Learning Disabilities Digest

A very interesting perspective:

“I think that from very early ages we [in America] see struggle as an indicator that you’re just not very smart,” Stigler says. “It’s a sign of low ability — people who are smart don’t struggle, they just naturally get it, that’s our folk theory. Whereas in Asian cultures they tend to see struggle more as an opportunity.”

In Eastern cultures, Stigler says, it’s just assumed that struggle is a predictable part of the learning process. Everyone is expected to struggle in the process of learning, and so struggling becomes a chance to show that you, the student, have what it takes emotionally to resolve the problem by persisting through that struggle."

"As a neurologist and middle school teacher I have often been asked about the best schedule to maximize children’s health and brainpower. During sleep, the higher thinking regions of the brain are less active because information enters the brain during sleep. This is when the brain can devote a greater portion of its energy (metabolism) to organization and filing the information learned during the day. This brain state is just what is needed to allow recently learned material to be stored in long-term memory."

People with conditions like ADHD, dyslexia and mood disorders are routinely labeled “disabled”. But differences among brains are as enriching—and essential—as differences among plants and animals. Welcome to the new field of neurodiversity.

Humans are the only animals that can imagine the future. That’s great when it comes to figuring out what makes us happy. But what about those sleepless nights filled with anxiety? Joseph LeDoux has spent 30 years studying the biological underpinnings of memory and emotion, especially the mechanisms of fear. He has been doing research on animals, primarily rats, to understand pathological fear and anxiety in humans. A Henry and Lucy Moses Professor of Science and professor of neural science and psychology at New York University, his concentration on the amygdala, that almond-shaped structure in the brain’s temporal lobe having to do with emotional behavior, has also spawned a rock band called the Amygdaloids, with himself and three of his scientific colleagues.

French children don't need medications to control their behavior.

"Getting into, paying for, and navigating through college is rarely easy. For students who have been diagnosed with learning disabilities (LD), that struggle can take on even more dimensions.

Learning-related issues such as dyslexia, dysgraphia, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) often lead to difficulties in traditional classrooms and on standardized tests; if scholarship applications look foremost at test scores and GPAs, it can mean that LD students lose out. Fortunately, there are resources and scholarships out there that can help."

"Students who have both reading and mathematics difficulties are obviously at a double disadvantage. However, even though the reading and mathematical processing areas of the brain are separate from each other, these two cerebral regions interact whenever the learner must translate word problems into symbolic representations. Here are some strategies that are effective with these students."

With the help of correlations from neuroscience research, you can use best brain practices to help your children build the learning habits for best memory and test taking skills while also sustaining or restoring a positive attitude about school. This first of a three-blog series will focus on several practices to make new learning stick and promote the neural circuits long-term memory so knowledge is truly understood and retained beyond the test.

Advice to educators about how to help students with ADHD fulfill the potential of their powerful brains....

"Dear Educators,

I am a 62-year-old psychiatrist who has both attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and dyslexia. Of all the people who helped me deal with these conditions, top prize goes to my 1st grade teacher, Mrs. Eldredge, at Chatham Elementary School in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. She simply put her arm around me when it was my turn to read during reading period. No one laughed at my stammering and stuttering, because I had the mafia sitting next to me! Such a simple intervention, but profound in its impact.

Because of Mrs. Eldredge's arm, I didn't acquire the most damaging learning disabilities—shame, fear, and the conviction that you are stupid and defective. Many other teachers helped me along the way, but Mrs. Eldredge got me off to the right start. By eliminating fear, she enabled me to progress at my own pace, always believing that I could succeed....."

The following article, written by David Rose and Ge Vue in 2010, imagines the future by “pre-creating” the Presidential Address at the IDA Annual Conference in 2020. This article was first published in the International Dyslexia Association, Perspectives on Language and Literacy, Winter 2010. One notable difference between the printed text version and this digital version is the UDL learning supports embedded throughout.

(Website) While online learning holds great promise, there is a paucity of research addressing the pedagogical implications for students with disabilities. Researchers urgently need to conduct investigations that demonstrate how online instruction should be designed and delivered to improve student outcomes.
The challenge of the Center is to address learner variability by conducting research to make online learning more accessible, engaging, and effective for students with disabilities, for whom traditional forms of education have been only moderately successful and the precipitous growth in online instruction threatens to exclude. To address these issues, the Center will assume a leadership role in conducting research and building a network of research collaborators representing a wide array of disciplines whose expertise impacts learner outcomes.

"Practice allows the learner to use the newly learned skill in a new situation with sufficient accuracy so that it will be correctly remembered. Before students begin practice, the teacher should model the thinking process involved and guide the class through each step of the new learning’s application."