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Each week, LD OnLine gathers interesting news headlines about learning disabilities and ADHD issues. Please note that LD OnLine does not necessarily endorse these views or any others on these outside websites.
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Test Kids with Epilepsy Early to Spot Learning Disabilities
USA Today
Children newly diagnosed with epilepsy may not show signs of academic problems early on, but a new study suggests they could benefit from early cognitive testing to spot potential learning disabilities before they surface in school.
9 Drug-Free Approaches to Managing ADHD
US News and World Report
For decades, Ritalin and similar stimulants have reigned over other treatments for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, also known as ADHD or ADD. The latest results from the Multimodal Treatment Study of Children with ADHD, the largest investigation of the benefits of medication against behavioral therapy, found that stimulants' effects wane over time. Experts have a lengthy list of techniques other than prescription drugs that may help manage ADHD. Here's a quick look at some of them.
Funding Boost for Schools has Parents Fearing Worst for Special Education
Detroit Free Press
Federal stimulus money will allow local school districts to reduce their share of spending this year for special education. Parents of students with special needs, however, are worried that the one-shot money from Washington won't be made up once it runs out, shortchanging their kids.
San Diego Union-Tribune
Tom Pisapia came to The Winston School in second grade, his hooded jacket pulled far over his head. Shy and withdrawn, Tom's learning disabilities had wracked him with anxiety. Within six months at the private school for special-education students, Tom was thinking about running for class president. "This school really taught me that I don't have to be shy," said Tom, who is dyslexic and has auditory processing problems. "I could be who I am with everybody."
Boston Charter Schools Lag in Serving the Neediest
Boston Globe
Governor Deval Patrick has touted his proposed expansion of charter schools as a way to help students who face the greatest academic challenges, such as language barriers and disabilities. But a Globe analysis shows that charter schools in cities targeted by the proposal tend to enroll few special education students or English language learners.
Opinion: End Discriminatory Ban on Special Education at Religious Schools
Seattle Times
September 3 will be a big day for educational liberty and children with special needs in the Evergreen State. The Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction will hold a public hearing in Olympia on a proposal to end Washington's discriminatory ban on special-education services in religious schools. Ending the ban would be a major victory not only for children with disabilities, but also for the right of all parents to choose the schools that are best for their children.
Program Empowers Parents of Special Needs Kids
The University of Vermont
When Stephanie Deffinbaugh's five-year-old daughter Kristyn was diagnosed with severe dyslexia, the North Carolina parent felt a wave of relief that her child's inability to recognize letters wasn't due to laziness or bad parenting. The feeling was short lived. After four years of confrontation with her local school district, which refused to provide services for dyslexic students, Deffinbaugh finally sought refuge at the Exceptional Children's Assistance Center, the state's federally funded parent center.
ABC7 (CA)
One in five students have dyslexia — a disability that makes learning, and especially reading, difficult. Most cases aren't diagnosed until 3rd grade or later. By then, their chances of catching up in reading are just 1 in 7. But some educators are tackling the problem before a child even knows how to open a book.
Your Personal Best: Henry Winkler
Success Magazine
Arthur Fonzarelli was everything Henry Winkler wanted to be. "He was confident, he was a leader among his friends, he was good with women," Winkler says. "He had this confidence." And he didn't have dyslexia.
Evidence Does Not Support Vision Therapy to Correct Dyslexia in Children
Doctor's Guide
Children with suspected dyslexia and learning disabilities should receive only individualized, evidenced-based diagnostic and educational interventions combined with psychological, medical, and vision-oriented treatments as needed, according to a new policy statement released by the American Academy of Pediatrics and a number of professional organizations.
Getting Special Needs Kids Ready For Back to School
Examiner.com
Kids with ADHD, anxiety disorders, and learning disabilities can have more difficulty with transitions than your average kid. Since going back to school is a huge transition, it's a good idea to start preparing them for school ahead of time.
Don't Hesitate to Seek Advice If Your Child Is Lagging Behind
Kalamazoo News (MI)
It was a cute crayon drawing, exactly what someone might expect from a child about to enter kindergarten. Except the name, printed in a childish scrawl, appeared to be a perplexing jumble of letters. The logic of a 4- or 5-year-old can be endearing. But at times, it also can create panic for an overanxious parent wondering if his or her child is on track for academic success. The issue of academic learning curves can be particularly frustrating in the early years, when the range of abilities among children of similar ages is especially wide.
Arizona Woman Helps ADHD/ LD Students Prepare for SAT
The Arizona Republic
Clair Hinckley runs a tutoring service that helps high school students take the SAT and improve their grades and writing skills to help them become better candidates for college admissions and scholarships. She helps two groups of students, she said: the high achievers who want to get into prestigious colleges and students with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder or learning disabilities who want to improve their test scores and schoolwork. Hinckley has an adult form of ADHD herself, so it helps her connect with those kids, she said.
Stimulus Brings Special-Ed Funding Challenge
Education Week
The increase in special education funding driven by the economic stimulus is bringing new attention to a unique provision in federal special education law: Districts that get more special education funds from the federal government are allowed to cut back on the local funds that they use to pay for special education programs. The intent of the provision in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was to allow districts to gradually scale back their own spending while using federal money to fill the gap. But the law did not anticipate a near-doubling of special education funding from the federal government in a short amount of time.
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CA Budget Lifts Diploma Hurdle for Special-Ed Kids
San Francisco Gate
Changes to the California High School Exit Exam policy tucked into the state's new budget may offer a different future for thousands of disabled children denied diplomas over the past two years. The deal signed by the governor Tuesday suspends the exit exam graduation requirement for special-education students. That would mean special-education students in the class of 2010 and perhaps beyond would no longer have to pass the high-stakes test to graduate.
Does Your Child Need ADHD Drugs?
CNN Health
Unbeknownst to her parents, Sydney Kirk tried a little medical experiment on herself when she was in the eighth grade. For a day or two, every so often, she stopped taking her drugs for her attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder. While doctors don't endorse patients with ADHD taking themselves off drugs without consulting their physician, Kirk's experience brings up a question often on the minds of parents: Does my child really need drugs for ADHD, and if so, is there a point when he or she should stop taking them?
Camp is Therapy for Kids with ADHD
Deseret News (UT)
His camp counselors call it "not using materials appropriately." But that doesn't begin to describe the frantic way a 10-year-old boy is pulling up a patch of lawn. It's his third week at a summer camp designed specifically for children with ADHD, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and like most of the other kids sitting in a circle this morning, he's wiggly and distracted.
Helping Students with Learning Disabilities
Muskogee Phoenix (OK)
Nancy Jones has devoted decades to making sure no child feels left out of the learning process. She sees to it that any child with a learning disability gets the help they need to feel included among their classmates and go on to become a success. "The way to teach kids with learning disabilities is to catch them before they actually fail," said Jones, director of Special Services in the Tahlequah school system. "In other words, we're keeping a lot of kids from being actually labeled as learning disabled."
Australia: Spelling It Out For You
The Age (Australia)
Automatic spell checking in word-processing programs is now accepted as an essential part of accurate writing and most users appreciate it picking up typing errors, duplicated words, incorrect capitalization and similar errors. For people with dyslexia spell checking is absolutely essential, but it holds some challenges.
Trying to Learn How Learning Works
USA Today
A review in the current Science magazine makes the case for psychologists, neuroscientists, roboticists and teachers combining to quietly create a new field that combines everything from how brains grow to how classrooms work into a new kind of learning research.
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