If You Don't Like Salmon, Eat Kippers

I’ve always liked salmon, herring, and trout. Mackerel and kippers, less so.  Little did I know that by eating this fish, I was improving my ability to concentrate.

Researchers have recently been investigating the possible link between Omega 3 (an essential fatty acid required by the brain) and ADD/ADHD.  All the fish listed above is high in Omega 3s.

More than 100 children in Durham, England who didn’t want to have fish for breakfast took a daily fish oil supplement (in capsule form). After six months, many of the children with ADD symptoms increased their ability to concentrate.  In fact, the fish oil produced similar results as Ritalin.

Both Ritalin and fish oil increase dopamine in the brain. Brain scans have shown that low dopamine is often found in those experiencing ADD.

A similar double-blind research study with comparable results was also done at the University of South Australia. You can read about it here. http://www.newstarget.com/011395.html

Note: I am not a medical doctor. I am not prescribing fish oil capsules nor recommending that you or children stop taking Ritalin or other stimulant drugs prescribed for ADD. Before discontinuing any medication, you must talk to your
physician.

Don’t forget that you can get more research news, learning strategies, even contests and links to fun puzzles by subscribing to my Brain Boosters for Kids newsletter. Go to www.brain-based-learning.com

Going to the Library Could be Dangerous

If you’ve been following my blog, you know I’m all in favor of kids reading—at home, at school, while waiting in the dentist’s office, even on vacations. And I support parents and grandparents reading to kids, even kids who are old enough to read to themselves.

So naturally I was pleased to read that Claude DaCorsi, a management consultant in Portland, Oregon, had been encouraging his children to check out books from the local library.

Sadly, Claude has now forbidden his children to go to the library. He will only allow them to go to Barnes and Noble.

Seems some library books didn’t get returned, and Claude racked up a $40 fine. The library, annoyed about all the unpaid library fines that Claude and other patrons were ignoring, hired a collection agency to get the money. The collection agency then reported the unpaid library fines to credit bureaus.

And Claude, who boasted an excellent credit rating, now found his rating had tumbled to below average.

But here’s what I don’t get. Why not pay the fine, continue going to the library, and make sure all library books are returned? Couldn’t you just jot down the return date in your Daytimer or electronic gizmo?  Wouldn’t that be cheaper than buying books at Barnes and Noble?

Oh yes, forgot to mention that one of the tardy books was a picture book that Claude’s two-year-old son checked out. Since when would even the most precocious two-year-old be counted on to return his own library book. Perhaps Claude should have taken on this responsibility.

Finally the Experts Agree with Me

Don’t you just love it when somebody with a gazillion credentials “proves” what you’ve been saying all along!

For years I’ve been suggesting to concerned teachers and parents that one of the major causes of what we’ve labeled ADD/ADHD might have something to do with how we’re living. That our frantic, busy lives filled with way too many stimulating images, sounds, and activities contribute to our kids’ lack of concentration. And that it wouldn’t hurt to cut way back on TV watching.

So in the most recent issue of ADDitude, a magazine for people with ADD or those who have children with ADD, Michael Ruff, MD suggested that “Our modern lifestyles can cause AD/HD.”  He’s got the credentials I don’t have: a medical doctor and professor of pediatrics at Indiana University.

According to Ruff, at least some cases of AD/HD are a byproduct of our fast-paced, stressed-out, consumer-driven lifestyles. Researchers at the University of Washington found that toddlers who watch lots of TV are most likely to develop attentional  problems. For every hour watched per day, the risk rose by 10 percent.

On the flip side, Ruff has found that in his group practice which cares for more than 800 Amish families who forbid TV, they haven’t diagnosed a single child with AD/HD.

Maybe it’s time to throw the TV out the window?

You can read more from ADDitude and subscribe at http://www.additudemag.com/  Be forewarned however that the magazine is heavily weighted toward drugs. Drug advertising helps keep it a float.

Managing 2 Million Hyperactive Kids

So what if anxious parents and their doctors take kids off Ritalin and stimulant drugs after the announcement last week that there may be a link between heart-related deaths and Ritalin?

Now what are we going to do with the 2 million hyperactive children in the U.S. who take these drugs?  That’s a lot of kids diagnosed with ADD/ADHD!

For years, we haven’t had to take responsibility for helping these kids or keeping ourselves from going crazy trying to keep some kind of order in the classroom and at home. The drugs did it for us. Now we may be on our own. So here are some suggestions:

1. Have kids cross their ankles, right over left, and then give themselves a big hug by crossing their arms over their body left over right.  Calms the central nervous system and connects the electrical circuits in the body.  You can do it too. You’ll notice a difference.


2. Get some order, consistency, a schedule in place. These kids, on their own, have a lot of trouble with order and consistency but respond positively to it if you help them with it. Make a game out of it. Do it often. Less clutter. More rules about where things go like a hook for the backpack in the front hallway. And the backpack always goes there.


