Monterey Bay Forum

Some simple techniques can assist children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and/ or autistic spectrum disorder (ASD)to be happier and achieve appropriate goals. These techniques are easy for parents and teachers to implement.

Of course a child is not a car but think of the following analogy:

Every car to get to a destination needs a driver. Parents can assist children to get into the driver’s seat and drive their ‘car’ to appropriate ‘destinations’.

Here’s how to assist children who have difficulties with focus, attention, concentration, ‘executive functioning’ or ‘working memory’ difficulties. Executive functioning and working memory are words used by school psychologists. What the parent sees is a child who can’t seem to figure out what comes first and appear disorganized.

What to do: Get a pad of 8 by 12 inch lined paper.

On one per sheet of paper —
1) Write at the top, a Goal that parents/teachers want the child to achieve.
2) Write out all the Steps required to accomplish the Goal.
3) Order the steps from first to last using KISS (Keep It Simple, Simple)
4) Figure out an appropriate Reward for child accomplishing the steps.
Set it up so child can get partial reward for partial completion.
5) Decide the number of Days child needs to complete the Goal.
6) Draw up a Graph with Days across Top of Page and Goals listed on left.

Here’s an example of a Behavior Plan for a child who shows symptoms of both ADHD and ASD:

Gina is 8 years old and was exposed in utero to illegal drugs and alcohol. Her biological mother lost parental rights and Gina has been in foster care since age two. Since age four, Gina has received County Mental Health therapy and medication to assist with focus, attention and concentration. The therapy provided by County Mental Health focuses only on helping Gina to label emotions and better express her emotions appropriately.

Gina’s foster mother and her teacher agree that Gina’s adaptive functioning abilities are considerably below what they expect for her age. Her foster mother wants Gina to 1) wash her face & brush her teeth; 2) make her bed; 3) put toys in basket in her room; 4) set the table with utensils and plates before dinner.

Goals:

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday
Wash face & clean teeth
Make bed
Put toys in basket
Set table with utensils & plates

Spiritual/ religious beliefs need to be integral to a successful Behavioral Plan.
For example, Gina’s foster mother goes to church and rests on Sunday. Therefore the behavior plan is for six days a week and no work on Sunday, their day of rest. Six days a week time four goals = 24 Goals for Gina to achieve. For each Goal achieved she earns one (1) dime. During the week she puts stickers on the sheet and gets her motivators (dimes) which she puts into a plastic, clear jar. That way she can see exactly what she has earned towards a new toy on the weekend. Her foster mother believes Gina can find age appropriate toys for around $2.50 to $3.00 a toy.

What makes a Behavioral Plan successful?
The answer is simple: practice and more practice so the Steps are as simple as possible and the child gets rewarded for partial and then complete finishing the Goal.

For example, Gina when we started could not make her bed said her foster mom. Well, the cover was too big and too heavy for a thin, small 8 year old to move around. Thus, by simplifying and making a bed simply tossing a light duvet (down comforter) on a twin bed and putting the pillow in place — then making a bed by an 8 year old is simple and possible.

A second example:
Gina has never set the table for dinner. Part of the reason is that the plates are too high for her to reach and they are china easily breakable. Also, the utensils are not easy to get to. This is easily solved by moving plastic plates and smaller folks and spoons to one drawer that the child can reach. The point is to set it up so the child can successfully achieve the Goals.

Overall point: Parents can set simple ‘destinations’ for their child to drive their ‘car’ towards and by keeping the steps simple and practising the steps again and again their child can achieve those destinations to goals that parents set.

Very important: the hugs and ‘You did great!’ and ‘Keep trying!’ are as important and at times more important than any reward system. Parents – whether biological parents or foster parents – are the fire to ignite important, life long change in children.
Send comments to DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

Many CA children are wrongly diagnosed by reputable institutions such as Stanford Hsoital (LPCH) with Intellectual Disability/ Mental Retardation.

Read the story of Maria below. To make a referral to Stanford hospital ( LPCH) as County Mental Health did with Maria is simply wrong. County Mental Health actions — and lack of actions — harm children who deserve better.

