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Matthew Lynch published in Parental Involvement

How to Help Your Child Cope with ADHD

**The Edvocate is pleased to publish guest posts as way to fuel important conversations surrounding a P-20 education in America. The opinions contained within guest posts are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official opinion of The Edvocate or Dr. Matthew Lynch.**

By JaVohn Perry

A lot of parents wonder what to do once their child is diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder, commonly referred to ADHD. This is a very good question because it’s not enough to just know that your child has the disorder. It’s imperative to know what the next steps should be.

Form a support team. To start, one huge way to support your child is putting together a strong team. Your child’s support team should include family members, educators, parents and doctors. Cooperating as a team with the people in your child’s life is the best way to support him or her with the ADHD diagnosis.  This means you should be in constant contact with everyone involved in your child’s life. Frequent communication with your child’s educators is always a good idea. Find out as much as you can about your child’s learning environment. It’s also good to ask about your child’s strengths, struggles and areas of improvement. Take opportunities to share the same information with your child’s educator about home progression. This helps to keep things consistent from school to home and keeps everyone in the loop.

Reprioritize at home. Children who have been diagnosed with ADHD may sometimes give you a challenge when it comes to parenting. They often have a hard time following instructions which can get quite frustrating for adults. They are also very active which can make it a bit hard for adults to keep up with them. Another struggle your child may have is focusing their attention for long periods of time. Because of these factors and a few others, children with ADHD have a tendency to need more organized home lives and vivid expectations. These reasons may require you to adjust or alter things at home to support your child.

Offer rewards. One good idea is to praise and reward good behavior. Instead of focusing so much on behavior that is unacceptable, try to acknowledge when you observe good behavior. This can be anything from a pat on the back to buying a new toy. The most important thing is that your child knows that you noticed good behavior and you are rewarding him/her for it. Play off of your child’s desires and interests when it comes to rewards. Some children enjoy sticker charts, while others would like extra privileges. If you choose to implement a reward system, make sure it is based off of things your child is interested in and that is remains consistent.

Exercise attention span. Setting times for specific activities that require your child to be focused and engaged might help with attention span. Choose (or have your child choose) an activity to work on for a certain amount of time. You can set a timer and once the time is up, give your child the option to be finished. This helps your child to practice focusing attention. When introducing this for the first time, you should start with small sessions or a time frame in which you are sure you child can focus. After about a week or so, try adding on a little bit more time and see how it goes.

Maintain routine. Another way to support your child through ADHD is to make things predictable. You can do this by making a daily schedule and posting it for your child to see. Specify certain times for homework, television, going to bed, and chores. Having a predictable schedule makes it easier for your child to transition to the next task or activity. Having a set routine is really important. If there will be any changes, it is a good idea to tell your child ahead of time. A consistent routine may assist your child in having a sense of stability.

Keep in mind that these things aren’t the “fix all” but supporting and helping your child cope with this disorder may get you further in the progressing stages. This also shows your child that you care and will be there to guide them through his or her struggles with ADHD.

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JaVohn Perry is a devoted mother of three, Early Childhood Educator, Freelance Writer and Business Owner. As a writer, she holds many titles including Seattle Childhood Education Examiner for Examiner.com. With writing and working with children being her two passions, she makes it her duty to utilize her skills in those areas.

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Matthew Lynch published in Matthew Lynch, Policy & Reform

Parents: The Missing Ingredient in K-12 Success

As educators, we talk a lot about the role of teachers in the lives of students and debate the best ways to strengthen the classroom experience for students from all backgrounds. There is only so much a teacher can do, though, particularly with large class sizes and limited resources. Even teachers in the best of circumstances are limited when it comes to hours in the day and the amount of material that must be covered. As K-12 academic standards become more rigorous, parents are becoming an even more integral piece of a student’s success.

The timing couldn’t be worse though, from a cultural standpoint. A report released in February by Stanford University that found that the number of U.S. households with two working parents nearly doubled from 25 percent in 1968 to 48 percent in 2008, and that doesn’t even factor in parents who have part-time jobs, health issues or other children that vie for their time. Sending children off to school is a relief for many parents who need a place for their children to go and put their faith in the school to make those hours productive ones.

Asking parents to pick up some of the “slack” for teachers is often perceived as a burden and not as the legitimate parental duty it actually is. If you look at students living in poverty, whose own parents may not have played an active role in their own K-12 learning, the chance of parental involvement in the education process is even slimmer. No teacher would argue the fact that parents ARE needed to maximize student success – so how can educators, and society as a whole, make it so?

The parental difference

The most obvious benefit of parental involvement is more time spent on academic learning, with direct results in student performance. There are other benefits too, though, like:

  • Parents being aware of what is taking place at the school and getting involved.
  • Parents better understanding where their children may struggle, and not just hearing it secondhand at a teacher conference.
  • Better attendance and participation for kids who follow the enthusiasm and good example of their parents.
  • Parent-child bonding over a common goal (and what better one than education?).

Schools doing it right

Teachers reading this are likely shaking their heads as their frustration builds. Yes, parents are needed! Yes, students perform better if their parents are involved in their academics! But HOW do we get the message across to parents?

Every school district and community will have a difference approach but here are a few places that have figured out some great ways to trigger parental interest in what happens at school:

Sunnyside Schools, Washington: This school district has designed a pilot program that will engage parents and investigate what methods best keep parents involvement in education of children the highest. Regular, informal meetings are part of the plan and a family advocacy group is working with the school district to find the best solutions.

