News, commentary, and resources about Learning Disabilities
Wishing folks a happy MLK Day!
For those teachers who frequent these pages and don’t know about Paul Morris, the author of 101 Language Activities, please allow me to encourage you to scoot on over to Free Language Stuff and explore his site. Yes, you read the adjectives correctly. The first adjective does mean “at no cost.” Mr. Morris makes available for free lots and lots of materials that teachers can use for teaching language skills.
Continue reading ‘Paul Morris’s materials’
In “From illiterate to role model” Carla Rivera provides one of those examples worth passing along to others. Ms. Rivera, who reports for the Los Angeles Times, described the case of John Zickefoose, a man who at 30 years of age was not able to read to his own children, read their report cards, read prescription labels, or to order from a menu. As a boy he was diagnosed as having dyslexia but, after adult literacy studies, he participates in book clubs, writes his own speeches, and is an advocate for his local library.
Now, as Ms. Rivera reported, Mr. Zickefoose will serve as a member of his local school board.
Continue reading ‘A success story’
In what will be his last guest column for the Washington Post education column, “The Answer Sheet,” cognitive psychologist Dan Willingham advises people to be skeptical about the poppycock that masquerades as scientific advice about brain-based education. Under the headline “Willingham: 3 brain facts every educator should know,” Professor Willingham explains clearly and with the force of evidence and plain, ordinary reason why “most of what you see advertised as educational advice rooted in neuroscience is bunkum.”
Professor Willingham contends that there are three facts educators should know.
Continue reading ‘Willingham making sense of brain research’
The RTI Action Network published a paper by Jack Fletcher about identification of Learning Disabilities in the context of response to instruction (or intervention; RTI). Professor Fletcher, who has been a leading proponent of RTI since the 1990s, makes a strong case for the importance of examining instruction as a part of determining eligibility for LD services.
Continue reading ‘Fletcher paper about identifying LD’
Researchers from the University of Alabama at Birmingham (AL, US) presented a paper at Neuroscience 2010, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in which they reported that exposure to nicotine during pregnancy leads to a decrease in adult stem cells and a change in synaptic plasticity in the hippocampus of the offspring. The synaptic changes could have lifelong consequences for the offspring. According to Professor Robin Lester of the Department of Neurobiology and lead researcher on the project, “These problems could include various cognitive deficits, learning difficulties, [and] ADHD.”
These are very preliminary findings. They come from research conducted with rats and will require extensive additional work to make the connections to human learning. Note that the mother rats apparently were also ingesting nicotine while nursing (first 10 days after birth) as well as during pregnancy. My reporting here is based entirely on press releases from UAB and the Society for Neuroscience (with abstract).
Sources: http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/571417/ and http://www.sfn.org/index.aspx?pagename=news_111410b
Continue reading ‘Preliminary evidence of link between maternal smoking and risk of child problems’
For those who haven’t been paying attention, Katherine Ellison has appeared on multiple media outlets promoting her book, Buzz. She had another entry, this time in the Washington Post yesterday (20 November 2010). Given the recent release of the US Centers for Disease Control prevalence study, this is pretty timely and, award-winning journalist that she is, Ms. Ellison notes the connection in her lead.
As the mother of a teenager who got a diagnosis of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in 2004, I wasn’t surprised to read the new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that said the number of ADHD cases in children jumped by 22 percent between 2003 and 2007 – an increase of 1 million kids.
But, she goes on to add lots more good content to her op-ed piece published under the headline “Doing battle with the ADHD-industrial complex.”
Continue reading ‘K. Ellison again’
Telephone surveys of parents in the US about the health and well-being of 73,123 children and youths between 4 and 17 years of age revealed that at one time or another 9.5% of the parents said “a doctor or other health-care provider had … told [the parent] that [the] child had ‘attention deficit disorder or attention deficit hyperactive disorder, that is, ADD or ADHD.’” This represents a substantial increase from the 7.8% of parents who responded in the same way to a similar question four years earlier.
I don’t have time to dive into the details of the study right now, but interested readers can chase it through the US Centers for Disease Control. It was published several days ago as “Increasing Prevalence of Parent-Reported Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Among Children — United States, 2003 and 2007” in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR).
Sphere: Related ContentLos Angeles (CA, US) Unified School District has refused an offer by chef Jamie Oliver, who has received the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, to collaborate on a television production about improving school food service, according to Mary MacVean, of the Los Angeles Times. For those who are wondering why on Earth they are reading this lead on LD Blog, alert readers will remind them of a 2009 post on here that noted Mr. Oliver’s accomplishments in the culinary world as well as his connection to the world of Learning Disabilities through his own dyslexia.
Continue reading ‘Cooking something up’
Just as I did on EBD Blog, I’m encouraging folks to read Dan Willingham’s blog entry for the Washington Post regarding the persistent myth that sugar causes children to act hyper. Jump right on over to Dan’s post to read his full deflation of this popular balloon, then you can go back and catch my antique take down on the same topic at “Sugar High?”
Sphere: Related Content
More on smoking and neuropsych disorders
New research shows that using nicotine during pregnancy affects genes involved in myelination and, consequently may help explain why the children of mothers who smoke during pregnancy are more likely to develop such psychiatric disorders as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, depression, autism, and even drug abuse. In a paper presented at Neuroscience 2010, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, Professor Ming Li, Ph.D., of the University of Virginia (Charlottesville, VA, US) reported that when rats were given nicotine during pregnancy, their offspring manifested changes in myelin genes for the limbic system, especially the prefrontal cortex, a brain region important for decision-making.
“Our research shows that gestational treatment with nicotine significantly modifies myelin gene expression in specific brain regions that are involved in behavioral processes,” according to Professor Li, leader of the study. “Myelin deficits have been observed in adults with various psychiatric disorders. Our findings suggest that abnormal myelination may contribute to the psychiatric disorders associated with maternal smoking.”
Sphere: Related ContentContinue reading ‘More on smoking and neuropsych disorders’