I received an email this week from an author and professional speaker, inviting me to review his new book, The Short Bus, which the email said was about ADHD/LD.
I must admit that I feel a bit humbled, but nonetheless honored to be asked to do this. I have written the author, Jonathan Mooney, a reply email, letting him know that I would like a review copy of The Short Bus, but asked if he had one which is accessible via screen reader.
I also took the time to check out Mr. Mooney’s web site,
www.jonathanmooney.com
And was tickled to find a link to read an
excerpt from The Short Bus.
After reading the brief passage, I can’t wait to get a full copy of this book. Mr. Mooney writes in a very personable and straight-talking style, grabbing the reader and taking him along on his own journey. The Short Bus is his memoir about growing up in the special education system. He has undertaken a 35,000-mile journey across America in a real short bus to carry out a grass roots promotion of his book. Along the way, he met “more than a dozen people who have been diagnosed as disabled or different.” Their diagnoses ranged from dyslexia to Downs syndrome to autism. He is able to write effectively about meeting these people and the impact they have on his perspective, dredging up memories of what it is like to be different in a society where being normal is the norm. Along the way, he takes the reader in with his humor and empathetic understanding of what it is like to have grown up riding that short bus the first time around.
And, remember, I’m saying this having just read that short excerpt. Mr. Mooney, I sincerely hope that you get back to me soon about this matter. After reading that excerpt, I’d love to read more.
About the author:
“My name is Jonathan Mooney and I am a proud member of the community of people with disabilities. I am extremely dyslexic and have been labeled ADHD. I did not learn to read until I was 12 years old and dropped out of school for a year in sixth grade. I was given a 50/50 chance of graduating from high school. I was told I would end up in jail. Yet I shocked the skeptics by graduating from Brown University in 2000 with an honors degree in English Literature. I am the author of a book called Learning Outside the Lines (Simon and Schuster), and over the last eight years I have lectured in 48 states and three countries on empowering students with cognitive differences. I have lectured at Harvard’s Graduate school of Education, the University of Pennsylvania, Teachers College Columbia University and thousands of K-12 schools.”
Showing posts with label LD. Show all posts
Showing posts with label LD. Show all posts
Friday, January 25, 2008
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
LD podcast offers good resource
I just discovered the
LD Podcast
Blog through one of my news alerts. Just looking over the subjects of recent podcasts, it appears very interesting and appropriate for anybody seeking an informational resource for learning disabilities.
The link above is for just the blog, which is how I found the podcast. However, there is a richer and more comprehensive web site, including the same text from the blog on the podcast's home page,
ldpodcast.com
What first caught my eye, er, ears, was The podcast’s Show #72 which featured an interview with Ben Mitchell, Director of Admissions at
Landmark College.
For those who don’t know, Landmark is a college specializing in presenting a postsecondary learning environment for students with learning disabilities and ADHD.
From that firstintroduction, I checked out the blog and main web page much more thoroughly. I haven’t listened to any more podcasts yet, but, like I said, it strikes me as very interesting. And, the main web site is rich in supportive resources.
Additional: The interview with Ben Mitchell is a two-parter, concluded in Show #73.
Also, for trivia buffs, check out the second part, or read the blog to find out who is the most famous graduate of Landmark College.
LD Podcast
Blog through one of my news alerts. Just looking over the subjects of recent podcasts, it appears very interesting and appropriate for anybody seeking an informational resource for learning disabilities.
The link above is for just the blog, which is how I found the podcast. However, there is a richer and more comprehensive web site, including the same text from the blog on the podcast's home page,
ldpodcast.com
What first caught my eye, er, ears, was The podcast’s Show #72 which featured an interview with Ben Mitchell, Director of Admissions at
Landmark College.
For those who don’t know, Landmark is a college specializing in presenting a postsecondary learning environment for students with learning disabilities and ADHD.
From that firstintroduction, I checked out the blog and main web page much more thoroughly. I haven’t listened to any more podcasts yet, but, like I said, it strikes me as very interesting. And, the main web site is rich in supportive resources.
Additional: The interview with Ben Mitchell is a two-parter, concluded in Show #73.
Also, for trivia buffs, check out the second part, or read the blog to find out who is the most famous graduate of Landmark College.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Breastfeeding mom denied extra time
There is an interesting case being appealed before the National Board of Medical Examiners. This case is a gray area, blurred because it is framed by societal issues, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the health concerns of a nursing mother, playing out against the backdrop of the rigid enforcement structure of the Clinical Knowledge Exam.
