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Showing posts with label teen brains. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teen brains. Show all posts

THE LAST POST OF 2010 is an appropriate place to mention Edutopia's solicitation for nominees for "Person of the Year in Education." Got strong feelings? Want to see whom others feel should get the title? Go to Edutopia.
MEDS AND KIDS. A Wall Street Journal article examines medications for children, noting that 25 percent of kids and teens in the United States take prescription drugs. The article points out that many meds prescribed for for kids haven't  been tested on kids -- a little odd, it seems to us. Finding the proper dosage, or finding unexpected side effects in kids, can be an issue. Find the article.
GOING TO HAVE ANOTHER CHILD? Check out a review of the book Origins: How the Nine Months Before Birth Shape the Rest of Our Lives. Its author checked research on a variety of in utero influences on children that potentially affect a child's weight, predisposition to diabetes, lung health, and other factors. Find the review.
THE TEENAGE BRAIN. Sharp Brains has posted on its site "Top 10 Resources to Better Understand the Teenage Brain -- Brain Health Series Part 2." The resources consist of links to features and documents on other websites, including those of New Scientist (on brain maturation), the National Institute of Mental Health (a "Teenage Brain Fact Sheet"), and PBS ("Inside the Teenage Brain," a documentary). Find the list.
THE DSM MEETS GENETICS. An illuminating article on the Scientific American website offers insight into a variety of issues that face parents of twice-exceptional children. Among those issues are: 
  • The fact that there are no validated lab tests for mental illnesses
  • The way symptom patterns commonly change over a lifetime, leading to different diagnoses
  • The heritability of traits 
  • Common co-morbidities, especially the tendency for certain disorders to "cluster" with others. 
The author, a former director of the US National Institute of Mental Health, suggests that what we know about genetics does not map well onto DSM classifications. He further recommends that DSM task forces "create chapters of disorders that co-occur at very high rates and that appear to share genetic risk factors based on family, twin, and molecular genetic studies... [This] would be possible for certain neurodevelopmental disorders, anxiety disorders, the obsessive-compulsive disorder spectrum, so-called externalizing or disruptive disorders (such as antisocial personality disorder and substance use disorders), and others." Find this article.

FOLLOWING UP. Several mental health professionals took the time to write and respond to the recent article in The New York Times about the misdiagnosis and medication of a toddler, blogged about last week. Find the letters.

TECHNOLOGY AND LEARNING. A Washington, DC, technology blog writes about a California school experiment with iPads that will replace algebra textbooks for 400 eighth-graders. One of the participants in the program is a textbook publisher. The iPads will offer access to digital versions of the textbook along with instructional videos. Read more, and consider the ramifications for differentiation for gifted and 2e students. Separately, Edutopia featured an article on integrating technology into elementary schools, and another on how technology can facilitate differentiation.

DYSLEXIC ACHIEVERS. Read about a congressman and about a researcher/computer expert who both relate their early struggles with dyslexia and how they persevered and overcame. Find the article. (And find another article on the topic in the upcoming issue of 2e Newsletter, out soon.)

CHICAGO-AREA WORKSHOP. School psychologist Michael Gladstein, featured in a recent issue of 2e Newsletter on the various professionals that can help families of 2e children, is presenting a workshop titled "Executive Function: Key Techniques to Improve School-related Behaviors." The workshop is to be held the evening of October 5th in the Park Ridge, Illinois, offices of Kinetic Konnections, the program's sponsor. A $10 fee will be donated to a worthy cause. Find out more by contacting the sponsor at www.kinetickonnections.com.

THE TEEN BRAIN. If you have a real interest in the teenage brain -- and we mean $175 worth of interest -- check out an NYT Knowledge Network course called "Exploring the Teenage Brain." The course lasts from September 20th until October 15th and involves weekly online live sessions as well as self-paced lessons. Find out more.

Resources and News from 3 Newsletters and Other Media

REMEMBER HOAGIES' as a resource when you're looking for information about your gifted or twice-exceptional child. For those of you interested in the brain's impact on the gifted and the LD, check out Carolyn K's "Brain Research and Learning Theories" page. And if you raise or teach a twice-exceptional child who will be going to college, read the "Twice Exceptional Students in College" page. Or, you may nominate a favorite teacher or administrator for Hoagies' "Gifted Teacher and Administrator of the Year Contest." Or, you can just start at the Hoagies' home page and spend a year or two following your interests...

