Ask The Expert: Past Procrastination: Get Your Kids Organized, Focused and Motivated…without Being the Bad GuyAsk The Expert
Smartphones in School? A Voice for Change
AS A PARENT COACH AND TEACHER TRAINER, I deal with the challenges created by electronic devices and social media on a daily basis. Parents struggle to set appropriate limits, kids have a hard time regulating their usage, and educators need to manage the balance between using these devices as tools and the unintended consequences they…
Read MoreYou Don’t Know Jack: The Teacher Letter
FOR YEARS, WE APPROACHED EACH NEW SCHOOL YEAR with renewed hopes and rejuvenated expectations. Certainly, we thought, this would be the year when everything clicked and our son Jack would take off like a rocket through the academic stratosphere. The trials and tribulations of the last year would be lost like so many discarded booster…
Read MoreStrengthen Connection: It’s Their Survival Rope
MOST PARENTS I WORK WITH are genuinely loving, caring people who want the very best for their kids. Some have gone to extraordinary lengths to become parents; others had this greatness thrust upon them. Whatever your path, I ask you to take a moment to consider what you really hope to accomplish as parents. What…
Read MoreHow to Talk with Your Child About Starting ADHD Meds
SLOWLY BUT SURELY, the old stigma attached to ADHD and other neurodevelopmental differences is fading into history. Although full disclosure can still be thorny, the diagnosis of ADHD should not be treated as some shameful family secret. You need not feel defensive or conflicted about your child’s need for medication. This does not mean that…
Read MoreSPACE: A Parent-Based Intervention for Reducing Childhood Anxiety
EXPERTS estimate that up to thirty percent of children with ADHD experience a co-occurring anxiety disorder. Unfortunately, not all highly anxious children will agree to participate in treatment, no matter how effective the treatment might be in reducing their suffering. And even when they do agree to participate, not all of these otherwise effective treatments…
Read MoreWhy Does Sam Struggle with School Projects?
Executive Functions and Academic Achievement WHY DO MANY STUDENTS, including those with average and above intelligence and no diagnosed or known learning or developmental disability, struggle with academic performance? While there is no simple response to this vexing question, the answer is often rooted in executive functioning deficits. Executive functions, often synonymous with the term…
Read MoreHomework Problems & ADHD?
Use Research-Based Strategies that Work PROBLEMS WITH HOMEWORK COMPLETION are the most common and frustrating challenge faced by parents and teachers of children with ADHD. These children may perform well on tests but receive low or failing grades due to incomplete or missing assignments. Homework problems prevent students with ADHD from reaching their full academic…
Read MoreBrain Management as a Developmental Path
FOR THE KIDS, let’s start with marshmallows. Why marshmallows? Because it turns out that the basic cognitive skill of putting off a short-term reward (one marshmallow) for a long-term gain (two marshmallows) correlates with success across a lifetime. It reflects one step on a developmental self-management path called executive function (EF). Understanding the impact of…
Read MoreCBT & College Students
WE WILL HIGHLIGHT two new studies in this issue, spanning cognitive behavioral interventions for college students with ADHD and a newly released US prevalence study. Can a cognitive-behavioral treatment program help college students with ADHD? College students with ADHD experience academic deficits, have difficulty with the transition from high school to college, and are at…
Read MoreThe Truth about ADHD and Lying
I HATE TO SAY IT, but children with ADHD don’t always tell the truth. Consider this: What if, every day, you were asked to do all of the things you just weren’t good at—fulfill obligations that you found so onerous, you would gladly pay someone else to do them for you? Scrubbing the toilet, mowing…
Read MoreDiscontinuing ADHD Meds
Sometimes the only way to move forward… is to stop. MUCH HAS BEEN WRITTEN about starting medication for ADHD. Carefully controlled treatment trials are crucial in determining who will benefit, what medicine works best, and at what dose. But much less attention has been paid to stopping ADHD treatment. At the beginning of treatment for…
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