Surviving brain farts in Milton Keynes

Apologies for the toilet humour... but also HUGE THANKS to my student A who taught me the term 'brain fart'. Unbelievable how many years I was helping anxious students understand why their brains go blank, without the term 'brain fart' to make them giggle and help carry them back into being able to think again.

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A brain fart is when your brain goes blank for a moment. Reasons vary. The reason I come across most is panic. And a common response to this panic is more panic. Cue behaviours which include...

• brain and body frozen, deer in the headlights

• an urge to distract with charming or amusing questions, stories and shenanigans

• an urge to distract with "naughty" behaviours

• expressions of anger

• expressions of fear

I.e. unhelpful and often disruptive in school and in life.

Common triggers of the panic-inducing brain blanks for anxious or neurodivergent children include...

• realising they've made a mistake

• fearing they'll make a mistake

• not understanding

• fearing they'll not understand

• being told to stop trying to understand in the "wrong" way

• being asked a question

• needing to ask a question

• staring at an exam paper

• being otherwise overwhelmed

I.e. unavoidable in school and in life.

Thankfully, I have found ways to help.

The first thing I usually offer a blanking student (after sympathy!) is to tell them why their, my and everyone else's brains go blank. I tell them about cavemen running from tigers, the amygdala and the hippocampus. I point to the places where these are in my body, so they can find it in theirs. I tell them how I'm going to help them reduce their brain blanks. I tell them what they can do to reduce them. Over the following weeks, I help them notice how their brain blanks reduce and improve.

And at some time in that whole process, when they need a giggle to calm or distract, I talk to about the term 'brain fart'. Thank you A .