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Homeroom: July 2011 Archives

July 2011 Archives

High IQ No Defense Against ADHD, Yale Researchers Find

By Homeroom on July 26, 2011 12:25 PM   |   Comments   |   Bookmark and Share
Bright students are not immune from the cognitive difficulties that plague other children and adolescents with attention deficit disorder, a new Yale study has found.

Youth with high IQs and ADHD suffered difficulty with working memory, processing speed, organization and focus, according to the study published online July 26 in the Open Journal of Psychiatry.

 “When children and adolescents with high IQ and ADD are struggling with their studies, parents, teachers and physicians tend to blame their difficulties with focus and output on laziness or lack of motivation,” said Thomas E. Brown, assistant clinical professor of psychiatry, associate director of the Yale Clinic for Attention and Related Disorders and senior author of the study. “They assume that a high IQ student cannot suffer from ADD.”

Researchers identified 117 students ages six to 17 years old with IQ scores within the top 9 percent of the population. All these students fully met diagnostic criteria for ADD. 
The study measured IQ, narrative recall and ability to organize and initiate tasks while managing frustration.
 
Brown found patterns of impairment in all of these measures in this sample of youths with ADD. For instance, a high IQ child without ADD is likely to have high scores on all four sections of the IQ test, but 75 percent to 80 percent of those with ADD scored high on two sections but significantly lower on working memory and processing speed. In the narrative recall test, most children who do well on the verbal portion of the IQ test do well on recall; high IQ children with ADD did considerably worse.

High IQ children with ADD are rarely diagnosed with ADD until late in their schooling, after the disorder has caused lasting damage to their academics and self-esteem, Brown said.
 
Brown hopes that this study increases awareness of parents, educators and physicians that ADD can occur in smart children — and that it can be diagnosed and treated.

This study extends findings these same researchers obtained in an earlier published study of 157 high IQ adults with ADD. Similar results were obtained in both age groups.

Study Indicates Computer Programming Enhances Student Reading Outcomes

By Alberto Luzarraga on July 14, 2011 4:23 PM   |   Comments   |   Bookmark and Share
A recent study looked at the possible benefits Team Alphie, a computer-assisted tutoring program, would have on student reading scores. Team Alphie is an innovative new program that combines computer-assisted instruction with peer-assisted learning in small groups of up to six students. 

It is believed that certain computer programs like Team Alphie can provide a slew of benefits to struggling readers such as “diagnosing reading difficulties…engaging children’s attention with dynamic activities...and providing ongoing reports for tutors and teachers,” according to the study’s authors. 

Because each student requires far less individual attention from teachers, Team Alphie could potentially take a lot of stress off teachers, especially in understaffed school districts, while even enhancing student learning — provided that the programming proves effective.

This study, in association with John Hopkins University, Concordia University, and the Success for All Foundation (SFA), compared the reading outcomes of students in schools using the Team Alphie method with students using more traditional personalized one-on-one tutoring provided by SFA. All 33 of the schools examined were in high poverty areas across nine states, all with majorities of minority students.  

The results were very encouraging, with students in the Team Alphie experimental schools scoring significantly higher on the Woodcock Letter-Word Identification Test. Team Alphie schools were also able to tutor 31 percent more first-grade students and 46 percent more second-grade students than the control schools. 

It is commonly accepted in academic circles that one-on-one tutoring is the most effective form of instruction. That this study seems to suggest otherwise is significant, and could help guide future attempts on how to best teach students how to read.

Bridging the 'Alienation Gap'

By Lisa Chen on July 1, 2011 1:33 PM   |   Comments   |   Bookmark and Share
What determines the difference between success and failure in building relationships with students? In the study “Working the Crevices: Granting Students Authority in Authoritarian Schools,” Joan F. Goodman explores the dynamics of giving more freedom to students as a means of confronting student alienation. Published in the May 2011 issue of the American Journal of Education, the study details the cases of four second-year Teach for America graduate students who teach in urban public schools with strict authoritarian hierarchies. These teachers each describe an experience in granting freedom to students as a means of achieving cooperation.

Goodman examines the “alienation gap” that exists between students and teachers, expressed through students flouting school rules to resisting assigned work to quitting school altogether. The gap that it creates, Goodman suggests, even precedes the achievement gap.

But if students are allowed to raise their own concerns to teachers, and if teachers contribute by taking their concerns seriously, the gap can slowly begin to close. As a result, this can lead to increased attendance, improved academic performance, a stronger school community and a more positive education experience overall for students and faculty alike.

However, methods of achieving student agency differ, and success varies. Goodman discusses the difference between granting power and granting authority in increasing student freedom — while granting power is merely a permitted extension of control from teacher to student, grant authority implies a mutual consent between the changed dynamic between teacher and student. A student who has been granted power not only has control, but also decides what having control means, and sets his or her own definitions for exercising it.

Through four very different anecdotes, Goodman exposes varying strategies in enhancing student cooperation. She identifies a few common themes — for example, that reaching out to individual influential students is often more effective than reaching out to a group, and that students are more responsive to grants of authority than mere grants of power. 

While it is limited by the specific nature of its cases, Goodman’s study provides interesting examples whose themes introduce new approaches to improving student-teacher relationships.
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