APRIL 2006

California Seeks Teachers in Philippines to Fill Gap

Recruiter Mary Willis spent months trying to find special-education teachers for San Mateo, California, schools. Then she went to the Philippines and hired a dozen on the spot.

Across San Francisco Bay, Oakland has as many as three dozen Filipino special-ed teachers. The Los Angeles Unified School District, second-largest in the U.S., is hiring about 50 for the coming academic year.

``U.S. schools that train special-education teachers simply don't produce enough to satisfy the needs we have nationally,'' said Phyllis Harris, special-ed director for the Oakland Unified School District. She said the Philippines is one of several countries, including Spain and Canada, ``that produce more educators than they have need for.''

The districts are part of a national trend as schools from New York and Maryland to Florida and Kansas look abroad to fill teacher vacancies. For the Philippines, teachers and other overseas workers contribute more than 10 percent of gross domestic product. The 7.4 million Filipinos who work abroad sent home $917 million in January, almost 17 percent more than a year earlier, according to the Philippines Central Bank.

Many California schools, hit by budget cuts, are losing special-education teachers and speech pathologists to higher- paying districts and private schools. The departures coincide with a growing need for such educators as more children are diagnosed with autism, a developmental disorder marked by impaired communication and social skills.

Autistic Pupils

The number of public-school students diagnosed with autism statewide more than doubled in four years through the 2004-2005 school year, compared with a 4.4 percent increase in total enrollment, according to the California Department of Education.

``There's always been a shortage of special-education teachers in California, and the growing number of autism cases has added to that,'' said Nicholas Certo, chairman of special education at San Francisco State University.

California doesn't train teachers at the undergraduate level, as most states do.

``That makes it doubly hard'' Certo said. ``The job pays little'' relative to the graduate education required.

Experienced teachers in the Philippines, where a third of the population lives on less than 60 cents a day, are jumping at opportunities in the U.S. Ligaya Avenida has placed almost 1,000 Filipino teachers in U.S. schools since opening her staffing agency in 2003, after 30 years as a teacher and administrator in San Francisco.

Wage Differential

Jeremiah Goco, 29, arrived in San Mateo in September from his home outside Manila to teach a class of five severely handicapped students at Bayside Middle School. With six years of experience and a graduate degree in special education, Goco earns about $45,000, nine times more than he made back home.

``Education is inexpensive in the Philippines,'' said Avenida, 60. Teachers know there's a special-ed need in the U.S., ``so naturally they apply for these courses,'' she said.
``It's a win-win situation,'' said Harris in Oakland. ``We need their services, and they need our standard of employment.''

Salary was the No. 2 reason for taking a job 7,000 miles away from his wife and two young children, Goco said.

``The opportunity is worth the sacrifice,'' he said in his art-lined classroom with aisles wide enough to accommodate wheelchairs. He wants to return to his country with better skills to identify autism.

``Most cases in the Philippines aren't diagnosed, especially among the poor, and without a diagnosis, you don't get the services,'' he said.

Hiring Trips

Willis, an assistant superintendent at the San Mateo Foster City School District, spent five days in Manila last May interviewing 120 applicants. The trip came after she spent months on the Internet, at job fairs and advertising for teachers in trade journals, all to no avail.

Los Angeles, with 727,000 students, conducts annual searches statewide and in other U.S. cities, said Carolina Pavia, the district's director of operations.

``We have not been able to fill our needs'' within the U.S., said Pavia, whose district hires about 400 special-ed teachers each year. The Filipinos are ``very committed and have a strong work ethic,'' she said. Only one or two haven't worked out in five years, she said.
Greener Pasture

Ethyl Santos, 42, who lived east of Manila in Antipolo, accepted a job in Oakland five years ago, seeking ``the proverbial greener pasture,'' she said.

Santos, whose salary jumped 10-fold, came by herself and was joined by her husband and two children a year later. She has since had a third child and the family is seeking permanent residency.

The foreign teachers are responsible for their transportation, housing and visa costs. Most turn to an agency like Avenida, which charges about $5,000 to $7,000, depending on the type of visa. The fee includes one-way transportation to the U.S. and help in finding housing.

Avenida covers transportation and hotel costs for recruiters whose district hires 10 or more teachers. The agency has placed Filipino teachers with schools in cities including Baltimore; West Palm Beach, Florida; and Memphis, Tennessee.

The teachers typically come to the U.S. on cultural-exchange visas that last for three years or work visas that are valid for as long as six years.

History of Ties

California has a long history of Filipino immigration, starting with a wave from 1903 to 1934, according to the Smithsonian Institution. A second wave from 1945 to 1965 was mostly soldiers who had fought with the U.S. during World War II and war brides. A third wave that began in the mid-1960s includes many professionals.

``Their educational system may in some ways be modeled after the U.S.'' said Catherine Ceniza Choy, an associate professor of ethnic studies at the University of California, Berkeley. ``When you have that kind of training, plus a century-old presence of the U.S. in the Philippines, it's not so surprising'' that U.S. schools recruit there, she said.

Goco, who pays $360 a month to share a two-bedroom apartment with four other teachers, has adjusted to his job and even coaches the Bayside girls soccer team. Being away from family is the biggest challenge, he said. He sees and talks with his kids daily using a Webcam and free voice service.

``You have to look forward and think about what you can provide for them later,'' he said. ``Sometimes they ask me to come home.''

