Bergerie Caroline

There is a great deal of evidence from animal experimentation that for instance, rodents who are exposed to generally stimulating environments such as mazes, etc. experience better brain growth than those who are not exposed to such environments. These findings have been mirrored in human societies with children who have been exposed to impoverished, understimulating environments having smaller, more underdeveloped brains than children who have experienced more stimulating environments, who in turn have larger, better developed brains with more connections between neurons.

Now by default, brain injured children, such as those suffering from say, cerebral palsy, have smaller, less well developed brains with less connections than their uninjured peers. This is because their brain injuries prevent them from interacting with and taking advantage of their developmental environment. However, if we could somehow ensure that they did receive enriched environmental stimulation, then we know from the previously mentioned studies that there would be an excellent chance that their brains would respond to that environment by changing its structure and functioning, ie, by brain cells forming new connections. We know that this process or brain plasticity, known as ‘Long Term Potentiation’ takes place in all of us, so why should children who have suffered brain injury be any different? The answer is that of course they aren’t!

In the area of learning disabilities, we often need to concentrate upon developing working memory. Working memory is vital to learning and in young children, has been demonstrated to predict future academic success. When working memory is poor, it makes it difficult for children to recall the instructions given by parents or teacher, therefore making tasks difficult if not nearly impossible for them to complete. The effect of this is failure both at school and in daily life, causing lack of motivation, which further compounds an already dire situation. Children with cerebral palsy, autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia and many more, all demonstrate poor working memory function

Fortunately, we can now address many learning difficulties by giving children appropriate training in the use of working memory and consequently encourage brain plasticity and rewiring. Many researchers have proven this to be true, most notably the Max Plank Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tubingen who have succeeded in demonstrating for the first time that the activities of large parts of the brain can be altered in the long term. The scientists were able to trace how large populations of brain cells in the human forebrain are able to reorganise and change their connections to other brain cells as a consequence of environmental stimulation. (Current Biology, March 10th, 2009)

What we do at Snowdrop, when we see a child with brain injuries, is to design a set of sensory, physical and intellectual tasks designed to gradually strengthen the child’s abilities. The tasks are necessarily repetitive and demand the child’s attention. This is done for several hours per week, but we do see some huge improvements. All we are doing is providing an enriched environment designed to retrain the brain of the child with brain injuries, – an environment which will encourage the plasticity and the neural rewiring that we know occurs not only in lower mammals, but in human beings too.

Research has shown that Snowdrop’s approach is correct. If we train our brains we stimulate them to grow and change. By training the functions we seek to strengthen in brain injured children, they should eventually become more and more capable in those areas.

Anyone interested in more information on Snowdrop’s programmes should email info@snowdrop.cc

 

 

Historically society has overlooked the sexual needs of those with impairments. The topic is either completely ignored or brushed aside as being irrelevant as disabled people have been considered to be almost non-sexual. However, the sexual needs of the disabled are very much a reality and there is an urgent need to address them in todays world.

Physically, the nature of the impairment itself determines how sexually active the person can be. Many impairments affect men more than women. With sexual arousal and libido being affected negatively, impotence is a common complaint. Women, on the other hand, may find their fertility completely unaffected by their disability.

The mental effects of the disability however are far reaching. Every culture has always had standards pertaining to how men and women should look and behave to be considered beautiful and attractive. These images almost always strongly stress a certain appearance and way of dressing.

People with disabilities often do not fit into this mould. This leads many to consider themselves ugly or unattractive because of their impairment. For those who have suffered the impairment later in their lives, feelings of inadequacy in comparison to the past are common.

Persons with disabilities, whether mental and/or physical, often question their sexual desirability. Performance, sexual positions and enjoyment of the act itself are issues of common concern. It is also natural to wonder about whether they can maintain a long term relationship and have children. These feelings of inadequacy make it difficult for impaired persons to express themselves sexually and thus impair their functioning further.

Today society has woken up to the fact that the issue of sexuality and disability needs to be addressed in a positive manner. It has acknowledged that creating awareness and providing more information on the issue will lead to a better understanding of the needs of the disabled and this will benefit society in general.

Various organisations and bodies have taken steps to ease the problems being faced by the disabled. Resource books addressing concerns like fertility and sustenance of long term relationships have been published to provide support and advice.

The numbers of disabled dating sites are also increasing rapidly. These offer dating services and tips as well as information and advice. Further, adult chat rooms allow patrons to interact with others. Some sites also document the experiences of those who live with disabilities, both their own as well as that of a loved one.

By aiming their services both at persons with various disability types as well as those who are interested in dating disabled persons, the disabled dating websites are helping disabled singles connect with potential partners.

Further they are also spreading awareness about issues that were hitherto not spoken about openly. All these efforts are contributing towards the creation of a more tolerant and understanding society.

Life has its own shades. Some are born with silver spoons in the mouth while some others work very hard all through their life, to make even the simplest of living. And there are still others, who are born to live with both the shades of life, mostly the latter part. Such are the people who are born with learning disability- Dyscalculia.

People living with dyscalculia disability have very strong language skills and their vocabulary is many a times better than the normal people. They are very creative and can excel in the field of science and geometry. And their logic base is quite strong. But their excellence simply slides off when it comes to handle formula based equations.

They find difficulty in performing calculations, counting efficiently, or for that matter, performing whole of mathematical calculations. But this does not mean that they are mentally retarded. A person who is suffering from the disability disorder like dyscalculia with no doubts has normal intelligence levels.

Well, dyscalculia is not a very common form of disability. It is termed as “disease of the absent-minded.” Recent Studies have shown that dyscalculia has gentical links. Therefore, many of the theories that were put worth in explaining the true cause of this disability have been held void. Thus, there are chances that if a father or mother is suffering from dyscalculia, then the progeny might also get afflicted. Scientists are working harder in the direction of finding out the causes or the adverse chemical reactions that occur in the genes, leading to this disability.

There are several symptoms that confirm the presence of dyscalculia. The most visible and common one is poor affliction to mathematical calculations. A person suffering from dyscalculia will generally have difficulty in distinguishing the four common mathematical signs: addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. This puts them in a difficulty to balance equations. Also they are unable to differentiate between larger and smaller numbers. For them, all numbers, say, 1, 5 or 8, are similar, carrying the same value.

Besides this, dyscalculia-afflicted people are predominantly absent-minded people. As a result of which they are unable to keep a track of any work or activity that involves sequences or use of active memory. For instance, such a person will find it difficult to remember the sequences of a dance set up. They are also unable to recall the events that have happened in the past because of short memory. They are also poor in remembering the rules of any game.

But the world is not finished here. A child with dyscalculia needs proper training and assistance to overcome the disability. The parents as well as teachers need to make efforts in the right direction. Help child by making him use fingers, colored papers, diagrams, graph papers, colored pencils to differentiate the mathematical problems. Draw pictures or flowcharts to explain the concepts and problem sums. Apart from these, you can use several other methods to train the child.