How Science is Attacking Learning Disabilities

 

            Scientists are closing in on the causes of learning disabilities with experiments that are revealing practical steps that we can take to help more kids learn better.

 

            In the olden days, parents criticized kids who were struggling in school as being "lazy" or "stupid." Brain research is showing now that far and away the more common causes for school failure or difficulty are 'way out of the child's control.

 

            Examples: physical differences in the brain . . . nurturance issues in early childhood . . . variance in levels of emotional development . . . and differences in the mental pathways between the hearing centers and thinking centers of the brain.

 

            See a report on what's going on around the country in brain research:

 

            http://www.readingrockets.org/pressrelease/9847

 

            Also note that new research indicates that about one-third of attention deficit cases among American children may be linked to tobacco smoke they may have ingested through their mothers before birth, or lead exposure afterward.

 

            Environmental causes of learning disabilities were the focus of the study's authors, led by Joe Braun of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. ADHD is a brain disorder affecting between 4 percent and 12 percent of school-age children -- or as many as 3.8 million youngsters.