What does it all mean?

This blog post is a transcript of Episode 94 of my podcast/YouTube series. Because of that, it is not written to be grammatically/syntactically correct.

You can listen here and watch here.

Once upon a time, there were students who struggled to understand what people mean by what they say, and what people intend with their actions and their words.

Some students often misinterpreted people's words and actions as negative or personal, even when they weren't. Other students caused frustration amongst their family and teachers when they didn't do what someone expected them to do, because they failed to decode the expectation. And then there were students who struggled to recognize if people's treatment of them was insincere or problematic. I created this lesson for all of these students.

In this lesson, students learn different clues to help them figure out what something means, how to interpret the things people say when they speak indirectly, and to recognize the difference between friendly and mean teasing.

When we look at the checklist for this module (this lesson is in module two, which is all about awareness), the checklist shows that this lesson addresses students who: interpret words or actions as negative and personal, even when they aren't, struggle to understand abstract language, struggle with knowing who is a friend versus who may be taking advantage of them, and do not recognize or understand nonverbal communication from others. These are all things that are addressed in this lesson in module two of the program.

This module is all about noticing. Being able to decode and understand indirect communication is a skill that a lot of neurodivergent people really struggle with. Our minds tend to be pretty direct, pretty black and white. But most people who aren't neurodivergent don't communicate directly. I tend to be a direct communicator, and I have to revise the things that I write. If I'm typing an email, for example, I have to write what I want to say, and then go back and revise it so it's not so direct. I also use a lot of exclamation marks and emojis when I'm on my phone if I'm on social media or texting someone to try to clarify what I mean and how I feel, because otherwise I often get misinterpreted as being direct, which then becomes interpreted as being rude or disrespectful. That's definitely not my intention. Even yesterday, I made a comment on social media and intentionally put a smiley face at the end of it because I was intending to say something direct to somebody, but I wasn't intending to be rude, and so I put a smiley face at the end of it.

Because this is a challenge for people who are neurodivergent, this is something that I explicitly put into the program. Again, most people don't speak directly, and that becomes confusing and even overwhelming for those of us who are direct communicators and prefer to just have the information. Just tell me what you want to tell me!

I start this lesson by sharing a story with the students in my groups, and the story has to do with something that happened several years ago at this point, but it was a great example about our ability to notice indirect communication. Indirect communication can be people's facial expressions, it can be their body language, it can be their tone of voice, the way they say the things that they say.

In this example, I was transitioning between groups, and so I had some students leaving and some students coming in, and a student who was coming in ran up to me and had a toy, a stuffed animal, and she put it right up in my face. She said, "Steph, look!" I tend to sometimes exaggerate my reactions to things to help students recognize what I'm thinking or how I'm feeling. This is why so many of our students like Disney. Disney characters over-exaggerate things. Most animated characters over-exaggerate things. So for so many of our students, it makes it so much easier for them to understand what's happening. They don't have to try to figure out how this character feels, or what they think about something, it's very clear.

I even struggle sometimes. I'm not a big fan of movies. I sometimes get lost in the plot and can't really tell what's happening. I forget who people are. I forget the relationships that are going on. Sometimes in movies, they'll zoom in on an email or a text message, and I can't figure out what it means. The character has a reaction to it, but I can't figure out what it means. So this is me as an adult functioning in the world. So I'm not a big fan of movies, because I often can't really follow along and can't figure out what's happening. This is why animation tends to over-exaggerate characters, and I do the same when I'm working with my students for the same reason. I don't want them to have to guess what I'm thinking or how I'm feeling. I want to make it very clear.

So back to my story. The student put her toy in my face, and said, "Steph, look!" It was way too close to my face. It was uncomfortable. I took a step back, I made a face that showed I was uncomfortable, and I held my hand up in front of me, and I said, "Oh, I don't like that being so close to my face." So I was giving her lots of signals: I took a step back, I held my hand up in a 'stop' motion, my face had an expression on it that was uncomfortable, and I specifically said what I was thinking: "I don't like that in my face." She stopped, and then about five seconds later, she put it back in my face again and said, "Steph, look what I have!"

