Week in Review - December 8, 2017

NASET

WEEK IN REVIEW

National Association of Special Education Teachers

December 8, 2017                     Vol 13 Issue #48



Dear NASET News,

Welcome to NASET'sWEEK in REVIEW.  Here, we provide you with the latest publications fromNASET to read and or download, as well as some of the most interesting articles that have happened this week in the field of special education. We hope you enjoy this publication.  Feel free to send us articles for this publication or let us know your thoughts about the WEEK in REVIEW at news@naset.org. Have a great weekend.

Sincerely,

NASET News Team
NEW THIS WEEK ON NASET
Inclusion Series
Learners with Autism Spectrum Disorders
In this issue of the Inclusion Series we provide a Video Lecture where you will learn about the:
  • Definition of Autism Spectrum Disorders
  • Prevalence
  • Causes
  • Educational Programming
To view this Video Lecture Click Here
Early Intervention Series
Part 8- Public Awareness and the Referral System

Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) requires that each State have a early intervention system that includes well-advertised processes for finding, referring, and (as appropriate) evaluating babies and toddlers suspected of having (or known to have) a developmental delay or disability. Having such a system includes:
  • Operating a public awareness program so that residents of the State know that early intervention services are available to help eligible infants and toddlers with developmental delays or disabilities; and
  • Providing a referral system by which children may be referred to the Part C system for evaluation.
The focus of this brief webpage is on both of these critical components in the State's early intervention system. Read More

Dyslexia: When Spelling Problems Impair Writing Acquisition
Dyslexia is a learning difficulty which affects the ability to adopt the automatic reflexes needed to read and write. Several studies have sought to identify the source of the problems encountered by individuals with dyslexia when they read. Little attention, however, has been paid to the mechanisms involved in writing. Sonia Kandel, Professor at the GIPSA-Lab of the Université Grenoble Alpes (CNRS/Université Grenoble Alpes/Grenoble INP) and her team1 decided to look at the purely motor aspects of writing in children diagnosed with dyslexia. Their results show that orthographic processing in children with dyslexia is so laborious that it can modify or impair writing skills, despite the absence of dysgraphia in these children. The findings of this study are published in the November 2017 edition of Cognitive Neuropsychology. As soon as a child starts school, it is essential that he or she learns how to write - a skill they are called upon to use constantly. Certain students, however, have trouble mastering this process. Many of these children suffer from dyslexia, and despite presenting no motor disorders, experience greater difficulties in writing than in reading. Read More