`Fast Track'

To get teachers into classrooms faster, California is issuing intern licenses for people enrolled in university programs that will lead to education credentials. About 100 people are in San Francisco State's ``fast-track'' program this year, Certo said.

The Los Angeles school district has a program that encourages teaching assistants to become teachers.

``The key is growing your own,'' Pavia said. ``These programs have the highest retention rate because the people know what to expect. They've worked in the classrooms, they live in the communities.''

To contact the reporter on this story:
Lisa Wolfson in San Francisco at lwolfson@bloomberg.net
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000080&sid=aLDm4B7NDY3c&refer=asia#


Patriotism lessons for Japan's schools

Japan's ruling coalition is to revise education laws to promote patriotism in schools - a taboo since World War II.

The proposal has triggered opposition among liberals including Japan's teachers' association, which say it is reminiscent of the nationalism seen in Japan before and during the war.

"Everybody has patriotism - it's a natural feeling," Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Thursday in support of the bill.

Patriotism is listed in the bill as an educational goal and defined as "an attitude that respects tradition and culture, loves the nation and homeland that have fostered them, and contributes to international peace and development."

The current education law, which was enacted under the US occupation, stipulates the need for compulsory schooling and equal opportunities, carefully avoiding any mention of patriotism.

The accord came a day after New Komeito, a pacifist party backed by Japan's biggest Buddhist sect Soka Gakkai, bowed to the LDP's proposal to add the expression "loves the nation."

Koizumi, who steps down in September, has championed the shedding of post-war inhibitions. His coalition is also seeking to revise the US- imposed 1947 constitution to declare that Japan has a military, although the country would remain officially pacifist.
The country has gradually shed caution about displays of patriotism that were shunned after World War II, when Emperor Hirohito was revered as a demigod.

In 1999, the government established Kimigayo, which honors the emperor, as the national anthem and made the rising sun flag an official emblem of the state.

The Tokyo municipality, led by outspoken nationalist Shintaro Ishihara, in 2003 ordered public school teachers to stand up for the anthem at ceremonies, infuriating liberal instructors who have been disciplined for refusing.

"We need broad discussions among people rather than hastily arranged and closed-door meetings by the ruling coalition," said Yasuo Morikoshi, chairman of the Japan Teachers' Union, of the patriotism law.

But the conservative Yomiuri Shimbun welcomed the move.

"There is no country apart from Japan that looks at the teaching of patriotism in a negative way," Japan's best- selling daily said in a commentary.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Shingo Ito
April 14, 2006
http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?
pp_cat=17&art_id=16545&sid=7508324&con_type=1


Tech helps teach complex reading skills

Software can aid in addressing what ACT calls a 'serious problem' With the testing requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act targeting elementary and middle school students until now, and with the knowledge that a strong foundation in reading begins at an early age, it's easy to see why school leaders might focus their attention on reading instruction in the early grades at the expense of high-school reading programs. But a new report from ACT--the Iowa-based, not-for-profit assessment, research, and management-services organization once known as the American College Testing Program--suggests the danger of this approach.

The report, titled "Reading Between the Lines," concludes that too many American high school students are graduating without the more sophisticated reading skills they'll need to succeed in college and in workforce training programs. Substantial experience with complex reading texts in high school is the key to developing college-level reading skills, ACT says--and it calls on policy makers and school leaders to revise their standards and curricula to incorporate the reading of more complex texts.

"The research reveals a very serious problem," said Richard L. Ferguson, ACT's chief executive officer. "Too few students are developing the level of reading skills they'll need after high school."

ACT's research shows the benefits experienced by students who are ready for college-level reading: They are more likely to enroll in college in the fall following high school graduation, earn higher grades in college social science courses, earn higher first-year college grade point averages, and return to the same college for a second year in higher proportions than do students who are not ready for college-level reading.

ACT's findings suggest the ability to read complex texts is the clearest differentiator between students who are more likely to be ready for college-level reading and those who are less likely to be ready. Unfortunately, the majority of states don't define the types of reading materials to which high school students in each specific grade should be exposed, and not a single state defines what complex texts are, ACT says.

The ACT report defines the types of materials that should be included in all high school courses in English, math, social studies, and science, and it provides a number of sample reading passages that illustrate the six essential features of complex texts. These six features are:

Relationships--Interactions among ideas or characters in the text are subtle, involved, or deeply embedded.
Richness--The text possesses a sizable amount of highly sophisticated information conveyed through data or literary devices.
Structure--The text is organized in ways that are elaborate and sometimes unconventional.
Style--The author's tone and use of language are often intricate.
Vocabulary--The author's choice of words is demanding and highly context-dependent.
Purpose--The author's intent in writing the text is implicit and sometimes ambiguous.

The report also offers a number of recommendations to educators and policy makers on how to help increase the number of high school graduates who are ready for college-level reading, such as strengthening reading instruction in all high school courses by incorporating complex reading materials into course content, and offering targeted interventions to help students who have fallen behind in their reading skills.

One challenge to implementing these suggestions, however, is the often wide disparity in the reading abilities of students who are enrolled in the same high school classes. Another challenge is time: Educators already are hard-pressed to make sure students understand the core curricular material--and adding another dimension to the course, especially if it's not an English class, takes time away from instruction in the core subject matter.

But some educators have found solutions to these challenges with the help of technology. At University High School in Orlando, Fla., the graduation rate has risen from the mid-80s to 92 percent, and reading scores on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) have registered significant learning gains for the lower 25 percent of students, pushing the school's state rating from a "C" to a high "B." Principal David Christiansen attributes these gains, in part, to the school's use of Academy of Reading software from Autoskill Inc.

