By Malynn Kuangparichat, Psy.D., J.D.

As a parent, how many times have you found yourself jumping in to help your child with a challenge they’re having? Maybe your child comes home frustrated because the teacher made a comment that didn’t make them feel seen or heard. Or your child is upset because they got into a fight with a friend. Maybe, at school, your child is struggling with math and you notice a significant dip in their confidence. You’re most likely highly attuned to your kid’s needs, especially when you’re raising exceptional, neurodiverse kids with ADHD, on the autism spectrum, twice exceptional, OCD, or have sensory processing disorder.

With 3 kids of my own, I know what it’s like. When you see your child in distress, you automatically want to jump in and solve the problem for them. It can be so hard not to intervene. But when we do, we’re taking away the opportunity for our children to learn how to handle their own challenges.

If this is you, don’t be hard on yourself. You care deeply about your kids, and we acknowledge the courage it takes for us, as parents, to let go, so that our kids can navigate school, friendships, and family conflicts with growing confidence.

In our blog article, we’ll explore how teaching self-advocacy can significantly impact your child’s mental health and well-being. We’ll discuss the importance of allowing kids to experience failure, the positive effects of parenting kids with independence, and provide practical tips to help nurture these essential skills.

Benefits of Teaching Self-Advocacy to Your Neurodiverse Child

First, self-advocacy for your child is about understanding their own needs and communicating them effectively. This skill is foundational to mental health and personal development because it empowers children to manage their own lives and handle challenges with confidence.

Self-advocacy fosters empowerment by teaching neurodiverse children that their voices matter. It encourages them to take charge of their decisions and actions, which in turn promotes self-care and self-compassion. 

By learning to advocate for themselves, children can better navigate social and academic challenges, leading to improved emotional resilience and a healthier self-image.

Your child can use self-advocacy skills to effectively communicate their needs and get the support and accommodations they need from a teacher, school staff, friend, or family member.

The Negative Consequences of Parent Overinvolvement

When you’re inclined to protect your child from failure or discomfort, you may find yourself hovering over your child’s every move and making decisions for them. You want to fix the problem for them before they’ve had a chance to grapple with the problem, or you want to provide solutions immediately.

And you may be thinking, “Isn’t that what a good parent is supposed to do?”

However, continually stepping in and fixing problems for your kids takes away valuable opportunities for them to make decisions, solve problems, and learn from their mistakes.

Parenting overinvolvement can have negative effects on a child’s mental health and well-being such as low self-esteem, poor coping skills, and lack of independence.

You’re likely taking from your own experiences as a child, resulting in overinvolvement. Again, be kind to yourself. The first step is awareness and learning around overinvolvement and how to shift from that to supportive guidance and self-advocacy for your kids. You’re a cycle breaker and you’ve taken that first step right here.

Parenting is a journey, and we can learn so much about ourselves and our children along the way.

So, now, we’ll get into how you can shift from overinvolved parenting to supportive guidance.

How to Shift From Over-Involved Parenting to Supportive Guidance

Shifting from parenting overinvolvement to a more balanced approach involves offering support while allowing your child to take the lead. You’re still showing care and empathy and providing space for them to process, decide, try, and experience the results of their autonomy. 

Here’s how parents can make this transition:

1. Encourage Decision-Making – Allow children to make age-appropriate decisions and deal with the consequences. For example, if your child can decide how to approach a school project at home and faces difficulties, she learns to manage outcomes and develop problem-solving skills.

2. Provide Guidance, Not Solution –  Instead of solving problems for your child, guide them through the process of finding their own solutions through guided questions. This helps build their confidence and self-reliance.

3. Balance Support with Autonomy – Be there to offer support and encouragement, but avoid stepping in to solve every problem. This balance helps children learn to advocate for themselves while knowing they have a safety net.

Practical Tips for Teaching Self-Advocacy

When it comes to teaching tips for self-advocacy, you can approach it from two prongs: (1) Parent or Caretaker’s Role (2) Child’s Role. 

