02/17/2026
I didn’t always see resistance clearly.
Early in my career as a speech-language pathologist, I thought if I just explained something better, pushed a little more, raised the expectation… the child would rise.
Sometimes they did.
But the kids who struggled the most?
They didn’t push harder.
They protected themselves.
And once I understood the neuroscience behind learning and language processing, everything shifted.
The brain is wired for efficiency and safety.
When language feels confusing, when directions overload working memory, when decoding is effortful, when organizing thoughts feels chaotic,
the nervous system adapts.
It builds habits to avoid cognitive overload.
Guessing.
Rushing.
Deflecting.
Shutting down.
Not because a child doesn’t care.
But because their brain is trying to conserve energy and avoid threat.
Research in cognitive load theory and neuroplasticity shows us something powerful:
Repeated failure wires resistance.
Repeated supported success wires confidence.
And here’s the part adults don’t always want to hear:
We do this too.
We avoid what makes us feel incompetent.
We rush through discomfort.
We overtalk when we’re unsure.
We scroll instead of sitting with something hard.
Learning resistance doesn’t disappear in adulthood.
It just gets better disguised.
So the real question isn’t,
“How do I make them try harder?”
It’s:
“How do I make thinking feel safer?”
For children.
For students.
For ourselves.
Because confidence isn’t about personality.
It’s about experience.
And safety is the foundation of real learning.