Sophie Currier
Already has her Harvard doctorate and has followed that up with five years of medical training. The final barrier that is keeping her from having a hard-earned MD-Ph.D. is the aforementioned exam.
(Note: registration is required to read this Boston Globe article, but it is free and easy.)
To understand this case fully, you need to know that Currier is the mother of a still nursing, 7-week old daughter. According to the article linked above, “If she does not pump milk from her breasts every two or three hours, she could suffer blocked ducts, the discomfort of hard breasts, or an infection called mastitis.”
Currier is receiving accommodations for dyslexia and attention problems. This includes giving her double time for the nine-hour exam, letting her take the test over a two-day period. On the surface, this may appear to help ameliorate her problems, but it only doubled them, allowing her only the normally allowed break times each day.
She asked the board last week for extra break time to allow her to pump her breasts, but was denied. The board cited the Americans with Disabilities Act as their guide and told her that breastfeeding was not among the covered disabilities.
Yes, it is true that, under the ADA, pregnancy, lactation and related actions such as breast feeding and breast pumping are not covered by the law. However, what they are dealing with in this case are health concerns of the mother. Granted, the short time that she will be subjected to testing is not guaranteed to incur the possible adverse physical results that are possible. Still, there are health concerns that are not necessarily disabilities, no matter how temporary the condition is.
According to the article, “Forty-seven states have passed laws that protect nursing mothers, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Many protect the right of mothers to breast-feed in public, and some exempt them from jury duty, where breaks can be few and unpredictable.” Unfortunately for Currier, Massachusetts, where her case is playing out, has no such laws at this time.
It is interesting that one of Currier’s advocates, Dr. Ruth Lawrence, is a chairwoman on the American Academy of Pediatrics. Here, a medical professional is speaking on Currier’s behalf against the medical testing establishment. Ironic, isn’t it?
“Lawrence said the nursing mother of an infant that age should pump at a minimum of every three hours, for about one half-hour each time. The academy recommends that babies be exclusively breast-fed for the first six months .”
It is understandable that the exam board is trying to avoid setting a precedent, but they need to use the ADA as a guide, not a rigid rule that does not allow for gray areas such as this. A warden once had a sign hanging in his office that read, “When the rules and common sense collide, common sense shall prevail.” Currier’s case is one where common sense should be victorious.
Additional Reading:
Here is a 2006 Boston Globe article about Currier, illustrating how she manages her busy and demanding
life while dealing with dyslexia and ADHD.
Sophie Currier
Already has her Harvard doctorate and has followed that up with five years of medical training. The final barrier that is keeping her from having a hard-earned MD-Ph.D. is the aforementioned exam.
(Note: registration is required to read this Boston Globe article, but it is free and easy.)
To understand this case fully, you need to know that Currier is the mother of a still nursing, 7-week old daughter. According to the article linked above, “If she does not pump milk from her breasts every two or three hours, she could suffer blocked ducts, the discomfort of hard breasts, or an infection called mastitis.”
Currier is receiving accommodations for dyslexia and attention problems. This includes giving her double time for the nine-hour exam, letting her take the test over a two-day period. On the surface, this may appear to help ameliorate her problems, but it only doubled them, allowing her only the normally allowed break times each day.
She asked the board last week for extra break time to allow her to pump her breasts, but was denied. The board cited the Americans with Disabilities Act as their guide and told her that breastfeeding was not among the covered disabilities.
Yes, it is true that, under the ADA, pregnancy, lactation and related actions such as breast feeding and breast pumping are not covered by the law. However, what they are dealing with in this case are health concerns of the mother. Granted, the short time that she will be subjected to testing is not guaranteed to incur the possible adverse physical results that are possible. Still, there are health concerns that are not necessarily disabilities, no matter how temporary the condition is.
According to the article, “Forty-seven states have passed laws that protect nursing mothers, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Many protect the right of mothers to breast-feed in public, and some exempt them from jury duty, where breaks can be few and unpredictable.” Unfortunately for Currier, Massachusetts, where her case is playing out, has no such laws at this time.
It is interesting that one of Currier’s advocates, Dr. Ruth Lawrence, is a chairwoman on the American Academy of Pediatrics. Here, a medical professional is speaking on Currier’s behalf against the medical testing establishment. Ironic, isn’t it?
