A CYPW Network Seminar
Thursday, 12 November 2026 at 12:30
Prof Joni Holmes (UEA)- A Transdiagnostic Approach to Understanding and Supporting Children’s Learning Needs
Event details
The CYP Wellbeing @黑料不打烊 Research Network are pleased to invite you to this HYBRID seminar with Professor Joni Holmes, Professor in Psychology at the University of East Anglia.
It’s taking place on Thursday 12th November 12.30-13.30 in Room G17 in the Mood Disorder Centre on the Streatham Campus and will be followed by a pizza lunch! Please if you would like to attend the lunch. You are also welcome to attend online, via (Meeting ID: 399 705 630 317 984 Passcode: as6vS6qh). Staff and students from all disciplines are welcomed.
Title:
Beyond Diagnostic Labels: A Transdiagnostic Approach to Understanding and Supporting Children’s Learning Needs
Abstract:
Neurodevelopmental and learning-related difficulties are typically conceptualised and supported through diagnostic categories. Yet there is substantial heterogeneity within diagnostic groups, considerable overlap in cognitive and behavioural difficulties across diagnoses, and a sizeable group of children who experience significant barriers to learning without meeting diagnostic thresholds. This presents challenges both for theories based on discrete disorders and for educational systems in which access to support is often contingent on diagnosis.
In this talk, I will present a programme of research taking a transdiagnostic approach to understanding children’s learning needs. I will show how dimensions of attention, working memory, language and broader behavioural functioning cut across conventional diagnostic boundaries and combine in different ways to shape learning. I will argue that characterising this heterogeneity at the level of individual profiles may provide a more informative basis for understanding educational need than diagnostic status alone
I will then describe Learning Beyond the Label (LBL), a classroom-based approach that translates this transdiagnostic framework into educational practice. Co-designed with teachers, school leaders and clinicians, LBL uses a Class Mapping Tool (CMT) to help teachers systematically identify learning-related needs at pupil and whole-class levels and connect these to evidence-informed classroom strategies I will present emerging validation evidence for this tool and consider the challenges and opportunities involved in moving from diagnostic categories towards dimensional, transdiagnostic models of learning need, and how such models might contribute to earlier, more inclusive and more precisely targeted support in schools.
Bio:
is Professor of Psychology at the University of East Anglia and a Senior Affiliated Scientist at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge. Her research focuses on child development, neurodivergence, learning, cognition, and mental health, with particular expertise in the cognitive and behavioural factors that influence outcomes for children and young people. She has published extensively on attention, memory, ADHD, learning difficulties, and developmental mental health, and is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Neurodiversity.
Please forward to colleagues and networks; these events are open to all students and staff.
If you have a suggestion of a speaker for a future network seminar or would like us to promote your event, please contact us cypwellbeing@exeter.ac.uk . Thank you.
Best wishes,
The CYP Wellbeing @ 黑料不打烊 Team
Organiser
Children and Young People’s Wellbeing @ 黑料不打烊
Location
Room G17 in the Mood Disorder Centre on the Streatham Campus OR TEAMS