"Our school happens to be extremely diverse, socio-economically and racially: [We have a] 62-percent minority rate and [a] 42-percent free and reduced-price lunch status," Christiansen said. "We've seen movement on the FCAT, SAT, graduation rate--across the board. Not that one product is the sole reason, but I believe it's a big factor."

He added: "What happens in high school is every student is different. Some students come into the high school environment at a third-grade reading level. A lot of times, at the high school level, we don't have the ability to deal with that. But this software pretests the students [and] places them in the reading process where they belong." Students use the software two days a week in the school's computer lab. The solution incorporates headphones and a microphone, targeting reading instruction to address each student's unique needs.

"In high school, if [students aren't] reading at the level they should be, they kind of shut down. But if you're at a computer, nobody else can see what you're doing, and you're able to sound out the words," Christiansen said.

Salt Lake Community College is one of many schools using Merit Software's reading programs to help students learn to understand complex texts. The software has "allowed us to add more reading to our curriculum without being overwhelmed," said Kathleen Johnston of the school's Reading and Learning Enhancement Department. She added, "Research tells us that people who read a lot are better readers."

With Merit reading comprehension software, students practice reading complex texts and answering several questions about each one. They work on a variety of questions that help develop important reading skills, such as discovering the main idea, figuring out the meaning of words in context, and inferring the meaning of complex passages.

Assessments place students at an appropriately challenging level, and passages advance in difficulty as students demonstrate readiness.

Student scores are kept in a management system that allows teachers to view individual student progress. This feature helps teachers see where students need additional, offline support.

"With the Merit software, students can get a lot of information, and the readings are short. That builds confidence," Johnston said. "Also, [visually] the information is all there on one page, and it's very colorful. And students know these activities are going to be over soon, so the activities are very motivating in that regard--students know the work will be completed relatively quickly."

Using Merit reading software as a supplement to everyday instruction can increase the reading skills of low-achieving students, according to a recent study. Researchers at Marshall University monitored the progress of students at Calhoun Middle-High School in Mount Zion, W.Va., where the software was used for two years in a row. The lowest-achieving quartile of students there made greater test-score gains than students who did not use the software, researchers found.

At Salt Lake Community College, educators have just started using the software. "We're hoping, over time, and as more and more of our instructors take advantage of this, we'll gather more concrete proof that it is helpful," Johnston said.

The Miami-Dade County Public Schools are using Read On! software from Steck Vaughn, an imprint of Harcourt Achieve, in their high school and adult-education programs. Students "get very interested in it, because it's paced at their individual level--writing lessons, vocabulary lessons, directed reading lessons. It seems to have all the elements to pique the interest of the students," said Dale Keith, Miami-Dade County Public Schools, instructional supervisor for adult education.

Available through a site license covering an unlimited number of students, Read On! provides more than 1,000 hours of instruction and practice in 20 reading comprehension strategies and across 10 skill levels, said Harcourt's Bill Walker. Each lesson provides about four hours of instruction, and the software bookmarks where students leave off so they can resume again after school, or whenever it's convenient to receive instruction. At the end of each lesson, students are referred to a print-based book to read a passage and answer comprehension questions. "The 'aha' for that is that it encourages students to apply the learning from the software to the printed page," Walker said. "There is a transfer of learning to the printed page."

He added: "We're trying to train students who have never picked up a book that reading can be not only informational, but also fun. That has a direct correlation to success in their content-area classrooms. It helps them transfer those 20 reading comprehension strategies to their social studies, science, math, and English classes."

eSchool News readers chose their favorite reading software in 2004
(see http://www.eschoolnews.com/resources/surveys/editorial/rca/srs/pdf/srs04.pdf).
A new reader poll will be taken in July, with results published in our September issue.

From eSchool News staff reports
April 13, 2006
http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryts.cfm?ArticleID=6260

Links:
ACT report: "Reading Between the Lines" http://www.act.org/path/policy/index.html
University High School http://www.uhs.ocps.net
Autoskill Inc. http://www.autoskill.com
Salt Lake Community College http://www.slcc.edu
Merit Software http://www.meritsoftware.com
Miami-Dade County Public Schools http://www.dadeschools.net
Harcourt Achieve http://www.harcourtachieve.com


Early help for the special child

"There were just so many people who told me nothing was wrong with my son, and so many stories about other children who didn't speak until they were five years old, and how boys develop slower than girls," Leela Barrock remembers.

Still, her gut instinct told her by the time her second child, Rayen Yeoh, was a-year-and-ahalf-old, something was not right. He was not responding to communication nor was he forming words like other children his age. But despite knowing that her son needed help, it wasn't until a year later that Rayen's pediatrician agreed that he should see a speech therapist for delayed speech development.

Barrock, an associate editor with The Edge, says it took her and her husband two years, consultations with several different doctors and therapists, and between RM5,000 and RM6,000 before they were able to have Rayen's condition satisfactorily assessed and therapy appropriately prescribed.

Barrock says Rayen, who is now three-and-a-half-years old, has been diagnosed with delayed development as a result of his delayed speech.

"But with therapy, we're seeing vast improvements," she says. Still, Rayen has bad days as well as good days, and Barrock's main concern is to help her son gain the interactive skills he needs to socialise and access the world around him.

Barrock's experience is no different from many other parents' who have children with special needs that do not have a clear-cut diagnosis as children with visible problems such as mental retardation, autism or Down Syndrome.