As the parent, you can create a supportive environment for your child to practice self-advocacy and you can model self-advocacy to your child. For your child, they can practice open communication, decision-making, and building self-confidence.

And it’s important to note that self-advocacy is a skill that takes time to learn.

For instance, I’ve taught my oldest child self-advocacy by increasing his awareness of what he needs in school. He has a slower processing speed, so I encourage him to approach his teachers to ask for extra time to finish a task when needed. 

Last night, I was telling my daughter that she needs to read for 15 minutes every night. My son asked why he needed to read 20 minutes every night when he was her age. I told him that I give the kids what they need. He responded, “Like I need time.”  

Parents sometimes don’t want to bring attention to their kids’ weaknesses (which I reframe to my kids as areas of support and that we each have our own). But they won’t know how to advocate for themselves if they don’t have that awareness.

Tip #1: Create a Supportive Environment

• Providing Constructive Feedback – Offer feedback that helps children improve while reinforcing their efforts and strengths.

• Encouraging Independence – Support your child’s growth by giving them space to practice self-advocacy skills in a safe and nurturing environment.

Tip #2: Model Self-Advocacy

Children often learn by observing. Demonstrate self-advocacy by:

• Modeling Effective Communication – Show how to express needs and negotiate solutions in everyday situations.

• Sharing Personal Experiences – Discuss your own experiences of advocating for yourself and overcoming challenges.

Tip #3: Encourage Open Communication

Teaching children to express their needs and feelings is fundamental to self-advocacy. Encourage open dialogue by:

• Creating a Safe Space – Ensure that children feel comfortable sharing their thoughts and emotions without fear of judgment.

• Role-Playing Scenarios – Practice different situations where they need to communicate their needs or concerns. This can help them build confidence in advocating for themselves.

• Cultivate Communication Skills – Teach your child to be specific with what the problem is and what they need. Find a person who is reliable and trustworthy and can support them. Let your child know that it’s okay to ask, speak up, and make their voice heard in a polite and non-demanding tone. Let them know they can say “thank you” after getting support.

Tip #4: Foster Decision-Making Skills

Decision-making is a critical aspect of self-advocacy. To support this:

• Allow for Age-Appropriate Choices – Give children opportunities to make decisions and understand the consequences.

• Guide, Don’t Dictate – Provide advice on how to evaluate options and make informed decisions, but let them take the final call.

Tip #5: Build Self-Confidence

Confidence is key to effective self-advocacy. To build your child’s self-confidence:

• Encourage Participation in Activities – Engage them in activities that build their skills and confidence, whether it’s sports, arts, or academics.

• Reinforce Positive Behaviors – Acknowledge and celebrate their efforts and achievements, no matter how small.

What Exactly Does Self-Advocacy Look Like At School and Home?

When your kids self-advocate, they can identify how they feel or the problem at-hand, and get the support they need from a parent, friend, or teacher.

It may sound like this:

“This is what I need.”

“___ is important to me so ___.”

At school, it may look like asking a teacher or peer for extra help in math. It may also look like setting up a boundary with a friend when your child knows they need more alone time.

In essence, your child is asking themselves, “What do I need to be successful?”

When your child can self-advocate, they feel a sense of agency, and learn more, do better in school, improve mental well-being.

Research studies show, specifically for teens and college-age students, that teaching self-advocacy skills can positively affect student success in school.

In certain cultures, self-advocacy can be seen as disrespectful or pandering to each and every need of a child. Parents may see self-advocating as demanding and complaining, but parents and educators can teach self-advocacy skills for neurodiverse kids that’s respectful, polite, and not demanding.

The Role of Failure in Building Self-Advocacy

Failure is often perceived negatively, but it’s a powerful teacher. When children face setbacks, they have the opportunity to develop resilience and problem-solving skills. 

For example, if your child is allowed to work through their struggle with a math problem and find a solution on their own, they’re given the opportunity to gain a sense of accomplishment and a deeper understanding of the material. This experience teaches children that failure is a natural part of learning and growth.