3. Stop telling them to sit still.  Their ability to do so is limited. Furthermore, movement is essential to learning.


4. When you start to lose it because they’re losing it, keep in mind that Einstein himself had ADD. So do lots of other famous and brilliant people. To see a list of some of these folks, go to http://www.oneaddplace.com/famous.htm

You can read more about the proposed FDA warning and managing ADD/ADHD at www.brain-based-learning.com/articleADD.htm

And don’t forget Brain Gym. Not a few kids have been able to stop taking stimulant meds after learning Brain Gym.  www.braingymclasses.com

Death by Ritalin?

I tried Ritalin once years ago when I was “diagnosed” with Adult ADD/ADHD. I had no job, neither did my husband, we’d just moved clear across the country, had six kids under our care, and my elderly mother needed daily care. And I decided that this was the moment to stop smoking once and for all. You’d have ADD too!

Then I got a grip and did a bunch of non-drug things to help my frantic brain. Did yoga, learned Brain Gym, mastered meditation, and discovered HeartMath. These things helped a lot. I stopped taking Ritalin in 2-3 weeks.

Meanwhile I’ve always worried about giving kids such high powered stimulants for ADD-like behavior. (I question that ADD is really a “disease” but that’s another subject.)  And the number of kids (and adults) in this country who are taking these drugs daily is staggering!

Now this practice is finally being questioned and not just by grandmothers writing blogs.  A few months ago, the “Wall Street Journal” (hardly noted for discouraging the drug companies or encouraging alternative therapies) suggested that Ritalin and other stimulant drugs might be causing some children to become depressed. It even suggested Brain Gym as a non-drug alternative.

Then just last week, the Food and Drug’s Administration advisory panel voted that Ritalin and other stimulant drugs should carry the strongest warning possible that these drugs may be linked to an increased risk of death and injury.

Need I say more?

P.S. Take a look at some books on non-drug alternatives to drugs for ADD at http://www.shirleys-wellness-cafe.com/ritalin_books.htm  I haven’t read any of these so can’t vouch for them personally.

Sit Still! Don't Move!

The other day I was chatting with some teachers who were worried about the probationary status of their elementary school. What if the kids don’t do better on the next batch of standardized tests? What if the school is shut down?

In a misguided effort to assure that the children learn to read better, there is now a mandate in this and other schools that all 1st and 2nd graders must spend 90 minutes at one time sitting still in their seats doing their reading.

Surely they’re joking. I’ve yet to meet a little kid who could or should sit still for 90 minutes! And we certainly don’t have any research results proving that this 90-minute forced sitting still improves anything.  

Kids need to move.  Moving is essential to learning. So every ten minutes or so they need to get up, stretch their arms up to the ceiling, walk around the room, swing their arms back and forth across the opposite leg while they’re walking (crossing the mid-line helps with reading), make an infinity sign (an 8 on it’s side) in the air, track this “lying down” 8 with their eyes.  Always start in the middle of the infinity sign and go up to the left. These activities only take a minute or two, and the children still get in their 90 minutes of reading.  

Got kids who are antsy doing their homework?  Try moving and crossing the mid-line. Just be sure that the “interruption” isn’t distracting—no TV or video games as a break.

By the way, I’ve moved my Brain Boosters web site over to www.brain-based-learning.com.  Take a look. Check out the Brain Boosters TeleSeminars for teachers and parents. You can start anytime. Take one. Take all six.  CEUs are offered for the series.

To Dissect or Not

My granddaughter Bryttany loves science. We gave her a butterfly kit for her birthday. Her Mom helped her follow the directions to order the cocoons and set up the hatching area. Then she conscientiously watched every day for the cocoons to hatch.

Asked all the appropriate questions? How long do think it will take? Would they do better in a different place in the room? Should it be dark? Light?  Will they be affected by noise? What happens if I touch them? Should I talk to them? This 3rd grader was doing an experiment.

Well, that’s what we used to call such activities. Now they call it “inquiry-based science education.” It was big for awhile too. Endorsed by the National Science Teachers Association who recommended in 2004 that hands-on and field work should be the center of science classrooms. Hmm, isn’t that what “real” scientists do?

I’m still puzzled. Way back in the middle ages when I went to high school, we dissected frogs.  (Animal rights hadn’t been invented yet.)

Now because of testing mandated in part by No Child Left Behind, everyone’s scurrying to have children memorize material from textbooks and lectures.

I’m still puzzled. Again, in that same biology class where we dissected frogs, we also memorized material from textbooks and lectures. We did both.

I guess the difference is that my science teacher wasn’t just teaching the facts that he knew would show up on some standardized test.

I just never get this “all one way, or all the other way.” What ever happened to good old compromise?  Can’t we teach kids to think critically, to ask open-ended questions, to form scientific hypotheses and to memorize a few facts along the way?   Seems to me that they’ll ask better questions and think more critically if they have a bit of knowledge.

Maybe we should just spend more time teaching and less time testing. After all, this obsession with testing hasn’t helped us in getting our kids to the top ranks of science education around the world.  See yesterday’s rant on that topic.