For example, a child with a hoarse voice may be told to hush up because he or she shouts too much, or a boy who sounds feminine at puberty is told there's nothing wrong, because there is still a lack of awareness in Malaysia about communication disorders, says speecHelp director Pamela Thomas Joseph.

A communication disorder can arise from a speech disorder where the expression is impaired and/or a language disorder where comprehension is impaired or under-developed.

"Speech and language delay is one of the most common concerns among parents, and is a symptom of something larger," Thomas Joseph, a speech language pathologist (SLP, otherwise known as a speech therapist) with six years' experience tells theSun in an interview in Petaling Jaya.

She explains that communication disorders can arise from congenital conditions like Down Syndrome or cerebal palsy, acquired conditions like strokes and injuries from accidents, environmental conditions (learnt or imposed), and physical limitations that go unnoticed, for example, hearing difficulties or large tonsils.

"Results from speech therapy are best when the cause of the difficulty is diagnosed and known," co-director and SLP Farah Azlina Alkaf says, adding that the speecHelp clinic treats both children and adults.

"Many different elements make up language. Many preverbal cognitive skills are needed for language to be learnt and expressed, for example, listening, attention, vocabulary, attention span, focus etc. A person will not acquire language or may have difficulty acquiring language even if one element is missing," U K-trained S LP Jennifer Peters says.

She says early intervention is crucial to help a child maximise his or her potential for developing communication. "If by two to two-and-a-half, a child is not communicating at all, especially if a child cannot understand what you are saying, it's important to seek help," Peters says.

Gleneagles Intan Medical Centre speech language therapist Sharimila M. Ambrose agrees, saying parents often think a child will "grow out of it".

"But by the time they seek help when the child enters school at seven, it may be late as the child's skills were not developed during his or her crucial growing years," she says. Many parents don't recognise a problem when they see it, or if they do, they don't know there's help out there, she says.

Still, Ambrose says, there is growing awareness especially in urban centres where education and income levels are higher.

Learning disabilities

Not all persons who experience communication difficulties are learning disabled, although some learning disabilities can and may result in a communication impairment of some sort.

Learning disabilities can also go unnoticed at home and in school and remain untreated, resulting in a child being disadvantaged in the long-term. According to the National Institutes of Health, a learning disability is a disorder that affects people's ability to either interpret what they see and hear or to link information from different parts of the brain. It is a broad term that includes developmental speech and language disorders, academic skills disorders and "other" that includes certain coordination disorders and learning handicaps not covered by other terms.

"Globally one in every eight children has learning difficulties," says KidzGrow clinical director and physiotherapist Cheryl Chia in an interview in Kuala Lumpur. These difficulties can stem from different causes.

"If a child is not focused or has bad handwriting or is not doing well in school, for example, it's common for parents to label them as `naughty' or `lazy' without realising the child may have an underlying problem that he or she was born with," she explains.

KidzGrow which began in Singapore, and opened in Kuala Lumpur in September last year, aims to be a service provider for struggling learners that fall within the "grey zone", Chia says.

She observes that while there are special government schools to support children with physical or mental disabilities, many parents in Asia resort to sending children who don't cope well for tuition because of a lack of awareness that their child has a learning disability.

"Three things need to be present in a child for him or her to learn successfully - attention, absorbing information through the eyes or visual channel, and listening, that is, through language," Chia explains. "If any of these components are missing or impaired, a child will face learning difficulties."

She says KidzGrow conducts a full evaluation of a child before a custom-made programme that is research-based and results-oriented is prescribed. "If a child has bad handwriting, for example, it could be caused by a deficiency in motor or visual or attention function or a combination of these."

At KidzGrow, depending on a child's needs, playing specificallydesigned games in a gym will result in a child's handwriting visibly improving by enhancing the child's fine motor control or visual perception abilities, Chia says. "We don't drill a child on writing or math or language but we address the root causes of their problem instead. We look at a child holistically," she adds, describing KidzGrow as a one-stop centre that offers therapy-based programmes which build attention, language skills, reading, writing, movement abilities as well as self-confidence.

"We build the foundational skills that children need to enable life-long learning," she explains further, adding that the ultimate aim is remove a child's dependence on therapy.
Chia says noticeable improvements in a child's learning abilities can be seen within six to eight weeks. Among others, KidzGrow uses Fast ForWord, a programme based on US patented technology that improves the essential cognitive skills required to read and learn effectively.

Gleneagles Intan's Ambrose says therapy doesn't solve or cure a learning disability.
"Children develop learning disabilities and a lot of them are permanent. Therapists teach and equip these children with strategies to cope with their disabilities and encourage opportunities for use of their new skills in their everyday setting."

Challenges

Private therapy is not cheap, and not everyone will be able to afford it. Barrock, for example, spends at least RM500 a month for once-a-week therapy for Rayen.

Gleneagles Intan's Ambrose says she is even aware of one parent who spends up to RM4,000 a month on therapy for her pre-school child. Assessments by a therapist can range from RM200 to RM450, while speech therapy can cost anything between RM80 and RM180 per session. KidzGrow charges between RM1,200 and RM4,000 for a six-week module.

Barrock says she is lucky she can afford private therapy for her son. "The wait list at a government hospital can be months-long, and there's no way my son would be able to attend therapy at least once a week."

Cost aside, the biggest challenge for parents, says Gleneagles Intan's Ambrose, is schooling for children with these special needs.

