Ferrari Engines, Bicycle Brakes
Advice to educators about how to help students with ADHD fulfill the potential of their powerful brains.
Dear Educators,
I am a 62-year-old psychiatrist who has both attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and dyslexia. Of all the people who helped me deal with these conditions, top prize goes to my 1st grade teacher, Mrs. Eldredge, at Chatham Elementary School in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
I am a 62-year-old psychiatrist who has both attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and dyslexia. Of all the people who helped me deal with these conditions, top prize goes to my 1st grade teacher, Mrs. Eldredge, at Chatham Elementary School in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
She simply put her arm around me when it was my turn to read during reading period. No one laughed at my stammering and stuttering, because I had the mafia sitting next to me! Such a simple intervention, but profound in its impact.
Because of Mrs. Eldredge's arm, I didn't acquire the most damaging learning disabilities—shame, fear, and the conviction that you are stupid and defective. Many other teachers helped me along the way, but Mrs. Eldredge got me off to the right start. By eliminating fear, she enabled me to progress at my own pace, always believing that I could succeed.
To this day, I am a painfully slow reader and rarely read a book all the way through. But because of Mrs. Eldredge and the many other gifted teachers I was lucky enough to have along the way, I became an excellent student, graduating from Phillips Exeter Academy, Harvard (where I majored in English!), and Tulane Medical School. Now I am a psychiatrist as well as a writer. I specialize in helping children and adults who have, you guessed it, ADHD and dyslexia.
Which brings me to you—wonderful, dedicated, life-changing teachers. My dad was a teacher for the final 20 years of his life, so I know firsthand what goes into a life of teaching. Of all the professions, I believe yours is the most noble—and certainly, in the United States anyway, the most unfairly underpaid.
I'd like to give back to you a bit of what I owe you, not in the form of money (would that I could!), but in the form of knowledge I've gained over the years in how best to help students who have ADHD.
It all begins with Mrs. Eldredge. Get that arm of safety around your students in any way you can. All of us learn better and do better when we feel safe. Fear and humiliation, which once upon a time were standard teaching tools, should be relics of the past.
It is a neurological fact that feeling safe opens up the brain, whereas feeling anxious and afraid clamps it down. So step one is to make sure all students feel as safe as possible. Remember, learning itself can feel dangerous. You are asking a student to leave his or her comfort zone and enter into new territory. A teacher's best gift to all students—not just those who have ADHD—is to allay fear, provide encouragement, and make the safari into new jungles of knowledge feel safe enough for them to take the trip and want to come back forever after.
Read more ... http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/oct12/vol70/num02/Ferrari-Engines,-Bicycle-Brakes.aspx
Because of Mrs. Eldredge's arm, I didn't acquire the most damaging learning disabilities—shame, fear, and the conviction that you are stupid and defective. Many other teachers helped me along the way, but Mrs. Eldredge got me off to the right start. By eliminating fear, she enabled me to progress at my own pace, always believing that I could succeed.
To this day, I am a painfully slow reader and rarely read a book all the way through. But because of Mrs. Eldredge and the many other gifted teachers I was lucky enough to have along the way, I became an excellent student, graduating from Phillips Exeter Academy, Harvard (where I majored in English!), and Tulane Medical School. Now I am a psychiatrist as well as a writer. I specialize in helping children and adults who have, you guessed it, ADHD and dyslexia.
Which brings me to you—wonderful, dedicated, life-changing teachers. My dad was a teacher for the final 20 years of his life, so I know firsthand what goes into a life of teaching. Of all the professions, I believe yours is the most noble—and certainly, in the United States anyway, the most unfairly underpaid.
I'd like to give back to you a bit of what I owe you, not in the form of money (would that I could!), but in the form of knowledge I've gained over the years in how best to help students who have ADHD.
It all begins with Mrs. Eldredge. Get that arm of safety around your students in any way you can. All of us learn better and do better when we feel safe. Fear and humiliation, which once upon a time were standard teaching tools, should be relics of the past.
It is a neurological fact that feeling safe opens up the brain, whereas feeling anxious and afraid clamps it down. So step one is to make sure all students feel as safe as possible. Remember, learning itself can feel dangerous. You are asking a student to leave his or her comfort zone and enter into new territory. A teacher's best gift to all students—not just those who have ADHD—is to allay fear, provide encouragement, and make the safari into new jungles of knowledge feel safe enough for them to take the trip and want to come back forever after.
Read more ... http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/oct12/vol70/num02/Ferrari-Engines,-Bicycle-Brakes.aspx