Concussions

From the Star Tribune - Kid's Health Section:

"Heightened concern about youth concussions spurred legislation in Minnesota and national guidelines governing when injured athletes can safely return to sports, but many parents and educators remain confused about when students’ brains have healed enough that they can safely return to class.

The American Academy of Pediatrics weighed in on Sunday, with new guidance called “Returning to Learning,” in an effort to keep concussed kids from being rushed back to class in ways that could prolong their brain injuries and cause their grades to plummet."  Link to full Article.

Attention School Psychologists:  Learn how to become a Certified Brain Injury Specialist at http://www.acbis.pro/.  Training teaches to develop plans for concussed or brain injured students.

Dyslexia Video

Well made documentary discussing personal struggles and triumphs of children and adults.  

Raises real  emotion and desire to make sure all students who struggle get the help they need.  

Link to Video.

For Reading/Dyslexia Consultation and Assessment contact Ron Hockman, School Psychologist

Home Work

The way we traditionally give homework assignments is a one of the major reasons kids dislike school.  Most homework in middle school and high school is copied or completed by someone else.  Low homework grades often pull down otherwise good test performance grades and teachers spend a lot of time grading homework.  It can be argued that that time could be used to prepare lessons.  

A different approach is to assign homework, don’t collect it, instead give a short quiz at the beginning of class that has a few of the problems, items, etc. from the homework, grade the quiz quickly.   This quiz can help understand what the students understand rather than what was copied or completed by someone else.  This approach can also reduce pressure on the students and teacher grading time.  

Professional Learning Communities (PLC’s) in Schools Improving Instruction for Students with Learning Disabilities

Teachers in NJ have formed PLC’s to work on adapting lessons for students with disabilities in inclusion settings.  Grant money has been used to provide training and purchase technology to improve practices in the classroom.  Link to Article.

For more information regarding evaluation and consultation services for students with suspected learning problems such as dyslexia email Ron.

Live Online Technology Helps Expand Learning for Students

The Walnut Valley Unified School District in California is using technology to live stream an algebra II honors course to students across schools. This idea started when the district wanted to expand access to advanced courses. "Streaming allows students who do not want to miss any instructional time at their home school to learn a curriculum that has not been offered at the middle school level until now," principal Les Ojeda said.  Link to Article.

Dyslexia

What is Dyslexia?  What Causes it?  What can be done about it?

Dyslexia is a neurobiological disorder that affects the development of both decoding (reading words) and encoding (spelling).  Go to Dyslexia learn more about symptoms and types of dyslexia.

Dyslexia can range from mild to severe and can impact reading and spelling at different times in a person's academic career.  Some people do not struggle significantly until they are in college or demanding graduate programs.  Others struggle from the very beginning of school.

Factors that improve a person's rate of improvement in reading and spelling:

1.  How early the person is identified

2.  Number of hours spent in a proper intervention

3.  Number of months during which the intervention was continued

4.  The person's level of intelligence

5.  The severity of the reading disability

6.  The extent of personality and behavior difficulties.

7.  The experience of the teacher providing the intervention

8.  The closeness of the supervision of the intervention techniques

Interventions and accommodations can be used to help students of all ages to cope and succeed.

For dyslexia consultation and evaluation services email me at rhockman11@gmail.com

Essentials of Dyslexia Assessment and Intervention

US Attitudes on Key Public Education Issues

Highlights from the results of its annual Gallup poll of U.S.attitudes on key issues in public education:

 Charter schools probably offer a better education than traditional public schools.

Most Americans don’t know about the Common Core and those who do don’t understand it.

The significant increase in testing in the past decade has either hurt or made no difference in improving schools.

Students’ standardized test scores should not be used to evaluate teachers. Teacher evaluations should be available to the public — and so should evaluations of doctors and police.

High school students should be able to earn college credits via the Internet while attending high school.

Lack of financial support continues to be the biggest problem facing public schools.

To see more poll data, visit www.pdkpoll.org