Maria’s story is not unusual. The story describes how many children are routinely mis-diagnosed by Stanford hospital (LPCH). Information concerning Maria and the actual parties involved have been changed or not specified to maintain privacy.

Maria, not the child’s real name, was for real exposed in utero to multiple illegal drugs. And as is true for many children exposed in utero to drugs, Maria, now age eight, has substantial difficulties that affect her overall development. Front and center, she has substantial difficulties with with executive functioning, attention and concentration.

Maria was removed at birth from her biological parents. She lives with a foster mother who only speaks Spanish and a handful of other children. In the home, she has no daily chores and prefers to play by herself. For the last several years, Maria has received County mental health services (medications and therapy) to assist with her dificulties related to inutero drug exposure.

In the home, Spanish is the principal language spoken by the foster mother. At school, Maria’s special education classes (SDC) are in English. Maria speaks a mixture of Spaish and English. For example she know shapes (circle, rectangle) and colors in English but not Spanish; on the other hand, she knows animals and and common home items better in Spanish.

Through her public school, Maria’s cognitive abilities have been assessed in Spanish, English and also with non-verbal tests. At school, she performs best on non-verbal, visual tests of intelligence that have less cultural bias. Assessed on multiple occasions, Maria performs variously. On I.Q. tests that do not rely on lanugae she performs in the Average to Low Average range.

County mental health gave Maria a diagnosis of Pervasive Developmental Disorder, Not Otherwise Specified (PPP-NOS). Saying that they sought more ‘diagnostic clarity’, the County recently referred Maria to Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital (LPCH) located in Stanford, CA.

Though County Menal Health initiated the referral to Stanford hospital (LPCH) they did not send along their own mental health records. The Mental Health therapist or psychiatrist could have put relevant mental health summary records in an envelope and given it to the family to take with them. That did not happen.

Nor did County Mental Health assist so that relevant school psychological assessments accompanied their referral to Stanford hospital (LPCH). With a Release signed by the mother the County Mental Health therapist could have ensured that school assessments accompanied the County’s referral to Stanford hospital. That did not happen.

As a result, there was no collaboration between County Mental Health, the local schools and local physicians. As a result Stanford hospital (LPCH) lacked up-to-date relevant records available for review. Very importantly, and one wonders about arrogance by Stanford hospital, LPCH routinely does not seek out additional information other than what it gets from their own assessment.

The family had to travel two to two and a half hours each way to go to Stanford hospital (LPCH). Although there are numerous licensed psychologists trained in assessment and diagnosis the County routinely chooses to refer outside the County to LCPH. If they wanted to, County Mental Health could reaadily refer to the local Psychological Association. Every County in CA has a psychological association.

Maria was recently assessed by Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital (LPCH). Of importance, the LPCH assessment did not request nor review Maria’s multiple prior school assessments. And LPCH did not review Maria’s medical records nor her mental health records.

LPCH limited the assessment of Maria’s current functional abilities to the ratings that they obtained that day from Maria’s foster mother. No ratings were obtained from Maria’s teachers. Based on a one day assessment, done in English using a Wechsler IQ test known to have strong cultural biases, LPCH gave Maria diagnosis of Intellectual Disability/ Mental Retardation.

Yes this 9 year old child suffers from dificulties related to in utero drug exposure. And she has not yet stabilized her language abilities because she hears only Spanish at home and English at school. And yes on certain tests of executive functioning, attention and concentration she scores quite low.

Maria and other children referred by County mental halth deserve an accurate diagnosis based on a thorough review of relevant school, medical and mental health records. County mental health should collaborate with local psychological associations and use locally trained psychologists who can visit schools and observe children in their home enviornment. When referring outside the County, County Mental Healh should see that relevant school, medical and mental health records accompany their referral.

As I wrote above, to make a referral to Stanford hospital ( LPCH) as County Mental Health did with Maria is simply wrong. County Mental Health’s actions and lack of actions harm children who disserve better.