ATTENTION RESEARCH UPDATE. David Rabiner wondered what happens when a child's core AD/HD symptoms are normalized -- will areas such as peer relations and academic performance improve as well? In the current issue of his newsletter, Rabiner reviews a study examining that question. Find the review and Rabiner's conclusions.

WRIGHTSLAW SPECIAL ED ADVOCATE. This newsletter for the first week of December covered reading programs that are effective and research based, as required by NCLB. If your bright but reading-challenged student could use help, check out Special Ed Advocate for this week.

SOCIAL SKILLS FOR ASPIES and kids with mild autism is the topic of an article in the Washington Post. The article examines what various schools in the Washington, DC, area are doing to help these young people navigate independently and fit in. Read it.

TEENAGERS -- DIFFERENT. We know that, and a developmental psychologist explains, in an interview in The New York Times, why teenagers often don't plan, anticipate consequences, or make the right decisions. The perspective is from a criminal justice perspective -- should a teenager be held as accountable for his or her crime as an adult would be? -- but the insights apply to everyday life. Find it.

GIFTED EDUCATION PRESS QUARTERLY'S winter issue has been published. In it, you can find articles on: science education for gifted minority students; ways to encourage and nurture reading in gifted children; and using Turner Classic movies to stimulate gifted students' sensibilities in both cognitive and affective areas. There is also a brief critique of the current state of gifted education by Alexis I. du Pont de Bie, who is "appalled by the horrific, stomach churning of our current local and national education for the gifted"; du Pont de Bie also expresses a concern with the way NAGC addresses gifted education. Find the newsletter.

On Praise, Thanks, At-Risk Labels, and the Amygdala

DON'T PRAISE INTELLIGENCE in your gifted, high-ability kids. It makes kids want to protect the idea that they're smart, and that can lead to lost confidence, lost interest in challenging tasks, and plummeting performance. So says psychologist Carol Dweck in an interview published in a University of Illinois publication. In the article, Dweck also discusses the fixed mindset versus the growth mindset and how they apply to children and students, among other areas. Find the article.

THANK THAT EDUCATOR OF 2e STUDENTS. The website MyTeacherMyHero.com is offering a way to fund school projects and supplies by posting a video thanking your favorite teacher. By thanking your favorite teacher in a video at the site, you can earn a $25 "Giving Card" from DonorsChoose.org. You can then donate the Giving Card to a project, school, or teacher you want to help -- and multiple videos from friends and colleagues can increase the funding for the project you choose. Find details.

FUNDRAISING IDEA FOR YOUR GIFTED SCHOOL. A private school in Vail, Colorado, is raising money by raffling off a $1.3 million ski home plus cash to pay the income tax on it. And you thought the fruit basket you gave to your school's last silent auction was something -- next time, donate your home. Read more, or enter.

BRAIN SCIENCE, STRESS, AND DISCIPLINE. An article in the Providence Journal tells how a consultant teaches educators how to apply brain science to reduce stress in schools and to help discipline. The article recounts the disruptive effects of stress on education, describes the importance a nurturing relationship with a non-parent adult (eg, a teacher) can have for a child, and describes how ritualized actions and nonverbal gestures can speak directly to the amygdala, calming kids when used properly. Read the article.

DUMPING THE ASPIE LABEL. An opinion piece in The New York Times about eliminating Asperger's as a separate condition in the next DSM and lumping it with ASDs generated lots of letters to the editor. If this issue interests you, check out the letters.

AT-RISK VERSUS AT-PROMISE. Washington Post columnist Jay Matthews writes about how some schools are changing the "at-risk" label to "at-promise." The rationale? Intimations of deficit model versus strength model. Silly? Read the column.

TEEN BRAINS. Are they wired differently? A recent study indicates they might be. From the study: “Our work on the amygdala revealed that the neuronal pathways that carry sensory information to the amygdala directly, bypassing cortex, are more plastic in the juvenile than in adult mice...” This could mean that teens are driven more by subcortical, less rational parts of the brain. Find out more.