“Lawrence said the nursing mother of an infant that age should pump at a minimum of every three hours, for about one half-hour each time. The academy recommends that babies be exclusively breast-fed for the first six months .”
It is understandable that the exam board is trying to avoid setting a precedent, but they need to use the ADA as a guide, not a rigid rule that does not allow for gray areas such as this. A warden once had a sign hanging in his office that read, “When the rules and common sense collide, common sense shall prevail.” Currier’s case is one where common sense should be victorious.
Additional Reading:
Here is a 2006 Boston Globe article about Currier, illustrating how she manages her busy and demanding
life while dealing with dyslexia and ADHD.
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Landmark College,specifically serving students with learning disabilities and AD/HD
For a long time, I have only known of one postsecondary school dedicated to serving a distinct population of students with a particular disability—
Gallaudet University,
The reknowned liberal arts university serving deaf and hard of hearing students.
That all changed this past week, when I learned about
Landmark College,
In Putney, Vermont, which bills itself as, “The premier college for students with learning disabilities and AD/HD.”
According to the college’s “About” page:
“While many colleges offer special programs for students with learning difficulties, Landmark College is one of the only accredited colleges in the United States designed exclusively for students with dyslexia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (AD/HD), or other specific learning disabilities. “
“Why does Landmark's approach succeed? Because we take a different path. We teach the skills and strategies necessary for success in college and the workforce.”
In addition to the on-line databases, DVD and CD recordings, plus the more than 30,000 printed texts, the Landmark College library also boasts more than 550 course texts formatted for Kurzweil. The library also possesses a learning disability and AD/HD research collection chock full of books, videos, and journals, which the web site claims is one of the most extensive in the nation.
Take some time to check out the Landmark College web site linked above and explore the information on the various pages. (I especially like the informational resources one can glean from the library’s page.) Their web site should serve well as an additional resource for providing services to your LD and AD/HD students.
Gallaudet University,
The reknowned liberal arts university serving deaf and hard of hearing students.
That all changed this past week, when I learned about
Landmark College,
In Putney, Vermont, which bills itself as, “The premier college for students with learning disabilities and AD/HD.”
According to the college’s “About” page:
“While many colleges offer special programs for students with learning difficulties, Landmark College is one of the only accredited colleges in the United States designed exclusively for students with dyslexia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (AD/HD), or other specific learning disabilities. “
“Why does Landmark's approach succeed? Because we take a different path. We teach the skills and strategies necessary for success in college and the workforce.”
In addition to the on-line databases, DVD and CD recordings, plus the more than 30,000 printed texts, the Landmark College library also boasts more than 550 course texts formatted for Kurzweil. The library also possesses a learning disability and AD/HD research collection chock full of books, videos, and journals, which the web site claims is one of the most extensive in the nation.
Take some time to check out the Landmark College web site linked above and explore the information on the various pages. (I especially like the informational resources one can glean from the library’s page.) Their web site should serve well as an additional resource for providing services to your LD and AD/HD students.
Monday, April 02, 2007
New bar codes could offer assistive technology promise
An interesting advent in cell phone technology looms promisingly on the horizon for people with disabilities.
In this New York Times news article , read how
New bar codes can talk with your cell phone.
(The article includes a link for watching a demonstration of this software.)
According to the Times article:
“It sounds like something straight out of a futuristic film: House hunters, driving past a for-sale sign, stop and point their cellphone at the sign. With a click, their cellphone screen displays the asking price, the number of bedrooms and baths and lots of other details about the house. “
“Media experts say that cellphones, the Swiss Army knives of technology, are quickly heading in this direction. New technology, already in use in parts of Asia but still in development in the United States, allows the phones to connect everyday objects with the Internet.”
“In their new incarnation, cellphones become a sort of digital remote control, as one CBS executive put it. With a wave, the phone can read encoded information on everyday objects and translate that into videos, pictures or text files on its screen.”
So you wonder what this has to do with Access Ability and providing disability support services. Read on and allow me to explain.
The trick for making this venture work on a broad scope, of course, will be companies seeing value in incorporating this technology into their products. If enough companies do this, then the use of these new bar codes will spread. I’m predicting that this is a foregone conclusion and we will soon be seeing more and more of these bar codes. Remember, you read that here first!
That same thought about manufacturers finding value to make it worth their while goes for incorporating this feature into the field of assistive technology. They have to see the practical value in it.
