are countless children, each requiring support differently and uniquely.

In my limited opinion, inclusion is a mindset to adopt rather than a prize to earn.

It is more than providing ramps and wheelchairs.

It is more than asking whether a child needs additional services before they can enter mainstream education.

It is more than writing a data-driven IEP.

It is asking, over and over again:

What does my child need right now?

What are they showing me?

What are their strengths?

How can I make this simpler for them?

The blueprint is not to add more. It is to remove the distractions created by the idea of “normal,” so that every child has the opportunity to thrive independently.

This path is sometimes cumbersome, effortful, enduring, and exasperating.

But it is possible when it becomes a shared goal.

We often say, “It takes a village to raise a child.”

We simply need more villagers.

And we need those villagers to adopt this mindset.

It may be a big ask.

But it is no longer a choice.

It is the way forward.

And for this, there are two ideas I find myself returning to repeatedly.

What is versus what should be

So much of our time is spent worrying about what a child should become instead of carefully observing who that child already is.

The first path leads to anxiety.

The second teaches us how to be inclusive.

A child’s challenges become our goals.

Their strengths become the foundation of our daily activities.

Their receptiveness becomes our timeline for teaching.

Children constantly leave us clues.

The question is not whether they are communicating.

The question is whether we are paying attention.

Understanding what needs assistance and what needs acceptance

Some differences require acceptance. Others require support.

Stimming needs acceptance. Harming oneself or others needs assistance.

Lack of eye contact needs acceptance. Lack of any meaningful way to communicate needs assistance.

A different learning style needs acceptance. An inability to learn life skills needs assistance.

If all of this feels difficult to remember, perhaps remember only this:

There is no single right way to be inclusive.

There is no one way to practise inclusion.

Being inclusive is simply the right way to be.

Connect with Malavika Muthukumar: yourconsultantslp@gmail.com