With an erroneous diagnosis in hand, County Mental Health will close Maria’s case saying that her supposed diagnosis of intellectual disability makes it impossible for her to profit from therapy. And with this diagnosis the schools probably will refer the family to social security.

What Maria truly needs is: 1) time to develop and stabilize her language abilities; 2) training in how to use schedules and other techniques that assist persons with problems with attention and concentration. Just because this eight year old tends to skip from step 1 to 4 does not mean she cannot learn to do tasks correctly. With correct interventions, Maria will be happier and society will not have to support her as an adult.

Commnets welcome. Send to: DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

A jailbird who was so outraged over what he felt was his lawyer’s shoddy representation of him in court sued the attorney — but he couldn’t remember the guy’s name.

So the fuming felon filed a federal suit against “I Don’t Know My Lawyer’s Name” for the truly astounding sum of “one houndred dollarys” in damages.

Some portions of Wilfredo Rodena’s self-filed suit against “I don’t know” are incomprehensible, but he filed the action as part of a civil-rights bid to overturn his 1989 conviction for kidnapping a young woman at knife point.

In his Manhattan federal court filing, Rodena claimed that “I don’t know” and he did “not fight for me at all. He did not said one word in my behelf.”

The suit also names Bronx District Attorney Robert Johnson — whose name Rodena spelled correctly — and says, “the stenographer is envoled to. But I don’t no her name.”

Instead of typing, Rodena said, “All she did was Smirk at me. And kept her fingers over the machine, and never typed one letter.”
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After 20 plus years in the prison library, he gets his jailhouse degree.

jaj48@aol.com

Thus spake President Obama: “I had a chance to meet a young man named Robert Baroz. He’s an English teacher in Boston … In the last few years, he’s received three pink slips because of budget cuts. Why wouldn’t we want to pass a bill that puts somebody like Robert back in the classroom teaching our kids?’

Mr. Baroz’s story, however, has a few problems. For one, we don’t need to put Mr. Baroz back in the classroom because he’s already in the classroom. He is currently working in the Curley School in Jamaica Plain.

When the Boston Herald pointed this out to teacehr Baroz, he responded with this argument to the Herald, “he doesn’t mind if the president — or his speechwriters — took some liberties with the facts. It was all in aid of a higher truth, said teacher Baroz.

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Is that “hire truth”or higher truth?
FirenzeSage48@gmail.com

The campus at the University of Wisconsin-Madison erupted this week after the release of two studies documenting the heavy use of race in deciding which students are admitted. But the university was none too keen on releasing the data, which CEO obtained through filing Freedom of Information Act requests only after a successful legal challenge went all the way to the state supreme court.

It’s no wonder the university wanted to keep the information secret. The studies show that a black or Hispanic undergraduate applicant was more than 500 times likelier to be admitted to Wisconsin-Madison than a similarly qualified white or Asian applicant. The odds ratio favoring black law school applicants over similarly qualified white applicants was 61 to 1.

The median SAT scores of black undergraduates who were admitted were 150 points lower than whites or Asians, while the median Hispanic scores were roughly 100 points lower. And median high school rankings for both blacks and Hispanics were also lower than for either whites or Asians.
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It’s bad enough if a second rater botches your divorce, but heart surgery is another matter.

FirenzeSage48@gmail.com

Joan Heffington, who has run for governor of Kansas and was taken to court by the state attorney general, is suing Derby Public Schools because her son was cut from the marching band.

Heffington said in a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court that her 17-year-old son is being denied his right to an education.

She claims her son has special needs and Derby has not given him accommodations as required by law.

The focus of the lawsuit is Heffington’s son, a trombone player who was cut from the marching band. ———————————————
Hey ma, a lawsuit does not a trombone player make.

Politicians, especially Democratic politicians, generally do what unions want. The unions, in turn, are very clear about what that is: They want happy members so that those who run the unions get re-elected and they want more members, so that their power, money and influence grow.

It’s because of union power that it’s so hard to fire bad teachers or make any substantial reforms in education.

