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Showing posts with label education law. Show all posts
Showing posts with label education law. Show all posts

Lots of good items today...
STEPHEN HAWKING ON DISABILITY. Scientist/cosmologist Stephen Hawking was profiled and interviewed in Wednesday's New York Times. In the interview, Hawking, who has Lou Gehrig's disease and communicates using a computer-generated voice, covered his daily life, his condition, his works, and -- most interesting to us -- his advice on disability. He said, "My advice to other disabled people would be, concentrate on things your disability doesn’t prevent you doing well, and don’t regret the things it interferes with." Find the article.
2e-FRIENDLY SCHOOL IN CONNECTICUT? A member of the 2e community who is moving her family to Connecticut is looking for a 2e-friendly school there for her 6YO son. If you can help, please sign up at the 2e Newsletter Network on Ning.com (http://2enewsletter.ning.com/?xgi=5fRjVktrpoYhb5) and respond to her query in the Forum, or else contact us directly to relay your referral. Thanks!
MATT COHEN ONLINE. Special ed attorney Matt Cohen, who has contributed to 2e: Twice-Exceptional Newsletter, offers a column of legal advice at LDOnline.org. In May's column he covers a number of issues of interest to parents of 2e kids, among them: how schools are required to use peer-reviewed, scientifically-based programs, when possible, to help students; whether a school can deny an IEP because of academic success; the assumption that colleges are required to comply with 504 plans; whether a school counselor may suggest medication; and the extent to which a school must accept an evaluation from an independent professional. Find the column.
WRIGHTSLAW. On the  topic of education law, in the current issue of Special Ed Advocate, the Wrights comment on Compton v. Addison, where a school allegedly failed to evaluate a student for disabilities and is being sued for negligence. They also cover the Child Find Mandate, meant to identify children who might need special ed services. Find the issue.
MOMS WITH AD/HD was the topic of a recent NPR program. NPR interviewed the writer and the subject of a recent Washington Post article on the topic. Read about the mom's discovery of AD/HD and what it means to her and her family (which includes an AD/HD son).
NCLB AND GIFTED CHILDREN. Education Next discussed the issue of whether gifted kids in the U.S. have been shortchanged by NCLB. Members of the discussion noted, among other things, that top-performing 17-year-olds in the U.S. perform no better now than 20 years ago, and that the U.S. is 41st out of 56 participating countries in one measure of advanced mathematical achievement. Find the discussion.
BIOMARKER FOR MAJOR DEPRESSION. A study by scientists at Wayne State University has revealed a new way to distinguish children with major depressive disorder (MDD) from not only normal children, but also from children with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD).The study found different patterns of cortical thickness for patients with MDD versus OCD. Researchers call the results "an exciting new way to identify more objective markers of psychiatric illness in children." Read an abstract of the journal article announcing the study. Read an article based on the press release by Wayne State. Separately, an Oxford University study of depression finds that "overgeneral memory" -- where past events are recalled in an overly broad manner -- is linked to depression. Studies are underway to determine whether overgeneral memory in teens foretells later depression. Read about it.
PAYING ATTENTION TO THE SCREEN. Parents of twice-exceptional children often notice that many kids are able to pay tremendous amounts of sustained attention to those glowing screens. A recent article on the topic explains a variety of views on why this might be so -- video games as self-medication; video as an ameliorative for poor social skills, etc. Read more.
THE BEST BOOKS MONEY CAN BUY. The American Coal Foundation got caught spreading its "clean" view of coal to school kids by paying Scholastic Corporation to write materials for 4th-graders called "United States of Energy." Three advocacy groups took note of how the materials seemed to fail to mention the negative effects of coal and are drawing attention to the collaboration between Scholastic and the foundation. The larger issue is, how many "educational" materials produced and distributed to students are similarly biased. Read more.
AND FINALLY, THIS. If your 16-year-old kid's only out-of-school activity is reading books, know that your child has a better than average chance of becoming a manager or professional later in life, according to an Oxford University study. No other studied activities had such a correlation. Reassuringly, however, the study also found that computer gaming did not decrease a child's chances for later managerial or professional status. Read about the study.


