Treatment In School Age Children With ADHD In A School Setting

Importance of school-based interventions for children with ADHD

Treatment in school age children with ADHD in a school setting

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common neurological disorder which affects neurological development of children. With onset in childhood, the effect of ADHD persists in adulthood as well. However, if the school settings are equipped with facilities and interventions so that students with ADHD could be provided interventions or special education plan so that with the help of these psychosocial treatment, management of students could be obtained (Chacko et al., 2014). It is important that the school facilities provide the students with ADHD an Individualized Educational program or IEP so that each student and their learning abilities could be properly assessed and interventions as per their abilities could be applied (Van de Glind et al., 2013). This school based treatment will be helpful in bringing inclusion and confidence in students with ADHD and the confidence will develop in their day to day life so that their sense of mental wellbeing could be encouraged.

1. What is ADHD?
2. How can the “application of school based treatment” be beneficial to students with ADHD?
3. What are the other interventions which could be as beneficial as the proposed intervention for students with ADHD?
4. How this intervention could be applied in Los Angeles School District?
5. Which kind of situations could be handled by the application of this intervention in school facilities?
6. Can school based interventions be applied in school students in combination with Occupational therapy?

ADHD is a disorder associated to brains which is characterized by inattention and hyperactivity related impulsivity which generally interferes with the daily activities of daily life of the affected individual (Van de Glind et al., 2013). This disorder directly or indirectly affects the ability of the child to access the curriculum taught in the classroom than other children who are not affected with the disorder. Due to this children become unable to distracted to smaller incidences of classroom such as windows, posters present on wall, conversation between other kids, as well they are unable to sit still or faces difficulty in following instructions (Christakou et al., 2013). However, if the school based interventions along with occupational therapy is applied, it has been witnessed that students are able to enhance their attention ability, which not only enhances their education but also positively enhances their activities of daily life. In a research by Power et al. (2012), it is determined that school based interventions including parents of children is helpful in improving the ADHD associated condition as they named the intervention as Family School Success or FSS. Therefore, with application of these interventions it is possible to enrich the students with their enhanced intellectual ability and increases their ability of learning and ability to focus on interventions (Adamou et al., 2013).

ADHD is one of most common and widespread mental disorder which is very hard to diagnose and treat among children as the symptoms of this disorder are very common and could easily be misinterpreted in majority of the children. Due to this children who are actually affected with ADHD, suffer from several negative effects within the school facility as they are unable to understand the curriculum taught in the classroom due to their poor fine motor skills, poor organizational skills and several disruptive behavior (Power et al., 2012). Therefore, treatment within the school facility for children with ADHD holds tremendous significance as within school facility, as it has been witnessed that application of this within school facility is beneficial in improving the student’s ability to improve seatwork assignments, grades, improve organizational skills, relationship with their peers as well as teachers and so on. Further, it is also witnessed that application of occupational therapy with some other pharmacological and non-pharmacological interventions, it is beneficial in affecting the social environment of the student affected with ADHD as it increases their ability to perform their daily life related activities and boost their confidence to communicate with others (Chacko et al., 2014).

Benefits of individualized education plans

School is an important part of a student’s life as they spend a big section of their lifetime within those classrooms. Therefore, for children with ADHD, school facilities should be equipped with interventions so that children with ADHD could be treated within the facility. There are several interventions which could be applied in school settings such as self-regulation strategies, Home-school communication, providing academic support to the child, and behavioral classroom strategies. Further, to implement the interventions there are several core principles which should be clearly mentioned to the teachers of the schools. These are considering behavioral function, using multiple support for application of intervention such as teachers, nurses, occupational therapists, and maintaining a balanced treatment and education plan so that other students and their education could not hamper.  Further, all the teachers within the school facility should be provided with educational and training sessions so that while application of interventions they are able to perform their tasks with excellence and help children the ADHD affected children with the interventions. Further, the application of occupational therapy is an important aspect for children with ADHD as it benefits them to a wider range. As per Chacko et al. (2014), application of school based intervention with occupational therapy helps to reinforce the knowledge and ability within the patients affected with ADHD and increases their social ability, communication ability and ability to perform activities of daily life (Power et al., 2012).

In a study done by Van der Oord, Bögels and Peijnenburg (2012), the aim of the researchers was to conduct an 8 week long mindfulness training process involving patients with 8 to 12 years age and involving parents in the process. In the process parents are asked to fill a questionnaire which involved questions about their children’s ADHD and the parental stress they suffer from the health condition of their children. After the completion of the participation process, the children are measured on different scales such as Disruptive Behavior Disorder rating Scale (DBDRS), Parenting Stress Index (PSI), Parenting Scale (PS), Mindfulness Attention and Awareness Scale (MAAS) and the ADHD Rating Scale (ARS). After that they are provided with scores as per each scale so that the current state of ADHD in patients and rate of improvement could be assessed for each of the patients (Van der Oord, Bögels & Peijnenburg, 2012). This study sought to address the application of school based intervention with the help of parents and helped to address the issue of attention and focus in children affected with ADHD and also helps the researchers to identify factors which directly or indirectly influences the integration of the technology within the existing educational curriculum. Therefore, the research was able to determine the fact that school based interventions with the help of occupational harpy is beneficial for improving the ADHD disorder and increasing their focus in educational and social factors (Van der Oord, Bögels & Peijnenburg, 2012).

Although, application of school based interventions with occupational therapies are useful in improving school children’s ADHD condition, there are several negative implication or drawbacks of application of these interventions within the school facility. As majority of the schools are not equipped with services for such treatment, quick application of this intervention is not possible. Further, for application of this parents, teachers and helathcare professionals should be provided with educational and intervention related training so that benefit could be provided to the patients properly. Therefore, due to the lack of a proper compatible assistance within school facilities, the intervention is not feasible to be applied in the school facilities. However, due to the increased use of helathcare interventions, school based treatments are being supported by the local governments all over USA and it should be made sure that inclusion of treatment with educational strategies should be applied in the educational facilities so that the communication between them could be assisted.

References

Adamou, M., Arif, M., Asherson, P., Aw, T. C., Bolea, B., Coghill, D., … & Pitts, M. (2013). Occupational issues of adults with ADHD. BMC psychiatry, 13(1), 59.

Chacko, A., Bedard, A. C., Marks, D. J., Feirsen, N., Uderman, J. Z., Chimiklis, A., … & Ramon, M. (2014). A randomized clinical trial of Cogmed working memory training in school?age children with ADHD: A replication in a diverse sample using a control condition. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 55(3), 247-255.

Christakou, A., Murphy, C. M., Chantiluke, K., Cubillo, A. I., Smith, A. B., Giampietro, V., … & Rubia, K. (2013). Disorder-specific functional abnormalities during sustained attention in youth with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and with autism. Molecular psychiatry, 18(2), 236.

Power, T. J., Mautone, J. A., Soffer, S. L., Clarke, A. T., Marshall, S. A., Sharman, J., … & Jawad, A. F. (2012). A family–school intervention for children with ADHD: Results of a randomized clinical trial. Journal of consulting and clinical psychology, 80(4), 611.

Van de Glind, G., van den Brink, W., Koeter, M. W., Carpentier, P. J., van Emmerik-van Oortmerssen, K., Kaye, S., … & Moggi, F. (2013). Validity of the Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS) as a screener for adult ADHD in treatment seeking substance use disorder patients. Drug and alcohol dependence, 132(3), 587-596.

Van der Oord, S., Bögels, S. M., & Peijnenburg, D. (2012). The effectiveness of mindfulness training for children with ADHD and mindful parenting for their parents. Journal of child and family studies, 21(1), 139-147.