Encouraging a growth mindset, as Carol Dweck teaches, is crucial here. Rather than viewing failure as an end, which is a fixed mindset, children should be guided to see it as a stepping stone to improvement. By framing challenges as opportunities to learn, we help them build a more positive attitude towards obstacles and setbacks.

Strategies for Supporting Kids Through Failure

Supporting your child through failure involves more than just offering sympathy. You can find 5 strategies below to help them navigate these experiences.

Demonstrate a Growth Mindset

To illustrate, a fixed mindset sounds like this:

“I’m so dumb.”

“I can’t do this.”

“There’s something wrong with me.”

Whereas, a growth mindset sounds like this:

“I AM smart and I can learn.”

“I can be successful if I try.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me. Everyone is unique. Everyone has potential, including me.”

You can teach your child to catch their negative thinking, pause, and take a breath. Then show them how they can reframe their thinking. Keep the fixed mindset to growth mindset self-talk on  a piece of paper that you can stick to the wall and choose a statement that fits the situation.

Developing a growth mindset will increase confidence, self-compassion, & resiliency while decreasing fear, shame, & anxiety.

And, remember, shifting mindsets doesn’t happen overnight, but happens over time.

Provide Emotional Support and Reassurance

Let children know that it’s okay to fail and that their worth is not determined by their success or failure. For example, after your child struggles with her project, reassuring her that everyone makes mistakes and that it’s part of the learning process can be comforting.

Encourage Reflection and Learning from Mistakes

Help children analyze what went wrong and how they can improve next time. This can be done through guided questions or discussions about the experience.

Celebrate Effort and Progress

Recognize and praise the effort they put into their tasks, not just the final outcome. This reinforces the idea that perseverance and hard work are valuable, regardless of the result.

Model, Model, Model!

Most importantly, you are the best model for your child. Our kids learn the most from our examples so allow your child to see how you navigate making mistakes, dealing with failure, and reframing fixed mindset statements into growth mindset statements.

Teaching Self-Advocacy is an Investment 

Teaching your child self-advocacy is an investment in their future well-being and success. By allowing them to experience failure, avoiding parenting overinvolvement, and providing practical guidance, we help them develop the skills they need to navigate life’s challenges with confidence. 

Empowering our children to advocate for themselves fosters resilience, builds confidence, and encourages independence, setting them on a path to a more fulfilling and self-directed life.

Let’s encourage our kids to embrace their challenges, make decisions, and advocate for their needs, knowing that each step they take towards self-advocacy is a step towards a stronger, more independent future.

Looking for more support? We specialize in supporting parents, teens, and youth, for depression, anxiety, perfectionism, and self-harm. We’re here to empower you and your child’s well-being so please reach out if you’re looking for a therapist to support you in your journey.

More Resources on Self-Advocacy for Kids

The National Parent Helpline

Offers support and resources for parents and caregivers, including tips on fostering self-advocacy in children.

Learning Disabilities Association of America – Self-Advocacy

Offers resources and information tailored to children with learning disabilities to support their self-advocacy skills.

Mind Yeti

An app that helps children practice mindfulness and emotional regulation, essential components of effective self-advocacy.

Breathe, Think, Do with Sesame

An interactive app for younger children to learn problem-solving and self-regulation skills, supporting their ability to advocate for themselves.

Research

http://www.overindulgence.org/about-our-research/the-relationship-between.pdf

https://red.mnstate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1739&context=thesis

https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1274024.pdf

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8734393

*Disclaimer: The contents of this blog does not constitute a clinical relationship or replace the need for professional services.

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Chester County Well-Being (CCWB) provides a range of mental health services to ensure we meet our community’s needs. We serve individuals, couples, and families in the Chester County area. Reach out to us here.

Our specializations include:

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About the Author

Malynn Kuangparichat, Psy.D., J.D. is founder and psychologist at Chester County Well-Being.  

She has a collaborative approach that results in highly tailored evaluations intended to meet her clients’ unique needs. She focuses on an individual’s strengths, which are integrated in the practical, personalized recommendations identified by the findings of an evaluation. 

In her free time, she enjoys running, spending time with family and friends, and getting ice cream or doughnuts from the local shops.