From the Publishers of 2e: Twice-Exceptional Newsletter

EDNEWS.ORG. Michael Shaughnessy interviews a man who couldn't learn in school, was the "problem kid" and endured all kinds of senseless (to us) punishment and discipline. Functionally illiterate at age 29, he discovered in a happenstance encounter with a college professor that he was dyslexic. The saddest part: only one teacher from K-12 realized his intelligence; others treated him in ways not good for his self-esteem. Read the interview.

STRAIGHT-A DYSLEXIC. In contrast to the previous item, a young woman diagnosed with dyslexia in third grade has been named one of CEC's "Yes I Can" award winners for her straight-A average. Even she, however, encountered early teachers who "assumed I was stupid," according to the young woman. Read more about her.

CLEARANCE SALE. Prufrock Press is offering heavy discounts on 33 items from its inventory, including items such as:

  • "The Challenges of Educating the Gifted in Rural Area," originally $12.95 and now $.99
  • "Early Gifts: Recognizing and Nurturing Children's Talents," originally $24.95 and now $.99
  • A number of titles on autism
  • Various posters for teachers,  for example one illustrating the quote "Earth laughs in flowers," originally $7.95 and now $.99.
Find the sale.

CAN A SCHOOL BE NEGLIGENT by not identifying a student's learning disabilities? That's the question that has made it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court as a result of a lawsuit by a family against a Compton, California, school district. In spite of a couneslor's recommendation that the girl be evaluated for learning disabilities, the school did nothing, promoting the girl instead. Several previous administrative and legal decisions have sided with the family. Read more.

INFO ON NORTHWESTERN U PROGRAM. Northwestern University offers certificate and master's degree programs in advanced gifted education. This Thursday the school is offering a one-hour "virtual information session" about those programs. Find out more here or at the university website.

GIFTED ED UNDER ATTACK IN N.C. Up until now, North Carolina has funded and mandated efforts to identify and serve gifted students, but now the legislature is, in educational terms, messing with the arrangement. Find out more.

THE GUT AND THE BRAIN. Scientific American reports on findings that microflora in the gut can influence the biochemistry and development of the brain, especially during certain developmental stages. At least part of the influence comes from gut bacteria affecting the expression of up to 40 genes in the brain, in effect turning the genes on or off. Read more.

AND FINALLY, THIS. The 10 semifinalists have been announced in the Fifth Annual Bubble Wrap Competition for Young Innovators. In this, one of our favorite competitions for young people, students in grades 6-8 are encouraged to find innovative uses for Bubble Wrap. This year, projects include a floating, self-watering garden; a water carrier; a sleep-walk preventer; and seven more. Find out more.

BACK TO SCHOOL WITH AN LD. The Washington Post offers advice for parents of children with LDs or conditions such as AD/HD who are starting the school year. Drawing on the experience of Pam and Pete Wright as well as other experts, the article offers tips such as: know your rights; communicate ahead of time; prepare a statement of your concerns; and more. Find the article.

2e RESOURCE. Another reminder for the beginning of the school year -- the Colorado Department of Education has an online, 118-page resource book titled Twice-Exceptional Students: Gifted Students with Disabilities. The resource book contains information on identifying 2e students, IDEA considerations, planning and problem-solving, and case studies. Find the resource book.

AD/HD IN MIDDLE SCHOOL. Dr. David Rabiner pointed us to a piece on the ADDitude site about AD/HD in middle school and how to help students there with homework, classwork, social skills, and organizing. If your bright young person needs this help, check out the site.

ASD AND SENSORY PROCESSING. Science Daily reports on a study showing that children on the autism spectrum process sensory information differently than typically developing children. They apparently have difficulty dealing with sensory input from multiple sources -- sight, sound, and touch. ASD kids' brains responded more slowly and to a lesser level to multi-sensory stimuli. Read more.

MEDITATION CAN HELP REGULATE BEHAVIOR? A study showed that students trained in meditation developed new fibers in the part of the brain that helps regulate behavior, but study write-ups did not evaluate changes in subjects' behavior, just the structural changes. The type of meditation is IBMT (integrative mind-body training), evidently not currently available in the United States. Read more.

ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGY. A columnist for ZDNET reviewed a smartpen by Livescribe recently, then did a follow-up column on the pen's possibilities for students with learning challenges. The pen allows users to record what is written (using special paper) and also what is being said. The sound and writing capture are synchronized. Read the initial review, where the reviewer claims "This is a genuinely disruptive [in a good sense] tool that can change the way students and teachers interact in the classroom." Read the follow-up, in which he gets more specific about how kids with special issues can use the pen.

"WE DO NOT ACCELERATE" -- and so a gifted Canadian 10-year-old who has completed Grade 8 in a private school will not be allowed to enter public school at the Grade 9 level. Instead, the board wants him to enter at Grade 6. The boy, according to the article, says "I'd get really bored doing Grade 6 again." Find the story.

PESTICIDES AND AD/HD. More to worry about -- CBS News reports on a study linking pesticides used in food production to a two-times-higher risk of receiving an AD/HD diagnosis. One thousand kids were tested in the study, which was reported in Pediatrics. Read the CBS report. See the Pediatrics abstract.

From the Week of July 5th

"HE JUST NEEDS TO WORK HARDER." It's not dyslexia. That's what a mother in Florida kept hearing as her bright young son went through his first years of school. Finally she arranged private testing that revealed the indicators of dyslexia, and she began tutoring her son in reading, improving his abilities, improving his grades, and improving his scores on state standardized reading tests to their highest level. Mom is now a certified dyslexia tutor and dyslexia testing specialist, according to her column in the Lakeland (Florida) Ledger. Her son has presumably stopped proclaiming that school is stupid and that he is stupid. Read the article.

NATIONAL PARENTING GIFTED CHILDREN WEEK is coming up -- the week of July 19-25, as a matter for fact. Find out more at SENG or at NAGC. Both sites suggest ways you can use the designation to increase awareness of gifted children and their education -- ways like, say, mentioning the week on your blog. :)

UNWRAPPING THE GIFTED, Tamara Fisher's blog, contains a lengthy post from July 8th in which Fisher addresses the issue of twice exceptionality and then interviews a long-time gifted friend who has mild cerebral palsy. Find it. (Fisher also mentions 2e Newsletter as a resource, along with eight other links.)

NOTHING TO DO WITH 2e but still interesting. An article in Science Daily describes how neuroscientists have located where fear is stored in the brain -- in lab rats, anyway. Turns out that a form of brain imaging indicates that "the basolateral nucleus in the region of the brain called the of amygdala [is] the place where fear conditioning is encoded." Read the article.

BOOKS FOR KIDS was the topic of a recent New York Times column by Nicolas Kristof, where he offered his list of best children's books ever. He followed up on his blog with recommendations from "some real experts on children's literature" -- his kids -- who provided more recommendations. But then Kristof invited readers to submit their recommendations. He apparently has a bibliophilic following -- as we write this posting, over 2,500 readers had responded with their favorites. Find the recommendations.

THE IDEA FAIRNESS RESTORATION ACT will, according to Wrightslaw, help parents recover expert witness fees in due process hearings and litigation. Wrightslaw urges those potentially affected by this legislation to call their representative on July 9th, tomorrow. More information for the activists and advocates in the 2e community.

NEUROEDUCATION -- a combination of neuroscience, psychology, and education -- is moving "close to prime time as researchers gain a more sophisticated understanding of how young minds develop and learn," says an article at the Dana Foundation site. Findings from the field are influencing how classes are organized and taught. The article notes that research into specific conditions, such as dyslexia, can lead to insights that help everyone learn. The article includes examples of recent applications of "neuroeducation." Find the article.

ARE GIFTED CHILDREN BORN OR MADE? That's the question addressed by a brief article on Voice of America's website. The article focuses on talented musicians. Find it.

FREE GIFTED/TALENTED EDUCATION SEMINARS. The University of California at Irvine offers free, web-based seminars on a variety of GATE topics, including relating to gifted youngsters, differentiation, the parent/teacher connection, and IQ testing. Go here to read a press release. Find the seminars here.