She watched my face, she watched my body language, but what I realized is that she didn't know what to do next. She saw what was happening, she saw my reaction, but she did not know what to do with that information. So in addition to noticing social clues, our students also have to learn what to do next.

One of the things that happens in the brains of a lot of people who are neurodivergent is, when we decide on a plan of action, we don't often think about: What if it doesn't work? I talked a few episodes ago about why I think this is a big part of why a lot of kids struggle with hearing the word 'no' is because it's not what they were expecting, and so when they hear it, they don't know how to adapt and respond to that. And I think this is the same thing that happened with this student. She took in all the clues, but she didn't know how to adapt and respond to them, because it's not what she thought was going to happen. It's not what she thought my reaction would be.

So we talk about the concept of inferencing. Inferencing is a concept that a lot of students have heard through their reading/language arts class. It's a really big concept in those environments. Kids who are typically, I would say, eight or older, have heard this word. They might not know what it means, as is the case with a lot of vocabulary. Just because we know the word doesn't mean we know what it means, but they've at least heard it. And then there's always students who aren't familiar with it.

I explain that inferencing means to figure out what something means. We take the information that we have, and we try to figure out this new piece of information based on the information that we have. In America, in the English language, we tend to speak very indirectly. We tend to say a lot of things that don't actually mean what we intend for them to mean. This actually wasn't America, but I saw something posted online the other day that was, in Ireland, maybe? It was explaining what different phrases mean. It had something like, 'Well, I don't want to keep you.' And what that actually means is 'I'm going to go now.' And then it said, 'I don't want you to feel like you're keeping me,' which actually means 'I can't leave, but I want you to go.' All these things that we say in an effort to be polite, in an effort to be socially acceptable, but what happens is they don't mean what we're saying!

The one that gets me so much because it's such a common thing people say, and I think it's bizarre, is when somebody that you haven't seen in a while says something like, "We should get together soon!" They don't actually mean it! It took me a while to figure that out. There is somebody I used to be close to, and now we have become acquaintances, who will say that every once in a while: "We should get together soon!" But she doesn't mean it!

This is the challenge. So much of our communication is indirect. It doesn't really mean what we're saying, so it can be really confusing and disruptive and disorienting to people who are literal thinkers. I give the students a lot of examples of this, and I notice that when I say them explicitly and directly, often the students can figure out what I mean. But that's different from them hearing them in an organic situation. Obviously, when I'm saying them in the course of this lesson, they can recognize that there's a hidden meaning. But when people say things out in the world, it's very different to recognize when and where there's a hidden meaning.

Some of the examples that I give are: Often during game time, I tell the kids, "Hey guys, we have five minutes left." In this lesson, I ask: "Why do I say that we have five minutes left?" There are always students who recognize that the answer is because I'm expecting them to prepare to get ready to put things away. But there are also always students who don't recognize what that means. So even things that I say in my direct manner to my direct students, they don't always recognize it. At Starfish, I try to be very obvious about the things I say. So I will say, "There are five minutes left. When the timer goes off, it will be time to put things away." Or, "When the timer goes off, we are going to do this thing next. It will be time for this thing next." I always try to add a qualifier to it, because I don't want my students to have to think about what I mean by what I say.

Another example: I'll say to the students, "Let's pretend that we're having a conversation or a discussion right now, and different people are asking questions and making comments, and I say, 'I'm going to let someone else have a turn.'" I'll ask them: Why would I say that? What does that mean? A couple students will usually know that it means somebody's talking too much, somebody's answering too many questions, and they're not letting the whole group participate. But most people don't know what that means. Most students don't understand why I would say that. Because they don't understand why I would say that, their choices are not going to change. The next time I ask a question, they're going to keep trying to answer the question because they don't understand why I said I'm going to let someone else have a turn.