Meanwhile, although the Education Ministry provides for special schools, children with different learning modes and challenges are unfortunately lumped together. "But each child is different and has different needs," Ambrose notes.

SpeecHelp's Thomas Joseph concurs, saying, "No child is the same. The most difficult issue is for placement of children who have normal intelligence, peer comparable understanding but can't express themselves well."

UK-trained Ambrose adds that if therapy is conducted in Mandarin for a Chinese-speaking family, the child will face difficulties once he or she enters mainstream school where Malay is the medium.

She says Malaysia lacks early intervention centres which can detect problems in the pre-school years although more kindergarten teachers are becoming trained in identifying such children.

Peters, who has her own practice and 13 years' experience in Malaysia, says Malaysia actually has a high level of early intervention expertise. "But you need to go to the right people and they are usually not all under one roof," she observes.

Another problem lies in the fact that there are no controls or regulation of SLPs in Malaysia such as a licensing requirement like in the UK, Australia and America, she says.

While parents should check with the Malaysian Association of Speech and Hearing (MASH) for a list of qualified and MASH-registered SLPs, discussion about issues such as licensing with the Health Ministry is still pending.

Peters says that because there is no regulation, the fees charged for therapy does not necessarily reflect an SLP's qualifications or experience. "There are a lot of practicing SLPs that are not MASH members, and because MASH is not a governing body, it does not have the means to verify the qualifications of non-members, including the number of hands-on clinical hours they've completed," she says.

She adds that misdiagnoses can occur, citing one case where a teenage autistic child attended therapy with a psychologist for seven years for dyslexia instead. The psychologist also advised the parents that the child did not need speech therapy when the child would have benefited from it. "Parents may not know what to look out for when seeking help as many do not have a basis for comparison," Peters explains.

Jacqueline Ann Surin
April 13, 2006
http://www.sun2surf.com/article.cfm?id=13785


Solo Viewing, Bad EndingsWatching Violent TV May Cost Kids Friends

The kind of television shows children watch and whom they watch them with can be just as important as the amount of time they spend in front of the tube, researchers at Boston's Children's Hospital report in a new study that finds an association between violent shows and peer problems.

Children who watch violent television programs -- especially those who watch such shows alone -- spend less time with friends than children who watch a lot of nonviolent programs. Although the federally funded study could not determine a cause-and-effect relationship, researchers suspect one exists. They suggest that violent shows might teach and encourage aggressive behavior in children, which in turn isolates them from their peers. And that isolation, scientists suggest, appears to create a cycle that makes violent programming more attractive to lonely children.

"A lot of studies about violence and television deal with behavioral outcomes that don't resonate with people" because they occur years later, said David Bickham, lead author of the new study, which involved 1,356 children and appears in the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine. "We wanted something with a real-life outcome" that would motivate parents to consider the potential consequences of uncensored viewing that are more immediate.

While concerns about the harmful impact of violent TV shows on children are scarcely new -- the U.S. Surgeon General issued a warning in 1972 -- their influence on children's friendships and social activities has been little studied.

"This is a very interesting and novel study," said research psychologist Craig Anderson, an expert on children and media who is a professor at Iowa State University. "There really haven't been studies looking at TV violence" and peer relationships among children. "What they propose does make a lot of sense."

The study, by scientists at the Harvard-affiliated hospital's Center on Media and Child Health, suggests that the content of shows and the context in which they are viewed may influence social relationships in a more complicated way than previously believed.

Many researchers had speculated that TV viewing displaces time spent with friends. But Bickham and pediatrician Michael O. Rich found that children who watched television with friends also spent more time socializing in other ways, while those who watched violent shows spent significantly less time with their peers.

Studies have found that the average school-age child spends 27 hours a week watching TV and that 61 percent of programs contain violence.

To determine whether violent content affected relationships with peers differently than nonviolent shows, researchers analyzed detailed viewing diaries kept by a parent or other adult during one weekday and one weekend day for children between the ages of 6 and 12. The name of the TV show was recorded, as was the presence of other people in the room and activities performed while a show was on. Crime shows, police dramas and cartoons such as "Power Rangers" were classified as violent, as were other shows where violence was a central theme, Bickham said. News, sports and some nonfiction programming were omitted from the study.

Each hour of violent television watched by children aged 6 to 8 corresponded to 20 minutes less time spent with friends, while children 9 to 12 who watched an hour of violent shows spent 25 minutes less time with peers. Viewing nonviolent shows did not affect the time spent with friends, Bickham said.

"Viewing television together may be one activity in the repertoire of a rich childhood friendship," the authors write; the study, they continue, does not support the belief that watching TV "interferes with relationships or replaces other shared activities."

The results are consistent with findings from other studies, according to Brad J. Bushman, a research scientist at the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research.

"We know that how much violence you watch in first grade predicts how aggressive you will be 15 years later," Bushman said. "The link goes from violent TV to aggressive behavior in children, not the other way around."

The study did not examine the impact of violent programming viewed by groups of children. Bickham said there is no way to know whether collective viewing might encourage or discourage antisocial behavior or peer problems.

Nor does it demonstrate cause and effect, he added. "This just shows relationships" between violent viewing and peer isolation, he said, not causation.

Yet Bickham said the message for parents is simple: They, not their children, should be in control of the TV.

That means monitoring what children are watching, not turning on the set in the morning and leaving it on all day and not allowing children to watch shows meant for adults, such as "CSI" or "The Sopranos."

