I work with children in grades kindergarten through 5th grade who struggle in school in the areas of reading, handwriting, and math. I'm located in southern San Mateo county, California.
A six-minute video from a female college student on how dyscalculia affects her life, in every-day life and in academic study. (The picture quality isn't very good, but the audio is excellent). If you have an older child who is struggling or who has been diagnosed with dyscalculia, watching this video and the ones the following two Wednesdays might be reassuring.
While this video is narrated by an English woman with a mild accent, the letter sounds are quite clear. The video is 5 mins.
You can also find more materials from http://www.phonicbooks.co.uk. I wouldn't recommend USians purchasing the books, though, as the spelling variation might be confusion.
...and that's why universities should do more to understand, accommodate and value dyslexic graduate students, argues Rebecca Loncraine
I am dyslexic. I am also a writer with a PhD in English literature. Contrary to popular perception, these things are not incompatible. People are often surprised to hear this. Most assume that all dyslexics are aspiring architects, artists or entrepreneurs, not writers having to deal with the messy business of words as the tools of their trade.
When I completed my doctorate in English literature at Oxford University in 2002, I was the only dyslexic person to have achieved this as far as I knew. I swung between feeling like a proud pioneer and an isolated freak. I had not encountered other dyslexic graduates during my research, and I had come across some very old-fashioned attitudes towards dyslexia. I had overheard senior figures in the university asserting that there are no dyslexics at Oxford.
Landing a great job directly after college made 22-year-old Columbia graduate Tom Reed ecstatic. It was in the industry he wanted to be in (TV production), in the city he had grown to love (New York), and it came without the hassle of the long and tiresome job search that plagued many of his fellow graduates. Still, despite the tremendous relief of being gainfully employed, Reed was faced with the anxiety attached to one vital question: should he, or should he not, tell his superiors about his learning disability?
Disclosure meant a number of different things for Reed. If he told his superiors about his affliction, described by Reed as a non-verbal processing disorder which makes sorting fragmented information especially difficult, then his bosses could possibly treat the situation as a positive and find areas where they could maximize Reed's above-average creative faculties and find ways to work around his organizational difficulties.
Concerns about Stigma Undermine Adolescents' Treatment for ADHD
Because ADHD frequently persists into adolescence, and continues to undermine teens' academic and social functioning, most adolescents continue to need treatment. However, as issues of self-direction and autonomy become more important for teens, resistance to treatment for ADHD - medication or otherwise - frequently intensifies and many adolescents stop treatment prematurely. This is a challenge that many parents struggle with.
It is thus important to understand the factors - particularly adolescents' perspectives on treatment - that affect the receipt of ADHD treatment during this critical developmental period. Examining this issue was the focus of a study published recently in the Journal of Adolescent Health [Bussing et al (2011). Receiving treatment for Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: Do the perspectives of adolescents matter. Journal of Adolescent Health, 49, 7-14.]
Participants were 168 adolescents - about 50% female - and their parents recruited through a public school system in the US. These adolescents screened positive for ADHD in elementary school and were contacted 6 years later for a follow-up assessment. At follow-up, over 60% continued to meet full diagnostic criteria for ADHD and many others still had elevated levels of ADHD symptoms. The researchers were interested in how many adolescents had received ADHD treatment in the past year and the parent and child characteristics that predicted the receipt of treatment.
This three-minute video from Ireland introduces how Handwriting Without Tears and some multi-sensory ideas to introduce pre-school children to handwriting
And another short clip on the symptoms of dyscalculia
AThe causes
And then some of the things parents can do to help their struggling children
One of the speakers on the panel mentioned a particular curriculum, Jump Math. It is available here: http://jumpmath1.org/
Parents of children with ADHD have been found to experience elevated levels of parenting stress and distress in multiple studies. This is not surprising given the greater challenges associated with raising a child who consistently exhibits high levels of ADHD symptoms.