Autism and the Smell of Fear
Autism typically involves the inability to read social cues. We most often associate this with visual difficulty in interpreting facial expression, but new research at the Weizmann Institute of Science suggests that the sense of smell may also play a central role in autism. As reported in Nature Neuroscience, Weizmann Institute of Science researchers show that people on the autism spectrum have different -- and even opposite -- reactions to odors produced by the human body. These odors are ones that we are unaware of smelling, but which are, nonetheless, a part of the nonverbal communication that takes place between people, and which have been shown to affect our moods and behavior. Their findings may provide a unique window on autism, including, possibly, on the underlying developmental malfunctions in the disorder. Researchers in the lab of Prof. Noam Sobel in the Institute's Neurobiology Department investigate, among other things, the smells that announce such emotions as happiness, fear or aggression to others. Although this sense is not our primary sense, as it is in many other mammals, we still subliminally read and react to certain odors. For example "smelling fear," even if we cannot consciously detect its odor, is something we may do without thinking. Since this is a form of social communication, Sobel and members of his lab wondered whether it might be disrupted in a social disorder like autism. Read More
Trisomy 21: Research Breaks New Ground
Down's syndrome, also known as trisomy 21, is one of the most common genetic diseases. Researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and ETH Zurich (ETHZ), Switzerland, have recently analyzed the proteins of individuals with trisomy 21 for the first time: the goal was to improve our understanding of how a supernumerary copy of chromosome 21 could affect human development. Published in the journal Nature Communications, the research shows that trisomy 21, far from only affecting the proteins encoded by the chromosome 21 genes, also impacts on the proteins encoded by the genes located on the other chromosomes. In fact, the cells are overwhelmed by the protein surplus generated by the triplicated genes, and cannot regulate the amount of proteins. These results provide new insight into Down's syndrome and its symptoms based on the study of proteins, revealing the different outcomes of an excess of chromosome 21 on cell behavior. Read More
People with Disabilities More Likely to be Arrested
People with disabilities face all sorts of discrimination every day. New Cornell University research suggests they may also face it while interacting with the police. People with disabilities in the study -- including emotional, physical, cognitive or sensory disabilities -- were nearly 44 percent more likely to be arrested by age 28, while those without had a lower probability of arrest, at 30 percent. This "disability penalty" was strongest for African-American men. Black men with disabilities in the study were at a particularly high risk of arrest: 55 percent had been arrested by age 28. In contrast, 27.5 percent of whites in the study who had no disability had been arrested by that age.Read More
Reading Between the Lines in Children's Vocabulary Differences
The nation's 31 million children growing up in homes with low socioeconomic status have, on average, significantly smaller vocabularies compared with their peers. A new study from the Callier Center for Communication Disorders at The University of Texas at Dallas found these differences in vocabulary growth among grade school children of different socioeconomic statuses are likely related to differences in the process of word learning. Dr. Mandy Maguire, associate professor in the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences (BBS), said in her study that children from lower-income homes learned 10 percent fewer words than their peers from higher-income homes. When entering kindergarten, children from low-income homes generally score about two years behind their higher-income peers on language and vocabulary measures. Read More
Board Certification in Special Education Available to NASET Members
AASEP Logo
Through an agreement with The American Academy of Special Education Professionals(AASEP), NASET members now have the opportunity to achieve AASEP Board Certification in Special Education - (B.C.S.E.) at a reduced fee. AASEP Board Certification in Special Education - (B.C.S.E.) is a voluntary choice on the part of the candidate. The candidate for Board Certification wishes to demonstrate a commitment to excellence to employers, peers, administrators, other professionals, and parents. From the standpoint of the Academy, board certification will demonstrate the highest professional competency in the area of special education. Board Certification in Special Educationestablishes a much needed standard for professionals, across disciplines, who work with exceptional children.Read More
Individuals Born Premature Have Smaller Airways Causing Respiratory Problems
People born prematurely may have smaller airways than those born at full term, which can cause respiratory problems. That's according to research published in Experimental Physiology today. It is known that cardiovascular and respiratory system function is affected by premature birth, but the exact causes are still not completely known. Recent research suggests that the impaired lung (respiratory) function in those born prematurely could be due to smaller airways. The study looked at adults who were born prematurely (eight or more weeks early) and adults who were born at full term and the same age and height as those individuals in the premature group. The researchers measured the lung function of all participants at rest and during exercise. Using information from the resting lung function tests, they calculated an estimate of airway size for both premature and full term groups. The researchers found that the estimate of airway size was smaller in the premature group compared to the full term group. Read More
Why Autism Seems to Cluster in Some Immigrant Groups
Around 2 p.m. on a perfect summer afternoon in 2014, the clinicians arrived at Maki Gboro's home in Denver, Colorado, to test his 18-month-old son Baraka for autism. The family had only recently moved to the United States from the Democratic Republic of Congo: Gboro came first, in 2009. His wife Odile Nabunyi arrived in 2013 with their two sons. They later had a third child, but at the time, Baraka was the youngest. Gboro and Nabunyi sat on a sofa in the living room of their apartment and watched as the women from a community health clinic offered the toddler various objects. The women's goal was to observe how Baraka would play with the objects - standard protocol for an autism evaluation. But the protocol seemed geared toward a child with a typical American upbringing. There was a pretend birthday cake, but Baraka had not yet been to an American birthday party. They gave him a plastic bag of Cheerios, the popular American breakfast cereal, but a typical breakfast in the Congo - and in Gboro's household - is cheese, bread and milk, or sometimes porridge. And there was an African interpreter, too, but he spoke an unfamiliar French dialect and gave the boy instructions with words his parents never used. Sometimes, the clinicians spoke directly to Baraka in English, which he didn't understand at all. Read More

TRIVIA QUESTION OF THE WEEK
Congratulations to: Aurea Flesher, Elizabeth Ciccarelli-Rose, Melissa L. Davidson, Rena Root, Libby Kellogg, William Stolfi, Cindi Maurice, Patsy Ray, Tracey Christilles, Melody Owens, Olumide Akerele, Hillary Hollihan Leavitt, and Prahbhjot Malhi who all knew the answer to last week's trivia question.