Another example: What if your parents say to you, "It's almost time for bed." A lot of the students don't realize the meaning behind that phrase. Or, "You've been watching TV for a long time today." A lot of students don't recognize the meaning behind the things that we say and we tend to communicate very indirectly. It's just part of our culture. And even, as my example shows, it's not even the American culture. As Americans, we're not necessarily attempting to be polite all the time. People in the UK often are, and so they will say things to try to be polite, even though that's not really what it means. They're saying it to try to be polite. There are so many examples of this across cultures, across languages, where we say things that don't actually mean what they mean.

Most times, when I see clinicians and practitioners teaching this concept of indirect language, they teach idioms. It could also be similes, metaphors, and figures of speech. The one that always sticks out in my head is: It's raining cats and dogs. I feel like it's much more important for students to know the common everyday misunderstandings than the examples of things that aren't even that important. If somebody says 'it's raining cats and dogs' and you don't know what that means, I don't think that's all that important. But I think somebody saying something like, "You've been watching a lot of TV today," that's important for a student, a child, a kiddo, to be able to interpret. So I do think we miss the mark when it comes to teaching kids about inferencing. I think we tend to use idioms and examples of phrases that obviously don't mean what they say, as opposed to focusing on phrases that we don't realize don't mean what they say, and that are embedded in our everyday life.

Then I have it students come up with examples. I'll ask: What are examples of things that you have said, or have heard other people say that don't actually mean what we think it means? This is a lot more difficult. If students struggle with coming up with examples, I will continue to provide them, because there's just so many, there's just so many examples of things people say that aren't really what they mean. "Hey, it's cold outside today," as you're getting ready to leave for school. If somebody says, "I thought _____" (fill in the blank), that means they're questioning what's happening. "Oh, I thought it was my turn," they're saying, "Hey, it's my turn." It's just a polite way to do it. On social media today, somebody made a comment on a post that I made and said, "Shouldn't it be ____? And actually, they were wrong. It shouldn't be. But that was their way of telling me that they thought they knew better than me. They were just trying to say it politely.

So many things that that people say just go over our heads sometimes. Passive aggressive comments are a great example. If you're trying to be passive aggressive to a neurodivergent person, it's not going to go the way that you think it's going to go. So don't try to be passive aggressive about things. It also typically applies to sarcasm. Being passive aggressive a lot of times means being sarcastic, and a lot of neurodivergent people don't understand sarcasm. They also tend to not use it. I would say the only social type that understands and uses sarcasm is triangles. Triangles can have a reputation for being really funny. They can be very humorous, and they tend to understand sarcasm and use sarcasm. I can't think of a single circle student I've ever worked with that uses sarcasm. Squares often understand it, but don't use it because they don't function in a snarky world, I guess I'll say it that way. So out of the three social types, there's only one that's going to actually use sarcasm, so when we use sarcasm with them, our circle students are just lost when we use sarcasm. It's very confusing to them. And our square students might understand it, but they're not going to use it back. So it's typically only triangle students who even have an an appreciation, if you will, for sarcasm.

Now it's poll time. For the in-person students, I set up different places in the room for them to go to based on the answer. For online students, I can make polls in Zoom. For this poll, the answer options are 'yes', 'no' or 'I'm not sure', because I'm not sure is always an acceptable answer. The poll question is: Is teasing always mean?

What tends to happen with the poll questions, is that, if this were a question that a student saw written on a piece of paper or that somebody randomly asked them, they would have an immediate response to it. But because I'm asking it in the form of a poll, they recognize that there must be more to it. There must be more for them to think about. Often, a good number of the students will decide the answer is no, but they don't know where I'm going with this. They think, 'It must not be yes, because yes is obvious, but I don't know what she's talking about.' That's what we get to talk about next, we get to talk about the concept of teasing.

Traditionally, the word 'teasing' has a negative connotation. If you use the word 'teasing' in most contexts with most people, it will have a negative connotation. It refers typically, in people's minds, to something that somebody's doing that's bothering them and they don't like it. A lot of my students even use the word 'bullying' to talk about teasing. The two are not the same thing, and I'm really aware of helping to educate my students on the difference. Even if it's mean teasing, it's not the same as bullying. There's a technical difference, and I don't want my students to use the word 'bullying' when it's not applicable. I want us to use words when they are relevant and when they mean what we're trying to say, and not when they're not.