Studies of child ADHD and parenting stress have typically relied on global and static measures of both children's behavioral problems, e.g., having parents complete rating scales and parents' reports of stress/distress. Correlating these reports provides useful information on how children's ADHD symptoms relate to parents' average distress level, but say little about the moment-to-moment fluctuations in parents' stress that may occur in response to fluctuations in their child's behavior. This dynamic aspect of the parent child relationship can only be captured by relating parents' stress to children's behavior as it occurs in real time.
This is a long (1 hour 20 minute) presentation and Q & A by neuroscientist and clinician Laurie Cesnick on the reading process, dyslexia, and visual attention. This is fairly technical, but may be of interest.
This is on an Australian blog marketing a particular kind of dyslexia remediation that I don't endorse. I am going to have to find out if this claim has any merit.
Dyslexia is inherited through genetics. Most of the time a dyslexic child will also have a parent, grandparent, aunt or uncle that is also dyslexic. Dyslexia can be very hard to overcome, but with the proper teaching, anyone with dyslexia can “shine.” Traditional classroom teaching just isn’t enough for those with dyslexia. They need additional help in order to master their reading and writing skills.
I use to teach fifth grade and had 25 students in my class. It was a full time job guiding my 25 students through the day to day lessons. I would not have been able to offer the necessary attention and time to a student with dyslexia while teaching the rest of my 25 students. Once a child is diagnosed with dyslexia, it is definitely in the child’s best interest for the parent’s to find additional help for their child. As a parent, many thoughts will run through your mind that may hinder you from finding immediate help, but the quicker you get help for your child, the quicker your child can stop feeling “lost” while at school. Dyslexia is nothing to be ashamed of, it just requires a different type of learning in order to overcome. Don’t give Dyslexia a chance to affect your child’s life in the future, make sure you find the proper help and stand behind your child 100% of the way.
The author is David Rabiner. If you or a loved one are affected by attentional difficulties, diagnosed or not, you should sign up for his newsletter, Attention Research Update.
New Review of Neurofeedback Treatment for ADHD - Current State of the Science
Neurofeedback - also known as EEG Biofeedback - is an approach for treating ADHD in which individuals are provided real-time feedback on their brainwave activity and taught to alter their typical EEG pattern to one that is consistent with a focused and attentive state. According to neurofeedback proponents, this often results in improved attention and reduced hyperactive/impulsive behavior.
Several years ago I summarized the scientific support for neurofeedback treatment - see http://www.helpforadd.com/2007/september.htm - and noted that although positive findings had been reported in multiple published studies, limitations of these studies led many researchers to regard neurofeedback as a promising, but unproven treatment.
Oral language plays a vital role in the learning and lives of all students, but particularly early childhood students. These students learn to adjust their home language in order to use and understand the language of schooling. Michael Halliday lists seven functions of oral language which relate to the different ways young children use language to achieve particular purposes within particular contexts. These functions are:
• Instrumental – I want
• Regulatory – Do as I tell you
• Interactional – Me and you
• Personal- Here I come
• Heuristic – Tell me why
• Imaginative – Let’s pretend
• Representational – I’ve got something to tell you
Journey into Dyslexia presents profiles of students and adults with dyslexia who share their experiences of struggling in school and then succeeding in life. Academy-Award winning filmmakers Alan and Susan Raymond examine the complexities of this differently structured brain and debunk the myths and misperceptions about dyslexia. Journey into Dyslexia originally aired on HBO2 on May 11, 2011.
Showings:
Oakland Public Library
Saturday, October 6, 10:30 am-12:30 pm
125 14th St.
Oakland, CA 94612
San Jose Martin Luther King Library
Saturday, October 20, 10:00 am-12:00 pm
150 E. San Fernando St.
Cost is FREE, no RSVP necessary
For more information: www.dyslexia-ncbida.org. More information below the fold.
The scientists have discovered an important neural mechanism underlying dyslexia and shown that many difficulties associated with dyslexia can potentially be traced back to a malfunction of the medial geniculate body in the thalamus. The results provide an important basis for developing potential treatments.