QUESTION: According to Martin Luther King Jr., intelligence plus character is the goal of what? 

ANSWER:  TRUE EDUCATION
This week's question: Since 1975, how many times has the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (EHA) been reauthorized?
If you know the answer, email us at contactus@naset.org by December 11, 2017.  We will acknowledge your correct answer in the next edition of the Week in Review

Amputees Can Learn to Control a Robotic Arm with Their Minds
A new study by neuroscientists at the University of Chicago shows how amputees can learn to control a robotic arm through electrodes implanted in the brain. The research, published in Nature Communications, details changes that take place in both sides of the brain used to control the amputated limb and the remaining, intact limb. The results show both areas can create new connections to learn how to control the device, even several years after an amputation. "That's the novel aspect to this study, seeing that chronic, long-term amputees can learn to control a robotic limb," said Nicho Hatsopoulos, PhD, professor of organismal biology and anatomy at University of Chicago and senior author of the study. "But what was also interesting was the brain's plasticity over long-term exposure, and seeing what happened to the connectivity of the network as they learned to control the device." Read More
Asthma in Infant Boys May Eventually be Preventable
A new University of Alberta study shows that the family risk for asthma -- typically passed from moms to babies -- may not be a result of genetics alone: it may also involve the microbes found in a baby's digestive tract. AllerGen investigator and UAlberta microbiome epidemiologist Anita Kozyrskyj led a research team that found that Caucasian baby boys born to pregnant moms with asthma -- who are typically at the highest risk for developing asthma in early childhood -- were also one-third as likely to have a gut microbiome with specific characteristics at three to four months of age. "We saw a significant reduction in the family of microbes called Lactobacillus in Caucasian baby boys born to pregnant women who had asthma, and this was especially evident if the asthmatic mother had allergies or was overweight," said Kozyrskyj, senior author of the study and one of the world's leading researchers on the gut microbiome -- the community of microorganisms or bacteria that live in the digestive tracts of humans. Read more
Audit Finds Problems at Tennessee Department of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
A state audit of the Department of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities has found several areas where it says the department failed to meet its responsibilities and provide important services. The Tennessee comptroller's office released the sunset performance audit for the department responsible for administering services for Tennesseans with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The department listed 14 findings and nine observations of potential concerns since the last audit was conducted in 2013. Among the top concerns cited was the department's failure in 2016 to transfer critical information to TennCare about Tennesseans on a wait list for services, inadequate contact with individuals with aging caregivers, and improper development of support plans, timely background checks and other bookkeeping issues. Read More
The Link Between Parental Age and Autism, Explained
Older men and women are more likely than young ones to have a child with autism, according to multiple studies published in the past decade. Especially when it comes to fathers, this parental-age effect is one of the most consistent findings in the epidemiology of autism. The link between a mother's age and autism is more complex: Women seem to be at an increased risk both when they are much older and much younger than average, according to some studies. Nailing down why either parent's age influences autism risk has proved difficult, however. Read More
Technology and ADHD: The Nuances of the Modern Attention Span
The iPhone X came out earlier this month, marking 10 years since the release of the first iteration of Apple's ubiquitous device. Since the beginnings of smartphones, psychologists have been interested in studying the effects of technology on sleep, attention and stress. Some psychologists are finding that technology use may be giving users symptoms that resemble attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). "The more technology that we have, the more ADHD-like symptoms people can develop who are not ADHD," Seattle-based Adult ADHD Physician Dr. Angela Heithaus said. "Or, if you have ADHD, it can make the symptoms even worse." California-based clinical psychologist Dr. Lara Honos-Webb said that for those who won't be diagnosed with ADHD, her top two alternative explanations for lack of focus are sleep deprivation and technology.Read More
Low Vitamin D Levels at Birth Linked to Higher Autism Risk
Low vitamin D levels at birth were associated with an increased risk of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) at the age of 3 years in a recent Journal of Bone and Mineral Research study. In the study of 27,940 newborns in China, 310 were diagnosed with ASDs at 3 years of age, with a prevalence of 1.11 percent. When the 310 children with ASDs were compared with 1,240 control subjects, the risk of ASDs was significantly increased in each of the three lower quartiles of vitamin D level at birth, when compared with the highest quartile: an increased risk of ASDs by 260 percent in the lowest quartile, 150 percent in the second quartile, and 90 percent in the third quartile. Read More
Honor Society for Special Education Teachers
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Brain Impact of Youth Football: Brain Changes after One Season of Play
School-age football players with a history of concussion and high impact exposure undergo brain changes after one season of play, according to two new studies conducted at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas and Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem and presented today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA). Both studies analyzed the default mode network (DMN), a network of brain regions that is active during wakeful rest. Changes in the DMN are observed in patients with mental disorders. Decreased connectivity within the network is also associated with traumatic brain injury. "The DMN exists in the deep gray matter areas of the brain," explained Elizabeth M. Davenport, Ph.D., a postdoctoral researcher in the Advanced NeuroScience Imaging Research (ANSIR) lab at UT Southwestern's O'Donnell Brain Institute. "It includes structures that activate when we are awake and engaging in introspection or processing emotions, which are activities that are important for brain health." Read More
jobs
LATEST JOB LISTINGS POSTED ON NASET
* Special Education Teacher - Meeting Street Schools (MSS) is a groundbreaking initiative dedicated to the creation of a new mandate for education in South Carolina and beyond. MSS was founded upon the belief that all children deserve an excellent education regardless of their geographic or socioeconomic circumstances, and all children have the ability to excel in the classroom. To learn more - Click here