"These are things parents need to be aware of," he said. "It's not just the amount of time your child is spending, it's what he or she is watching." ·

Comments: boodmans@washpost.com. Join study author David Bickham for a Live Online chat on TV viewing and children's social development at 2 p.m. today at www.washingtonpost.com.

Sandra G. Boodman
Washington Post Staff Writer
April 11, 2006
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/10/AR2006041001308.html


Rare Opportunity for Hearing-Impaired Children As School Opens UN Integrated Regional Information Networks

Hearing-impaired children in Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, now have reason to enjoy a normal childhood, thanks to the opening of the country's first and only school for students with hearing difficulties.

"For many families, our school is the only one - not only in Mogadishu, but throughout the country - that offers normal classes to their children," said Usman Muhammad Mahamud, the school's director, on Tuesday.

Mahamud, who recently returned from South Africa after completing his university education, said he became aware of the need for such a school after he saw neighbours' hearing-impaired children. "It is heartbreaking to see a six-year-old deaf child standing at the doorstep, watching his or her siblings going off to school, while they have nowhere to go but play around in the sand," he said.

Mahamud, along with other Somalis from abroad, decided to open a school that catered to hearing-impaired children. The demand for a place at the school "has been amazing," he said. "Almost all the children in the school would never have had the opportunity to go to school. You should see them. They are so eager and happy to be in school. The school has opened doors they never dreamed of."

The students are now interacting with others through sign language. "We have a few hearing students, and we make it compulsory that they also learn sign language," he said. "We even have adults coming to the school to learn sign language."

However, as the number of students has increased, Mahamud has been faced with the challenge of finding more teachers with the appropriate training. There is already a general shortage of teachers in Somalia, because very few new teachers had entered the profession in the last 15 years. "It is proving very difficult to find ones able to teach deaf children," he said.

The school should be expanded to take more children, "but at the moment we do not have the capacity," he said. "Up to now, we have been sustained by support from the parents and the odd businessman." The parents barely have the means to sustain their families, let alone finance a school. He feared that economic hardship and a lack of government support would hinder the school's progress.

Mahamud has appealed to Somali well wishers in the diaspora and the international community "to help the school help this most neglected group." The school also needs educational material for the hearing impaired, computers and "help with training teachers and expanding the classrooms," he said.

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations ]

April 11, 2006
Nairobi
http://allafrica.com/stories/200604110149.html


'Sesame Street' sparks controversy over videos for infants

The creators of "Sesame Street" are releasing a new line of videos Tuesday targeted for children as young as six months, outraging some child-development experts who feel no form of TV or video is suitable for children younger than 2.

The DVDs -- part of a series called "Sesame Beginnings" -- are intended to be watched by parents along with their small children. Sesame Workshop developed the shows with help of experts from Zero to Three, a well-regarded nonprofit advocacy group.

Despite that partnership, the project has drawn fire from other experts who note that the American Academy of Pediatrics advises against TV viewing for children younger than 2. They fear the Sesame brand and Zero to Three's endorsement will convince many parents their infants would benefit from watching videos.

"There is no evidence that screen media is beneficial for babies and growing evidence it may be harmful," said the Boston-based Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood. "'Sesame Beginnings' will encourage babies' devotion to TV characters that have been licensed to promote hundreds of other products."

There already is a huge market for videos aimed at infants: "Teletubbies" has been on the air for nearly a decade, sometimes drawing similar criticism, and The Walt Disney Co.'s Baby Einstein products are very lucrative.

Sesame Workshop had stayed out of this field but says it now has found an effective way to promote interaction between parents and children younger than 2 -- something its executives say other shows do not do well.

"We didn't go into this in an impulsive way," said Rosemarie Truglio, Sesame Workshop's vice president of education and research. "We wanted to invite the parent into the viewing situation, to give the adult information about child development."

Working toward that goal, the videos show characters such as Baby Elmo and Baby Big Bird with their parents or caregivers, going through daily routines such as feeding and bedtime.

Truglio contends there is no scientific research justifying the "extreme recommendation" from the pediatrics academy to keep the youngest children away from TV.

"The reality is there's TV in 98 percent of all homes, and parents feel comfortable with it," she said. "We have to stop blaming parents, and create responsible content for them. ... The key is moderation. We're not advocating just plopping kids in front of a TV screen."

Psychologist Susan Linn, a co-founder of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, said she was disappointed but not surprised that Sesame Workshop had developed the DVDs.

"They're a media company in the business of promoting their brand," she said. "They've done some good things for kids and they sell a lot of junk for kids."

Linn and her colleagues are even more upset by Zero to Three's role, saying the project has damaged its credibility.

"It's a shame to see a prominent public health organization get involved," Linn said. "People trust Sesame Workshop so much. To have the combination of that and Zero to Three -- I think it's very likely that parents who have been hesitant will jump right in."

Zero to Three's executive director, Matthew Melmed, said he had no second thoughts about the partnership and accused Linn's group of misrepresenting the new DVDs.

"These are not 'baby videos' -- these are DVDs designed to promote healthy parent-child interactions," he said. "Once people understand what this product is designed to do, the response has been favorable."

More than two-thirds of parents with kids younger than 2 already let them watch an average of two hours of TV a day, Melmed said. "What we're trying to do is meet parents in their daily reality, to help them do a better job in what is really the hardest job any person has," he said.

Dr. Kyle Pruett, a child development expert at Yale University and member of Zero to Three's board, initially was skeptical of the new videos but said his views changed as he thought of how to improve options for parents who already had decided to expose their small children to videos.

