AI in Education Part 4: Decoding The Struggle Beneath the Behavior

What If Every Behavior Was Really a Clue?

This is the 4th and final installment in my AI in Education Series.

Have you watched your child rip up their assignment in frustration, or sit frozen when they are supposed to be starting their homework? Or dive into their video games because they can’t face what they are supposed to be doing? What about arguing and negotiating with you over assignments? Or even refusing to go to school all together?

Now let’s look inside our classrooms - where a large percentage of students display these challenging or disruptive behaviors. This is what our teachers are facing every day.

It’s human nature to interpret these behaviors as lack of motivation, defiance, laziness, or refusal.

If we take a closer look…

• The student who rips up their paper isn’t being disrespectful. They’re shutting down because they’re overwhelmed by a task that feels impossible. Their frustration is their nervous system saying:
  “I don’t understand the assignment.”
  “I can’t hold all these steps in my head.”
  “I don’t know where to start and I can’t handle failing again.”

• The student who argues and struggles with group work isn’t trying to be oppositional - they are struggling with cognitive flexibility. They’re stuck on one way to solve the problem and can’t shift their thinking. They lack the impulse control to pause before reacting.

• The student who hides under their desk refusing to come out during a transition from art to math isn’t seeking attention – they’re overwhelmed by change. Their nervous system is saying, “I can’t shift gears that fast.”

• The student who stares at a blank page isn’t “daydreaming” - the anxiety of not knowing where to start further diminishes working memory and task paralysis sets in.

• The student who grasps the big idea instantly but gets lost trying to follow the steps isn’t being careless - their brain is wired for pattern recognition and conceptual thinking, not linear, step-by-step processing. They can see the destination clearly but get frustrated or withdrawn when asked to explain how they got there.

What is the Behavior Trying to Tell Us?

We’ve become really good at labeling behaviors - oppositional, defiant, disruptive, withdrawn - but not nearly as good at understanding what those behaviors are communicating.

Challenging behaviors rarely come from bad intentions. More often, they stem from processing differences and lagging executive function skills that a child can’t yet express in words. When a student consistently acts out, shuts down, or refuses assignments, they’re often signaling difficulties in areas like:

• Emotional regulation – identifying and managing big feelings

• Task initiation – starting or switching from a preferred task to a non-preferred one

• Working Memory – holding and manipulating information in their brain

• Cognitive flexibility – adapting when plans change or problems require new approaches

• Impulse control – pausing before acting

• Social skills – navigating interactions with peers, reading non-verbal cues, understanding unwritten rules

• Processing speed – taking longer to absorb or respond to information

• Sequential processing – trouble following steps in order or understanding process flow

• Auditory processing – difficulty making sense of verbal directions or lectures

• Visual processing – struggling to interpret written or visual material like charts or slides

• Speed of retrieval – needing extra time to recall what they know

The Slow Machinery of Support

Even when teachers and parents recognize skill deficits and learning differences, the system is slow to respond. Evaluations for learning differences and academic challenges can take months or years. Meanwhile, capable, intelligent students are sitting in classrooms where their behaviors are misinterpreted daily. They are often labeled “lazy,” “defiant,” or “unmotivated” and they are falling behind. By the time an IEP or 504 plan is approved, the damage, both academic and emotional, is already done. Some start to believe they really are “bad kids.” Others disengage. Some give up and refuse school completely.

Inside the classroom, overwhelmed educators are trying to meet the needs of thirty unique learners with limited time, support, and training.

What AI Can Bring to the Table

This is where AI can become a bridge - not by replacing teachers, but by helping us notice triggers and patterns faster and more accurately than any single human can. One of my favorite sayings in this context is “figure out what happened before what happened happened” Imagine a system that helps pinpoint exactly what the student was working on right before the challenging behavior started. Those data points can reveal processing, executive functioning and academic struggles long before a formal diagnosis would.

AI can analyze patterns across:

• Antecedents – what happens before the behavior (like an overwhelming assignment, or a processing challenge or sensory overload)

• Behaviors – the observable actions (refusal, meltdown, hiding, shut down)

• Consequences – what happens after, and whether the response is reinforcing or reducing the behavior

By tracking all three elements systematically, AI could help educators more quickly identify where a child needs support, so we can intervene and build skills instead of just managing symptoms.

We can track what’s actually working, allowing faster adjustments instead of waiting months for the next IEP meeting.

AI could even reduce the burden for educators by generating alternative visual materials for those learners who struggle with big blocks of text or multi step instructions, creating different versions of assignments, explaining concepts in new ways that make sense to each individual student’s best way of processing information, and personalizing an effective pace for students if they are struggling with a certain subject.

There are currently adaptive technologies that do all of these things, but the system to put these in place can be slow and cumbersome. Utilizing AI tools can help educators free up time for human interaction with their students.

What This Might Look Like in Practice

• In the classroom: AI-assisted lesson planning can help teachers create differentiated content quickly. A platform might analyze which students struggle with transitions, which need visuals, and which respond better to verbal cues, help identify executive functioning deficits like working memory, cognitive flexibility or task initiation.

• For parents: A dashboard that highlights when your child’s focus improves or when their anxiety spikes - signaling a potential issue. You can see what works, share that with teachers, and create consistency between home and school.

A Future Where Support Is the Default

Imagine a world where accommodations aren’t exceptions - they are just how we teach.

• Every student automatically receives materials in the format that fits their brain.

• Every assignment adjusts to the learner’s pace and processing needs.

• Every teacher sees which strategies are helping and which need tweaking.

• Every parent can collaborate with insight, not guesswork.

No stigma. No separate accommodation plans. No waiting for a crisis. Just responsive, individualized support.

That’s not fantasy and it’s in no way a perfect solution. But this is what effective use of AI can do. It can help level the playing field for students and support our educators.

Because every child deserves to be understood. Every teacher deserves as much support as we can give them. And every behavior deserves to be seen as what it truly is: communication from a student who’s doing their absolute best with the skills they have right now.

If you want to learn more about executive function skills and how to recognize when your child or student is experiencing challenges with them, I made a course called The Executive Functioning Playbook for Parents - it’s everything I wish someone had told me when my son was younger.