* Private Teacher - Are you an unencumbered teacher at a top public or private school looking for a new opportunity? Do you want to step out of the classroom and use your experience to support the academic journey of a young teen with a promising future? If so, we have an excellent Private Teacher opportunity to oversee the overall curriculum, education, and college preparation for a young teen's high school career. You will assist this bright adolescent in all subject matters, in addition to helping formulate strategies and taking the time to help the student manage their language based learning disability. - Click here

* Special Education Teacher - The Adolescent Care Unit (ACU) at Tséhootsooí Medical Center on the Navajo Nation seeks a Special Education Teacher to work with 8 to 10 teens aged 13-17 with mild emotional or behavior issues in a subacute 60-day inpatient program. ACU combines western therapy with Native American traditional cultural methods to foster health and Hozho or harmony, and is located in northeastern AZ. To learn more - Click here
* Early Childhood Special Education Teacher - This private special education school services students with language, learning, sensory motor disabilities, and moderate to high functioning Autism. This special education teacher position is for an early education classroom. To learn more - Click here

* Licensed Special Education Teacher - Think is a multidisciplinary center offering services to children in Bahrain who have developmental and behavior disorders. We are a dynamic center with in-clinic and outreach programs, supervisors, leads and primary therapists in addition to SLT and OT services. We have a beautiful, custom facility that accommodates over 20 clinical staff. To learn more - Click here

* Special Education Teacher - JCFS is currently seeking a Special Education Teacher to work with individuals and small groups of children (K - 12) with emotional and behavior disorders in a therapeutic special education classroom. The Therapeutic Day School is located in West Rogers Park, Chicago, IL. To learn more - Click here

* Special Education Teacher - Various Positions Open: 2 positions for Special Education Resource 5th - 8th, Special Education Resource K-3rd, SPED - Social Skills le-4th, SPED - Social Skills 6th - 8th, Arizona certification required. To learn more - Click here
* Lead ED Special Education Teacher - The Lead Special Education Teacher for Cornerstone is an integral member of the academics team whose focus is to guide students in their social-emotional and academic development. To learn more -Click here
If you are an Employer looking for excellent special education staff - Click here for more information
Food For Thought..........
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.       
Frederick Douglass


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