"These are the absolute antithesis of park-your-baby-in-front-of-the-TV kind of videos," he said. "They are thoughtful, informative -- it's not a corporate campaign trying to draw kids into TV life."

David Crary
ASSOCIATED PRESS
April 9, 2006
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/living/education/14302263.htm


How 4 people turned learning disabilities into stories of success, fortune and happiness

Soft-spoken and conservatively dressed, Bill Jacobs owns eight car dealerships that did $400 million in sales last year. As a child, he couldn't swim freestyle or tie his shoes.

Chicago economist Diane Swonk, blessed with chiseled cheekbones and an ultraquick mind, is a TV darling, appearing 105 times in the past year. As a student, multiple-choice tests gave her headaches and blurred her vision. "It looked like the letters were dancing on the page," she recalled.

Restaurateur Jerry Kleiner, who has an uncanny knack for spotting the next hot neighborhood, recently opened his latest chic eatery, Carnivale, to rave reviews. But as a high school student, he said, "I was lost. I was really lost. If someone had said, `Do your homework or you'll be shot and killed,' I still couldn't have done it."

Over time Kleiner found his path, as did Swonk and Jacobs and countless other high-profile business people who have learning disabilities, whether attention-deficit (hyperactivity) disorder, dyslexia, some elements of each, or other learning differences.

The blend of learning issues and their severity is unique for every individual, but they are all connected to the way the brain processes and expresses information.

In the not-so-distant past, matters of the mind were not discussed. Now, taboos are falling away, and the way in which learning differences are viewed is shifting.

In an increasingly fast-spinning business world that values high-octane multitaskers, innovative risk-takers and big-picture thinkers, some experts are starting to question whether certain individuals are thriving because of their learning differences, rather than in spite of them. So far, the evidence is strictly anecdotal, but it is intriguing, given that an estimated 20 percent of American schoolchildren have some sort of learning issue.

Dr. Sally Shaywitz, author of "Overcoming Dyslexia," cites her experience at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, a few years ago.

"I couldn't walk through the halls without someone pulling me aside, and saying, `Can I talk with you for a minute?'" she recalled. "These were the heads of corporations, and they all had a secret: They weren't good readers."

`Terrific' thinkers

While dyslexics "may not be very good at spelling or sounding out words, they often are terrific at thinking, reasoning, getting to the heart of issues ... all the things you can't teach people," said Shaywitz, co-director of the Yale Center for the Study of Learning, Reading and Attention.

Dr. Mel Levine, an expert in learning difficulties, cited his clinical experience.

"We see a lot of children who have trouble with their attention. And many have a trait called insatiability, where they are chronically restless, bored easily. They need material possessions, and they want more and more," said Levine, a professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "They are hard to satisfy, and this can cause behavioral problems. But when they grow up, insatiability can translate into ambition and drive.

"Among the people I've worked with, I'm astounded by how many become highly successful adults," said Levine, co-founder of All Kinds of Minds, a non-profit institute for the study of learning differences.

Lara Honos-Webb, author of "The Gift of ADHD," said, "there is substantial overlap in what it takes to be an entrepreneur and the traits [often are] associated with ADHD," among them high energy, a tendency to do many things at once, a proclivity for innovative thinking and taking risks.

The Chicago landscape is dotted with success stories so varied that it seems almost impossible to make broad generalizations about where individuals with learning issues will find success. Some of the highly accomplished have been honored by the Rush Neurobehavioral Center in Skokie, including Jacobs, Swonk, futures industry leader Jack Sandner, former Chicago Public Schools chief Paul Vallas, chef Charlie Trotter, real estate executive Harvey Alter, Molex Inc. co-Chairman Frederick Krehbiel and Illinois Appellate Judge Anne Burke.

Nationally, business leaders with learning differences include brokerage innovator Charles Schwab, JetBlue Airways Corp. founder David Neeleman, Kinko's founder Paul Orfalea and John Chambers, chief of Cisco Systems Inc.

Rocky starts

For many of today's business leaders, childhood was peppered with frustration, humiliation and a sense of being different. When many of them were growing up, there was very little public awareness, if any, of learning differences, and very little help was available.

Even today, "school rewards people with excellent rote memory, and probably nothing is less important in most careers, especially now that we have hard drives on our desks," said Levine.

For Sandner, who has ADHD but wasn't diagnosed as a child, sitting still at a desk was impossible.

At Our Lady of Peace at 79th Street and Jeffrey Boulevard, "I'd rock, and I'd never know I was rocking," said Sandner, who is chairman of ETrade Futures LLC, after a long career with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and RB&H Financial Services. "They put me in the back of the class so I wouldn't disturb someone."

Today, Sandner often does his writing at a Starbucks rather than his spacious office, which is filled with photos of his family and of Sandner with various VIPs, from economist Milton Friedman to former President George H.W. Bush to Rev. Theodore Hesburgh, longtime leader of Notre Dame University, where he earned a law degree.

"I can study better in an atmosphere where there is a little chaos," said Sandner, who is dapper and trim at 64.

Restaurateur Kleiner, who came to this country from Eastern Europe at the age of 7, also was never assessed for learning differences, but looking back, he said, he's certain he fits the mold for ADHD.

When reading to himself for school, he could never get beyond three paragraphs.

"A little further, and my mind would drift and fantasize in 15 different directions," said Kleiner, 49, who conducts business by cell phone while cruising the city in his black Mercedes convertible, generally juggling several projects. "In the classroom, if the teacher told me to read something and remember it, I could never do it.