We talk about examples of mean teasing. We talk about calling people names, making fun of people for things, there are definitely all kinds of examples of mean teasing. Triangles can come up with an unending list of mean teasing that they've experienced, unfortunately. That tends to be part of the existence of a triangle. Square kids are very aware of examples. Even though square kids have a lot of social anxiety, it's typically not based in things that have actually happened to them. Square kids typically are not the recipient of mean teasing, but they've witnessed it. They've observed it. They've watched it happen.

They've heard things people have said. So they are typically able to come up with examples from what they have observed. Circle students don't always recognize when something is mean or when something is teasing. When I ask for examples, circle students don't always think of examples of teasing because they don't always recognize it for what it is.

It's such a perfect example of how, everything that I teach, different students have different perceptions and interpretations and experiences, but we're all learning the same stuff because it applies to all of us. They're just coming at it through a different lens. But the lesson itself applies to everybody. The information applies to everybody.

After we talk about mean teasing, I share the concept of friendly teasing. This is a concept that most of my students are not familiar with. The best example that I can give is nicknames. I ask the students, "How many of you have a nickname at home? A nickname is something your family calls you, even though it's not actually your name." Some students go by a nickname. They go by a name that's not actually their name. That's a pretty easy thing to recognize and understand. 'I go by ____, but my name is actually ____.' Then students start to recognize: 'Oh, my family calls me ____.' It could be things from when they were little.

In the book 'Social Skills is Canceled', I have a section where Square realizes he has a nickname. His family calls him 'Square Bear', and so he realizes, 'Oh, that's friendly teasing. It's a nickname they give me because they like me.' There's also a part in the book where he witnesses his older brother and his brother's friends calling each other nicknames. It's a big moment in the book, because at first he's he's offended by that. 'That's not their name! We're not supposed to call people things that aren't our names!' But he realizes they're doing it because they like each other. So nicknames are a great way to introduce the concept of friendly teasing.

The concept even expands to making fun of somebody. If you think about your spouse, your kids, your parents, your friends, your coworkers, most of us make fun of people that we like in a friendly way. We only do it because we like them, and we only do it because they're able to tolerate it and receive it. Otherwise we wouldn't do it. It could be reminders of something silly that happened in the past. "Hey, remember that time that you thought ____ was ____? That was so funny!" I share a story in the group about a former Starfish employee and something really silly that happened, and how I made fun of him for it. Then I share: What if this person went to the grocery store after he left Starfish, and a stranger made fun of him for the same thing that I made fun of him for? Would that be friendly teasing? We decide that the answer is no, and here's why: The number one thing that determines whether something is mean teasing or friendly teasing is your relationship and history with this person. That's what determines it. If it is a person who likes you, you have a good relationship, it's friendly teasing. Even if you don't like it, it's friendly teasing. They're doing it because they like you. If you don't know this person, or if you don't have a good relationship with them, it's not friendly teasing.

I remember I had a student, I think she was in fifth grade at the time, and she was telling me about something that happened at school where some other girls had said something to her. I don't remember the content of what they had said to her, but I can remember she was really conflicted about whether they were making fun of her or not. One of the things I pointed out to her was that she even had a thought that they were making fun of her in the first place, because typically, when it's people we like, we don't usually think about the things they say to us in a negative way. I asked her, "What is your relationship to these other students? Do you get along? Are they friendly to you? Do you like them? Do you enjoy being around them? Or do you not get along?" And she said, "We don't typically get along." That's it. That's your answer.

If you get along with someone, you have a good relationship with them, even if you don't like what they're saying, it's friendly teasing. We then go into what you can do if you don't like how someone's friendly teasing you, because that's a whole other conversation that we have in this lesson as well. But if this is someone that you don't have a good relationship with, recognize that it's not friendly teasing. This lesson comes up again in module four when we talk about relationships. It's an important part of other lessons in that module as well. But this is when it gets introduced, is in module two.