Look at how different Texas and California are in educational performance. The two states have very similar demographics yet Texas outperforms California on all four national tests — across demographic groups — despite spending less money per pupil. The gap amounts to about a year’s worth of learning. That’s big.

Individual schools are breathtakingly different. New York Harlem Success’s black students outperform white students at more than 700 schools across the state. Overall, Harlem Success now performs at the same level as the gifted-and-talented schools in New York City all of which have demanding admission requirements. Harlem Success, by contrast, selects its students mostly poor and minority m by random lottery.

One great school, Pacific Collegiate, is in California. So we can educate California school children and do so quite successfully. We need more success stories like Pacific Collegiate and Harlem Success Academy.

How? Give parents real choice through vouchers combined with more charter schools. A voucher costing roughly one-third the cost of current public school can provide better education at substantially lower cost to taxpayers.

And it’s time that teachers and other government workers have choice to opt out of unions. No employee should be forced to join a union in order to work. DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

It’s time that California imitates Chicago, Illinois and reins in teacher union power. It’s time to get rid of ineffective, poorly trained California teachers. It’s time to replace teacher pay based on seniority with pay based on performance. It’s time for five full school days in California.

If substantial education reform can occur in Democrat controlled Illinois then there is a possibility of similar change in Democrat controlled California.

How in the world did Illinois do it? The teacher unions claim that changes were made to the education reform bill at the last minute. If that’s what if takes — so be it.

Democrat controlled Illinois just passed a bill that resembles bills passed in Republican states. The Chicago Illinois bill links teacher tenure to student achievement, bases layoffs on performance instead of seniority and makes it easier to dismiss ineffective teachers. The bill gives Mayor 0 Rahm Emanuel power to lengthen the school day in Chicago. Teachers can only strike if 75% of members agree – up from 51% of votes cast. These laws are similar to ones passed in Republic-controlled states including Indiana and Florida.

DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

University of California at Santa Cruz (UCSC) students and faculty held an impromptu rally Friday after graffiti was discovered Thursday in a Cowell College men’s bathroom that read in part “Stop the Invasion” and threatened violence against Mexicans.

“First of all I want to apologize profoundly for this writing” said vice chancellor
Galloway, who was slightly choked up and struggled to get her words out at first.

“I’m shocked and horrified that this would exist on campus. Our response has not be sufficient to stop this, and I apologize for that as well. I am open to solutions.” The administration has expressed support for an ethnic studies program.”

How about a class in the history of writing on shithouse walls which is an almost universal event.

Most sane people simply ignore what some lowlife writes on the wall.

At a 21st century university such a crime gets strong women sobbing and a call for an ethnic studies class which I guess is to be filled with racists who write on bathroom walls and then wish to repent.

Grow up and hope your phone number is not next. On 2d thought why would you care since it’s on your facebook page.

FirenzeSage48@gmail.com

A proposed $1.7 billion tax on sweetened beverages got a sour reception Monday at a key Assembly committee hearing.

It would have taxed sodas, energy drinks, sweet teas and other sugary beverages, directing the money toward youth education and obesity-prevention programs. The failure prompted such remarks as, “Sugar is dangerous to society, and is a huge part of childhood obesity. Taxing soda would have been akin to taxing cigarettes.”

And boats and cars and cable tv and cell phones and every itty bitty thing that walks or crawls across the government view.

written by FirenzeSage48@gmail.com

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Other news about sugary drinks from across the county …. New York to ban low-income families from using food stamps to buy sugary drinks

New York announced plans to ban the use of food stamps to buy sugary drinks as it steps up its anti-obesity campaign. Mayor Michael Bloomberg and New York Governor David Paterson have asked the U.S. government to ban the purchase of fizzy drinks and sweetened fruit drinks with the federal vouchers used by 42million low-income families.They called sugar-sweetened beverages the largest single contributor to the obesity epidemic.

What next from the government sugar police? Tax sugar donuts? Declare apple juice a ‘no no’ for toddlers? Limit sugary coffee drinks to adults over 18?