Right off the top of my head, I can think of one aspect where a student buys the hard copy of a text book, uses her cell phone to gather the new bar code, and is instantly given the authorization for downloading the electronic version of the text. The accessible version can then be downloaded onto the phone and, with further innovation in cell phone technology, the book might also be read right there on the phone.
To ensure that it is actually a student with a disability who is accessing this material, this might be incorporated into a two-step process where, after entering the bar code from the book, the user is required to do the same with a publisher-issued identification card given to users of their accessible material.
This entire process can save much time for the publishers and, as time is money, the company can see profit by expediting the whole process of obtaining accessible material from a publisher. The student can also save time and have instant access to the material, an almost incomprehensible thought in many previous situations. Granted, it is a little pipe dreamy as we all know how tight the publishers hang onto their copyrighted material.
However, that proposed scenario is not too far off from being able to be realized today. There are a growing number of software applications that will run on cell phones, which already allow users to play audio files. The audio version of text material is great for some students with learning disabilities and the phone makes an ideal utilitarian tool. Additionally, two software models of screen readers already exist that allow blind people to access many features that appear on the visual display of many phones.
What is to prevent the actualization of making the cell phone progress even further, grabbing the informational leaps enabled by the new bar codes, complementing them with additional features that the assistive technology can make accessible to students with disabilities, and allowing a never before seen level of usability of information on a cell phone?
The only answer to that question may be limited thinking on behalf of the companies that have the technology and materials. If they do not think of the innovations like the one I proposed with the e-text authorization, then it is up to DSS professionals to share these ideas. If the tech companies won’t think outside of the mainstream box, we may have to pull them out.
In this New York Times news article , read how
New bar codes can talk with your cell phone.
(The article includes a link for watching a demonstration of this software.)
According to the Times article:
“It sounds like something straight out of a futuristic film: House hunters, driving past a for-sale sign, stop and point their cellphone at the sign. With a click, their cellphone screen displays the asking price, the number of bedrooms and baths and lots of other details about the house. “
“Media experts say that cellphones, the Swiss Army knives of technology, are quickly heading in this direction. New technology, already in use in parts of Asia but still in development in the United States, allows the phones to connect everyday objects with the Internet.”
“In their new incarnation, cellphones become a sort of digital remote control, as one CBS executive put it. With a wave, the phone can read encoded information on everyday objects and translate that into videos, pictures or text files on its screen.”
So you wonder what this has to do with Access Ability and providing disability support services. Read on and allow me to explain.
The trick for making this venture work on a broad scope, of course, will be companies seeing value in incorporating this technology into their products. If enough companies do this, then the use of these new bar codes will spread. I’m predicting that this is a foregone conclusion and we will soon be seeing more and more of these bar codes. Remember, you read that here first!
That same thought about manufacturers finding value to make it worth their while goes for incorporating this feature into the field of assistive technology. They have to see the practical value in it.
Right off the top of my head, I can think of one aspect where a student buys the hard copy of a text book, uses her cell phone to gather the new bar code, and is instantly given the authorization for downloading the electronic version of the text. The accessible version can then be downloaded onto the phone and, with further innovation in cell phone technology, the book might also be read right there on the phone.
To ensure that it is actually a student with a disability who is accessing this material, this might be incorporated into a two-step process where, after entering the bar code from the book, the user is required to do the same with a publisher-issued identification card given to users of their accessible material.
This entire process can save much time for the publishers and, as time is money, the company can see profit by expediting the whole process of obtaining accessible material from a publisher. The student can also save time and have instant access to the material, an almost incomprehensible thought in many previous situations. Granted, it is a little pipe dreamy as we all know how tight the publishers hang onto their copyrighted material.
However, that proposed scenario is not too far off from being able to be realized today. There are a growing number of software applications that will run on cell phones, which already allow users to play audio files. The audio version of text material is great for some students with learning disabilities and the phone makes an ideal utilitarian tool. Additionally, two software models of screen readers already exist that allow blind people to access many features that appear on the visual display of many phones.
What is to prevent the actualization of making the cell phone progress even further, grabbing the informational leaps enabled by the new bar codes, complementing them with additional features that the assistive technology can make accessible to students with disabilities, and allowing a never before seen level of usability of information on a cell phone?
The only answer to that question may be limited thinking on behalf of the companies that have the technology and materials. If they do not think of the innovations like the one I proposed with the e-text authorization, then it is up to DSS professionals to share these ideas. If the tech companies won’t think outside of the mainstream box, we may have to pull them out.
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