The next thing that we talk about in this lesson is a pretty big deal. We talk about, if you feel like someone is mean teasing you, picking on you, harassing you, intentionally making you feel bad, what are your choices? Almost everybody (my groups are as young as seven up to 21 plus), no matter how old they are, will say some version of, "Go tell an adult."My hot take on this is that: Number one, there's not always an adult available for you to tell. Number two, one day you will be the adult, so what are your options then? And number three, this takes away our students ability to learn how to self advocate. So I do not teach students to go tell an adult when they feel like somebody's bothering them.

I teach students to give feedback, which is in a lesson in module one, just a couple lessons prior to this one. In this lesson, I remind students how we learned about how to give people feedback. I always want my students to try to solve a problem first, unless somebody's in danger, somebody's hurt, or something is illegal. If any of those are the case, please go find someone who can help. But if that's not the case (which usually it's not), I want them to try to solve the problem first by giving feedback.

We also talk about how sometimes people say, "Just walk away." It's usually not an effective response. It sounds good, and it's what we would love for people to be able to do when someone's instigating, but it's usually not effective. I have a new kitten that I rescued a few months ago, and he is an absolute chaos goblin. When I found him, he was in really bad shape. As he got healthier, he's turned into such a goblin. And I have another cat! He harasses her so much, and she hisses and growls at him all the time, and it does not stop him from harassing her. She will run away from him and he chases her, even though she is not at all giving off any kind of signs that she's trying to play with him. He harasses her so much, and I just keep thinking, 'I wish she would just stand up for herself.' In cat world, I wish she would put the smackdown on him, to be honest. I wish she would smack him around a bit and get him to stop.

In people world, I want my students to be able to stand up for themselves. It might not be effective, but I want this option to be an option, instead of walking away or instead of telling an adult. So number one, I teach my students to give feedback. Say something. If that doesn't work and the situation persists, that's when we can explore more options. Is it an option to leave this situation? Is there someone else that you can talk to about what's happening? What are the other choices that you have? But first, I want you to stand up for yourself. I want you to self-advocate. I want you to give feedback.

Our next poll for this lesson is: Is it an option to be mean to someone who's being mean to us? And again, because I'm asking this as a poll, the students recognize that there's some kind of twist to it. Traditionally, students would say no, because that's what we've been taught, right? It's not okay to be mean to someone.

Here's the reality of the situation: It is an option to be mean to someone who's being mean to us. It's absolutely an option. Anytime I ask if something's an option, the answer is always yes. It's always an option. It's an option to yell at somebody. It's an option to hit somebody. It's an option to throw things at somebody.

However, what will the social consequences of that option likely be? They will likely be that everybody who's witnessing the situation observes us being mean. That will have social consequences. They will likely be that we develop a reputation for being mean. That's a likely social consequence. So we absolutely can be mean to someone who's being mean to us, but if we don't want to have a reputation for being mean, we can choose something else.

I end this lesson with one more poll as a reminder. When should we talk to someone else if we are being teased? When should we find someone else to tell? I really want to reinforce that, even though that's not what I want the first option to be, there are times that finding someone who can help is absolutely the best thing to do. Our last poll reinforces that. I guess it's not really a poll, it's more of a question, because it doesn't fit in the poll format. When we feel unsafe, when we've given someone feedback and it didn't work, when something is illegal, when someone is hurt, those are all times when, if there's someone available who can help, we need to pursue that option.

That is the end of our lesson about inferencing. It was probably a lot more involved than you thought when you saw we're going to talk about inferencing. You might have thought we were going to talk about idioms like raining cats and dogs. Nope, we're going to go super deep with it. We're going to talk about the things that actually matter in the everyday lives of our students.

Okay, random number generator, let's see what's coming up next. It says 22. That would be module three, which is all about conversations, and 22 would be lesson six. Let's see what that one's going to be. Lesson six is initiating a conversation. We recently did joining a conversation, which is one that's already happening. Lesson six is initiating a conversation. How do we start a conversation? This is lesson six out of eight, because it's pretty challenging. That's why I have it toward the end of the module. So that's what we'll talk about next time. I'll see you then!