Let Them Be Wild: Why Children With ADHD Deserve Better

Every parent remembers the first time the school calls.

For some, it’s a quick check-in.

For others — parents like me — it becomes a pattern.

“He’s not listening."

“She’s distracted.”

“They can’t sit still.”

And eventually, the predictable suggestion always arrives: “Have you tried medication?”

As a mother of a child with ADHD, I can’t begin to count how many meetings, phone calls, or “concerns” I’ve sat through. Each time, I walk in hoping that this time will be different — that someone will see my child for who they are, not for the behaviours that don’t fit neatly inside a box.

Yet the same approach is repeated:

“How do we make this child fit into our system?”

No one asks,

“How do we make the environment fit this child?”

ADHD in a Traditional Classroom Is Like Asking a Fish to Climb a Tree

Traditional schooling relies heavily on verbal instruction, still expecting children to sit still, listen, absorb, and retain information delivered in a passive format. Worksheets, listening, quiet focus. Then testing. Memorise. Repeat.

This works in a neurotypical world, where linear learning, stillness, and routine are natural and rewarded.

But for a child with ADHD? This is like asking a fish to live out of water.

Children with ADHD aren’t failing. The environment is failing them.

Their brains are wired for movement, exploration, problem-solving, hands-on discovery — not silent compliance.

When did we decide that learning only counts if it happens seated, silent, and still?

What If We Reimagined School Entirely?

What if classrooms weren’t four walls and fluorescent lights?

What if lessons were outside, hands-on, movement-based, full of wonder?

Imagine 30-minute sessions with breaks designed for regulation, not punishment.

Imagine learning that looks like:

• Building cubbies and learning geometry through real-world construction

• Growing food and learning science from soil to plate

• Budgeting with real money, not hypothetical worksheets

• Cooking, sewing, building, investing, connecting

• Prioritising emotional regulation, communication, collaboration, community

  
  

Where learning is lived, not memorised.

Where children learn how to be people, not just students.

Where free thinkers aren’t labelled “disruptive,” but recognised as innovators.

The Real Cost of Traditional Schooling

We are seeing it more than ever.

Children masking their symptoms to fit in. Children feeling like failures because they can’t “perform. ”Children exhausted — mentally and emotionally — from trying to mold themselves into a system that never considered them when it was designed.

• Parents are waking up.

• Teachers are frustrated.

• Children are hurting.

Little Wildlings Exists Because of This Gap

Little Wildlings has been created for these children — the ones who think differently, move differently, feel deeply and see the world wide open.

Here, children don’t have to shrink themselves to fit. They don’t have to “behave.” They don’t have to earn belonging.

They just get to be.

We explore. We build. We connect. We learn without fear.

Whatever sparks curiosity becomes the lesson.

I dream of the day our region has a full-time learning space like this — one that truly honours our Wild Ones. The children who will grow up to challenge systems, lead movements, invent solutions, and change the world not in spite of their differences, but because of them.

To Every Parent of a Wild One

You are not alone. Your child is not broken. There is nothing wrong with wanting more than “just make them fit.”

Keep dreaming big.

Keep advocating loudly.

Keep believing fiercely.

Because I promise you your little one is seen here.

They are safe here.

They are celebrated here.

Let’s raise children who don’t just fit into the world —let’s build a world that fits them.

— Little Wildlings