"And if I was called on to read, I'd have panic attacks," said Kleiner, settling down to a pepper-and-egg sandwich at a favorite South Side haunt, the Remova Grill.

Risks are high

For many with learning disabilities, the early patterns of failure are so relentless and disheartening that they head down self-destructive paths. Studies have shown increased rates of arrests, divorces and job-hopping, for instance.

And not every child with learning differences is blessed with intellectual brilliance or driven by burning ambition.

"Not everyone is going to be a star just because they have it," cautioned Meryl Lipton, executive director of the Rush Neurobehavioral Center, a part of Rush Children's Hospital. "For some people, their functioning is really compromised."

That said, those who manage to find learning techniques adapted to the way their minds work, and who are lucky enough to find a mentor or to possess the self-confidence necessary to pursue their passions, the potential is vast, experts say.

Medication, generally amphetamines, also can be an effective part of the equation for those with ADHD, though there is debate about whether it is being overused and whether it can dull a creative mind, a concern that has been voiced by JetBlue's Neeleman, the inventor of electronic airline ticketing.

The key, said Lipton, is to find ways to make the traits associated with various learning differences work in a healthy, productive way.

Overall, ADHD is "a gift that can be hard to unwrap," said Dr. Edward Hallowell, co-author of "Positively ADD: Real Success Stories to Inspire Your Dreams," a book for young adults, due out this spring.

Swonk, chief economist for Mesirow Financial in Chicago, has dyslexia, a reading disability having to do with how the brain processes written material. She said she struggled terribly in school until she had a "fabulous biology teacher who graded our notes and told us how to take notes.

"That's how I got through college and two graduate degrees," Swonk said. "I took notes in three colors ... copious notes. I learned to overcompensate."

She began her career at First Chicago Corp. in 1985 and credits much of her success to then-chief economist James Annable, her mentor at the bank for 16 years.

"I had someone roll the dice on me at a very young age," said Swonk, 43. "And he had to keep raising the bar."

Out in the open

And now, after years of trying to hide her difference, she treats it openly and with humor.

"I give a lot of speeches, and I start out by saying, `I'm a dyslexic economist. I flip numbers. So I like it when an indicator is up by 3.3 percent. I can't mix that up,'" Swonk said.

Sandner found a mentor, too, but of a different sort. A pugnacious kid, he found the boxing ring was a place where he could shine, winning a Golden Gloves title under the coaching wing of boxing legend Tony Zale.

And through the years he stumbled upon a couple of techniques that allowed him to make it through college and law school. Note-taking was key to staying focused on a lecture, and to this day he jots things down on the hand-held cards used by traders in the pits.

And one night in college, sick with a 104-degree fever and cramming for a political science test, he began to read the material aloud to stay awake.

"I read with a ruler, line by line, all night long. It took that long," he said during a speech given after winning the Rush honor. The next day, he wrote a perfect exam.

To this day, he finds speaking aloud helps focus his thoughts.

"Otherwise, I'm off in dreamland somewhere," he said. "And I'm a little obsessive, so then I need to start over."

The right niche

Finding a passion is key, too, experts say, and auto dealer Jacobs found his within the family car business, founded by his father, Bill Jacobs Sr.

"My passion is collecting cars, and it always has been," Jacobs said during an interview at his Willowbrook office, a virtual nirvana for aficionados of "automobilia."

There's a half-scale pre-WWII Bugatti, a Ford flathead engine and a kid's barber chair where the seat is within a 1995 mini-Chevrolet. And that's not even mentioning the adjoining storeroom, where Jacobs keeps his collection of nearly 30 classic cars, ranging from a 1936 Bentley to a 1952 Ferrari Barchetta.

"I take the cars out, sometimes for 1,000-mile rallies over four days," he said. "They are used a lot."

In 1978 there was one Bill Jacobs dealership, selling Chevrolets in Joliet. At age 23, Jacobs began purchasing the business from his father.

"Almost immediately we started growing," said Jacobs, 51, who believes he has ADHD but has never been officially diagnosed. At the time, interest rates were soaring, a lot of businesses were going down the tubes, and Jacobs undertook a number of leveraged buyouts.

"In my case, it was easier to build and grow a lot of things than to run a single-focus business," said Jacobs, whose dealerships last year sold more than 15,200 cars.

Navigating a minefield

Multitasking is a popular model these days, but it has its pitfalls, said author Hallowell.

"You can do it well, but you need to be careful not to overlook details and make big mistakes," he said.

Business people with ADHD often are advised to collaborate with detail people with strong organizational skills. It is a lesson many learn the hard way.

"I was trying to do everything, and it was a disaster," said Kleiner, referring to a period early in his career when he developed Cairo, a River North nightclub that ultimately failed.

Asked how he learned to function more effectively, he said, "I just kept getting hammered ... taking lumps."

Over time, "I've learned to hire the right people, for accounting, legal," said Kleiner, who also has a personal assistant to help him stay organized.

For Swonk, her early struggles with dyslexia have informed her worldview as an economist and contributed to a willingness to run counter to the pack.

"I was the first one to call the turnaround in the industrial Midwest in 1986, and the 1990s belonged to the Midwest," she said. "At the time, people thought I was a nutcase."

"But I've had so many challenges and overcome them," she said. "I just know we are incredibly resilient."

Kathy Bergen, Tribune staff reporter
April 9, 2006
kbergen@tribune.comhttp://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0604090280apr09,1,6967467.story