Chicago Public Schools: In June 2013 Chicago Public Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett unveiled a five-year action plan to help kids get ready for their college, career and life. In that plan, she discussed the importance of holding adults accountable as indispensable allies and says they must enforce homework, turn off the television and make education a priority. To help parents keep children on track, her action plan promises to launch city-wide “Parent Universities” that help parents learn more about appropriate expectations of their children, how to build academic skills and ways to support their college plans. Parents can also learn more to help better their own lives.

Getting parents to the right level of participation will take at least a generation of K-12 students but it is a must for future academic and life success.

How have you been successful at getting parents more involved in their children’s schooling?

 

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Matthew Lynch published in Equity, Parental Involvement, The Whole Truth

In kids, even low lead levels can cause lasting harm

Robert L. Fischer, Case Western Reserve University and Elizabeth Anthony, Case Western Reserve University

The recent firestorm over lead exposure from drinking water in Flint, Michigan is a reminder of the enduring risk posed by environmental lead. While we can all agree that it is unacceptable for children to be exposed to dangerously high levels of lead, there is less awareness of what this means.

Flint is just one of many cities in the country where lead exposure is a serious issue. For cities with an industrial past and much pre-1978 housing stock, like Cleveland, where we work, the risks to today’s children is of continuing concern. In recent years, we and our colleagues have been examining the incidence and effects of lead exposure on young children in Cleveland and its first-ring suburbs.

Even though lead paint was banned in 1978, many old homes still have it.
Thester11 via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY

Lead is a known neurotoxin that is associated with cognitive deficits in children – even at low levels of exposure. In fact, reports indicate that most of the harm may occur at levels of exposure well below current standards for concern. Though lead is no longer used in household paint and has been removed from gasoline, there is still plenty of it out there. Lead leaching into water pipes, in paint dust and chips, and soil remains a serious threat to children.

Children living in low-income neighborhoods, children of color and children whose families live in rental housing are statistically at the greatest risk of exposure to lead. That means the children most at risk of lead exposure also disproportionately face the effects of poverty, low-resource communities and trauma.

Lead’s effects never go away

Often attention is focused on the number of children who have an elevated lead test result in a given year. This is an important metric, but it can mask the cumulative role of lead exposure on child development.

For example, in Cuyahoga County, where nearly 25,000 children are tested each year, we have seen the number of children with an elevated blood lead level (above 5 micrograms per deciliter) drop from 35 percent in 2004 to 9 percent in 2013. This is a very encouraging trend showing success from public health efforts.

Despite the fact that the number of children with high lead level rates seems to be going down, it is important to think about the overall share of children that have ever had a positive lead test. These children carry those effects with them as they age.

In a recent unpublished analysis using integrated data from multiple sources, we found that fully 35 percent of children in a sample of preschool classrooms had an elevated blood lead level at some point in their lives.

The treatment options for children with elevated blood lead levels include dietary approaches and dealing with the effects of lead by managing sensory exposures. At greater exposures, chelation therapy – in which a synthetic compound is injected into the bloodstream which binds itself to the heavy metals – can be used. Though chelation has been shown to significantly reduce blood lead levels in the short term, there is evidence of a rebound in lead levels after therapy has concluded. Also, blood lead levels do not fully capture the retention of lead in bone and deep tissue.

Kids with lead exposure start behind nonexposed kids.
Children image via www.shutterstock.com.

Long-term consequences

Children exposed to lead are at elevated risk for learning delays and academic issues. We have also found that students with confirmed early childhood lead exposure have lower kindergarten readiness scores.

In tracking the experiences of children in our community, we find that lead-exposed children entering high-quality preschool start the year significantly behind their nonexposed peers.

In our ongoing research, we have found that on standardized measures these children score 10-30 percent below their peers on skills such as identifying letters, numbers and shapes. More sobering is the reality that while these children show significant progress during preschool they still finish the year, on average, below where their nonexposed peers start the preschool year.

This disparity is likely to grow as children age unless special efforts are made to address it. Results from Detroit show that these children are much more likely to experience academic challenges as they age.

And it looks like it doesn’t take much lead to cause harm. Other research has shown that blood levels well below the current standard for intervention can also cause negative effects on school readiness for young children.

There is no known safe level of lead exposure

Until a few years ago, the federal standard for action was 10 micrograms per deciliter of blood, and in 2012 it was lowered by half in recognition of evidence showing a lower threshold of concern.

But the truth is there is no known safe level of blood lead for children, and the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have said as much.

The medical research community has documented negative impacts on children with even lower levels of lead exposure than the current 5 micrograms per deciliters standard. With that view, we might consider every child with a confirmed nonzero lead test as at-risk.

Based on our analysis of lead data in our county, we calculate that if this standard were adopted in the U.S., our lead exposure rate for kids younger than 6 in a single year would climb from 9 percent to 3-4 times this rate.

Short of ensuring that every housing structure has been certified as lead-safe, parents and caregivers should be the first line of defense in keeping children from this exposure. Testing lead blood levels in children is simply too late.

This is akin to the TSA searching for lethal weapons after the passengers have boarded the flight and the plan has taken off. Once the lead is in the bloodstream, the damage is real and lasting for these children, and the options for response are far fewer and less effective.

The Conversation

Robert L. Fischer, Co-Director of the Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development, Case Western Reserve University and Elizabeth Anthony, Research Assistant Professor, Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development, Case Western Reserve University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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