People who suffer from dyslexia have difficulties with identifying speech sounds in spoken language. For example, while most children are able to recognise whether two words rhyme even before they go to school, dyslexic children often cannot do this until late primary school age. Those affected suffer from dyslexia their whole lives. However, there are also always cases where people can compensate for their dyslexia. "This suggests that dyslexia can be treated. We are therefore trying to find the neural causes of this learning disability in order to create a basis for improved treatment options," says Díaz.
Up to one in five Americans have dyslexia, making it challenging for them to get through a best seller — or even a menu. If they weren't diagnosed in school, many may incorrectly assume they're simply slow readers — "or even stupid," says Sally Shaywitz, M.D., codirector of the Yale Center for Dyslexia & Creativity. But dyslexia is neurological: Disruptions in key brain circuits affect the ability to retrieve or correctly order the basic sounds of language, explains Dr. Shaywitz. Telltale clues — beyond reading in a way that feels plodding and deliberate — include exceptionally poor spelling and knowing a word but being unable to utter it correctly.
Although the process is time- consuming, you can overcome dyslexia. It requires relearning the basics of reading, all the way back to learning how to sound out words. Group classes for adults typically meet at libraries, adult education centers, or offices of nonprofit literacy organizations several times a week for a year or longer. You can also have private lessons with a tutor.
Rule of thumb: at least two hours of tutoring a week; more is better. Estimate a minimum of 100 hours of skilled remediation to become more fluent in reading.
This is a short (10 min 34 sec) made for young teachers that defines the three different terms and some examples for how to teach each element.
This information is important for parents for struggling readers as well, because things go awry in reading in all three domains.
This video shares basic information about some terminology surrounding the teaching of emergent and beginning reading. It focuses on the definitions and distinctions between phonological awareness, phonemic awareness, and phonics.
In a nutshell:
Phonological awareness is the broader awareness of sound and is auditory.
Phonemic awareness is the awareness of the smallest units of sound in a word and the ability to segment, blend, isolate, and manipulate those smallest individual units of sound. It is auditory.
Phonics is the relationship between phonemes and graphemes. It is learning the rules and patterns of the letter-sound relationship.
This is an excellent short (2 min 58 sec) video produced in the UK. The voice appears to be synthesized with a British accent. Don't let that throw you: the signs given are all accurate.
This 10 minute video demonstrates a technique for helping the younger student learn and retain the weekly spelling words. Thanks to dyslexiamom to making a clear, understandable video. You might try this technique with your struggling reader.
A 49 second video that teaches you how to teach your child the correct pencil grip and grip firmness. This is were a lot of students begin to go wrong.
When I start working with a student on handwriting remediation, correcting grip is usually the first few lessons, and we keep returning to it as necessary.
Have your child correct the grip, and then do nothing more than tally marks |||| for a number of repetitions. Depending on the child, you can have the child make 5 tally marks, do the pencil-flip trick, and do 5 more, working up to 100 repetitions a day.
Often kids' hands get sore from this new (correct) form of grip, so monitor the child's comfort.
You can also mix things up with either repeated letter forms: c c c c c c or o o o o o.
Sometimes, the child struggling with handwriting needs wider-ruled paper than the standard wide-ruled paper. According to Wikipedia, the US standards for ruled paper are
Wide ruled (or Legal ruled) paper has 11/32 in (8.7 mm) spacing between horizontal lines, with a vertical margin drawn about 1-1/4 in (31.75 mm) from the left-hand edge of the page. It is commonly used by American children in grade school, as well as by those with larger handwriting.
Medium ruled (or College ruled) paper has 9/32 in (7.1 mm) spacing between horizontal lines, with a vertical margin drawn about 1-1/4 in (31.75 mm) from the left-hand edge of the page. Its use is very common in the United States.
Narrow ruled paper has 1/4 in (6.35 mm) spacing between ruling lines, and is used by those with smaller handwriting or to fit more lines per page.
I have used the following source for printable paper with various rulings.
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