The National Association of Therapeutic Schools and Programs (NATSAP) will be holding its national conference in Orlando, Florida next week, February 9th-11th at the World Swan and Dolphin Conference Center. Sanford Shapiro (me) will be presenting next Saturday on the impact of Learning Disabilities on Therapeutic Concerns. The focus of the presentation is to help [...]
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As expected, the recent piece in the NY Times Ritalin Gone Wrong, has led to mostly negative commentary from people who read the article as though the professor is attacking the biological case for ADHD and parents. He does claim that since the evidence does not support the long-term efficacy of Ritalin and stimulants for [...]
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In an opinion piece in the NY Times, Dr. Alan Sroufe, a psychologist and professor Ameritus from The University of Minnesota argues that we must reduce our reliance on medicating children with stimulants because there are no studies that indicate these medications have any long-term benefits. This is sure to create unrest and unease within [...]
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Despite the compelling and alarming statistics on the impact Learning Disabilities (LD) has on the mental health of our youth, there remains a great need to better understand the relationships between language-based LDs, Autism Spectrum, and depression, substance abuse, and defiance, and low self-esteem. While some in the therapeutic community know that upwards of 60% [...]
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I’ve felt for years that teenagers and young adults with Asperger’s Syndrome or with High Functioning Autism really need help understanding and negotiating romantic and sexual relationships. Moving from Social Skills or even Social Thinking curriculums (there’s a difference) to dating, sex, love and adult relationships is no easy task when your primary difficulties are [...]
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Photo by Evgeni Dinev In his book “What the Dog Saw,” based on a collection of his essays and New Yorker articles, Malcolm Gladwell wrote about the notion of Puzzles and Mysteries. Gladwell encouraged us to discern whether a problem or challenge to be solved was a puzzle or a mystery. What about kids with learning disabilities? [...]
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Too often we as educators and parents, get hyper-focused on the things our/your kids can’t do or struggle with. Even with the best of intentions, adults lose perspective. We run the risk of trying so hard, too hard, to squeeze children with learning disabilities into the mold of what we want for our kids in [...]
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Pretty amazing to see just how wrong an attempt at incentivizing success in student performance can go. From Good.is A couple of Orange County California schools came up with a poorly thought out concept to reward students who performed better on high stakes tests. “High-performing students received black cards, the ones in the middle got [...]
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Second Nature Wilderness Program (SNWP), with locations in central Oregon, northern and southern Utah, and Georgia, is one of the best Wilderness Therapy programs for struggling teens in the world. I’ve personally visited in an in-depth way all of their locations except Georgia (Footsteps program). Even though Second Nature is not specifically designed for kids [...]
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Let’s assume that you have a middle school or high school son or daughter who is struggling emotionally and behaviorally and thus far, despite trying different therapies and school supports, the situation is not getting better. Your family is most likely in a state of intermittent turmoil. If your acting out or acting in (depressed, [...]
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Jeremy Snyder and Julie Platt, students at Wesleyan University, are starting a university chapter of Project Eye-to-Eye, a national mentoring project for children with learning disabilities. In this article from the Wesleyan Argus, the students describe their start-up process this summer and the goals of Eye-to-Eye. They’re looking for about a dozen high caliber and [...]
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Yesterday I spoke with LA Talk Radio host Lon Woodbury on his show, “Parent Choices For Struggling Teens.” The show was called “Learning Disabilities or Therapy: You Shouldn’t Have to Choose”. Speaking to the integration of best practices between Learning Disabilities and Therapeutic Intervention, I’m advocating for all the kids in treatment centers, therapeutic boarding [...]
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