Non Linear Learning - Rethinking Education for Neurodivergent Learners

Most special education systems operate on this premise:
Students with disabilities must master small foundational skills before they are allowed access to academic content.
 
In practice, this often means students spend years repeating the same goals - decoding, counting, basic worksheets - while their peers move forward into real subjects like science, history, and mathematics.
 
But what happens when a student with significant disabilities is simply included in a high school physics class?
 
In this episode of Non Linear Learning, I speak with Sruthi Muralidharan, a high school physics teacher who is testing that question in a public school classroom.
 
Sruthi teaches general education physics where students with significant cognitive disabilities - including students with Down syndrome - participate alongside their peers in labs, engineering activities, and scientific investigations.
 
Her work challenges several assumptions that dominate special education today.
Sruthi did not begin her career in education. She holds an MS in Physics and a PhD in Electrical Engineering and spent more than ten years working in the semiconductor industry.
 
In This Episode
We discuss:
• Why mastery-based IEP goals often keep students repeating the same material year after year
• The limitations of self-contained special education classrooms
• What happens when students with significant disabilities join general education science classes
• Why educators often confuse communication challenges with cognitive limitations
• How inclusive classrooms can actually improve regulation and engagement
• Why the burden of proving intelligence should never fall on the child
 
About Our Guest
 
Sruthi Muralidharan is a high school physics teacher and advocate for inclusive education.
She previously worked for more than a decade in the semiconductor industry and holds an MS in Physics and a PhD in Electrical Engineering.
Links & Resources
Sruthi's Substack on lesson modification and inclusive teaching



Vaish's course on making academics possible: Non Linear Education

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Dr. Vaish Sarathy speaks with Dr. Kendall Stewart (former surgeon turned functional medicine + genomics clinician) about the biochemistry of learning: how inflammation, metabolic factors, neurotransmitter balance, and genetics can influence regulation, sensory stability, and why some kids respond to interventions while others don't.
What we cover:
Why progress can look like "good days/bad days" when inflammation fluctuates

Nutrigenomics vs exome sequencing vs pharmacogenetics (and why personalization matters)

A parent-friendly clinical framework: inflammation → autophagy/insulin tendencies → neurotrophic factors → glutamate/GABA → methylation

Sensory stability (vestibular/visual) and why eye contact can reduce listening for some learners

Microbiome basics: inflammation load, butyrate, absorption/biofilms

Resources
Dr. Kendall Stewart: www.drkendalstewart.com

Non Linear Education (NLE): https://www.drvaishsarathy.com/nonlineareducation

Medical disclaimer (important):
This episode is for educational purposes only and does not provide medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always consult your qualified clinician for medical decisions—especially for children and complex conditions.

Homeschooling sometimes begins when parents realize the education system is not serving their child. 
In this episode of Non Linear Learning, Dr. Vaish Sarathy speaks with Victoria Lenormand, a former detective turned holistic health practitioner and homeschooling parent, about what it takes to trust a child's internal compass and let go of conventional definitions of success.
Victoria brings an evidence-based perspective to homeschooling. Trained to observe patterns and follow facts, she applied that same mindset to her son's learning and recognized that a linear schooling model was taking enormous energy just to maintain — without supporting his identity or growth.
Together, Vaish and Victoria explore:
How to build the mindset needed for homeschooling

The 3 factors learning is built around when done right. 

How to interpret stubbornness or "wilfulness" in a way that works for your child, and 

Why the energy cost of education is critical information for parents

This conversation is for parents considering homeschooling, questioning traditional schooling, or feeling the constant friction between who their child is and what school expects.
As we reflect in the episode:
"When something in education takes enormous energy just to maintain, it's worth asking whether it's actually working."
Resources
Victoria Lenormand's parent community: https://www.geminidirections.co.uk
You can find Vaish at www.instagram.com/drvaishsarathy

Parents of Autistic children and children with Down syndrome are often given advice that sounds compassionate, reasonable, and supportive. But much of it slowly limits learning, flexibility, autonomy, and long-term growth.
In this milestone Episode 200 of Non Linear Learning, Dr. Vaish Sarathy challenges 5 common pieces of parenting and education advice that unintentionally lower expectations and shift focus away from real learning.
In this episode, you'll learn why Dr. Vaish challenges:
• Strict routines and rigid structure — and how too much predictability reduces tolerance for learning and change • Traditional support groups — and how shared grief can quietly stall progress
... and more 
This episode is for parents who:
• Have been told academics can wait • Feel uneasy about advice that sounds kind but feels limiting • Want age-appropriate, intellectually rich education for their child
Resources
Learn how to teach real academics non-linearly, without waiting for "readiness," inside Non Linear Education.

When 8-year-old non-speaking autistic Rafael found text-based communication, he didn't just start "answering questions." He started telling the truth about his body, his anxiety, and the frustration of being misunderstood.
 
If you've ever looked at your non-speaking child and thought, "I know there's more in there… I just don't know how to reach it," this conversation is for you.
 
Today I'm joined by Daria and her 8-year-old autistic, non-speaking son Rafael, co-creators of Spelling the Tea on Autism on Substack and Instagram. After discovering text-based communication, they realized how deeply Rafael had been misunderstood - and started documenting both his words and the science that helps explain them.
 
Inside the episode, we talk about:
Rafael's "goner mindset" before communication and what typing changed about his sense of the future.

How apraxia creates a gap between intention and movement and why that gap gets mislabeled as "low IQ," "behavior," or "non-compliance."

The concept of an "interference score" for food!

How Rafael would redesign first in schools for non-speakers.

Why regulation, communication, and learning are inseparable… and why independence in cognition does not mean independence in motor and sensory systems.

 
This is a humbling, practical, and very human reminder that:
We can't keep separating "behavior," "sensory," and "cognitive" boxes.

Research on autism that excludes non-speakers cannot be our only compass.

And most importantly: sitting still is not a pre-requisite for real thinking or rigorous education.

 
You can find Daria and Rafael at https://www.instagram.com/spelling_the_tea_on_autism/
and https://spellingthetea.substack.com/
 
You can find Dr. Vaish Sarathy at https://www.instagram.com/drvaishsarathy/
Check out her 6 foundational tips on education at https://www.drvaishsarathy.com/nonlinearlearning