Good points Linda - My daughter is dyslexic teenager, not ADHD, but a lot of what you say applies to her situation as well.

Narrow definition of disability limits the assistance available to teachers.

Large class sizes can result in undemocratic and punitive discipline systems.

Some teachers and administrations aren't fully aware of the Disabilites Discrimination Act 2005.

Educators are not fully telling parents about all the avenues of help available to them.

Ms. Graham,

I am to assume that it is not parents who are responsible for their children being on stimulate drugs, but rather teachers who refer the parents to Pediatricians and Psychiatrists. I gather I am to understand that teachers do this as they “are forced into a funding play-off”.

I so we plow more money into the education system and all is solved. Medication. Wonderful. Children now know their school work, have no social problems, who’s peers love to play with them, are organized, have a good sense of time, are no longer impulsive, with wonderful working memories, short term and long term memories are up to scratch, who can inhibit; their speech, their actions, their impatience. Good on these teachers, they have now cured ADHD. If only it was that simple.

See Dr. Russell Barkley’s lecture, San Francisco on 17 June 2000. In this lecture Dr. Barkley mentions that the US plowed millions into special education for those with ADHD with very little effect.

All children went to school in 1945!

Doctors in Australia have been well behind the times,finally some of them are getting educated in ADHD. Parents are better informed

Oh, I hope that you will publish your findings. Your interviews, with teachers, parents, children,pediatricians. How many did you interview? What were your methods? What materials did you refer too? Etc.

Take charge of a class of 3, three should be enough, 10 year old boys with ADHD (combined) who are not on medication. Let me know your opinion after a month of teaching them.

You have insulted teachers, parents and doctors. You say teachers want their pupils drugged, parents and doctors DO AS TEACHERS tell them! I don’t believe that? Your research is from the US. Not Australia. And not properly reported.

Now if YOU want to find a better way than medication then get into genetic research, there you will find the answer.

Do you believe in depression? Do you believe in any mental illness? Where does that $10,000 come from which you have received as a grant? Who put the money up?

jennywren

Ms. Graham,

I have just posted within the constriction of 350 words. A very difficult feat for an ADHD combined person. If as you state education is the answer to ADHD. What is your answer for a 66 year old female and a 38 year old male, still with the DSM symptoms of ADHD? I would really like, as would the 38 year old male, a solution to our life long disability.

Your assitance would be most appreciated indeed. Please help us. What do we do? You have the answers so please tell us. I am sure there are other readers who would be interested as well.

Can't wait for you kind assistance,

Jennywren

You're absolutely right Cornflower - boys are overrepresented in ADHD diagnosis: ie. between 1988 and 1998 the number of boys diagnosed with a mental and behavioural condition increased from 2,200 to 20,800. Then, research into disability and severe restrictions rates from the ABS also shows that the sheer number of young boys diagnosed with ADHD contributes to a peak in that rate at age 5, levelling off at age 15. This, as the authors of the report confirm, correlates with compulsory schooling ages.

Do we really have an gender specific epidemic on our hands? I think not. Do we have a generation of young people growing up with the belief that there is something "wrong" with them? Unfortunately, yes. Research shows that children internalise an ADHD diagnosis with a belief that they are somehow defective and need drugs to be "normal". My argument is simple: So, there are children who are fidgety, distractible, impulsive and so on... the problem is not that such difference exists - but instead what we do about it and, ultimately, whose interests this serves.

Good teachers can reach these children through innovative pedagogies and stimulating curricula. I am suggesting we give them the support and space to get on with it.

Well done, Linda.

I badger teachers a great deal about opening up their hearts and minds to kids who won't sit still and keep quiet.
The great majority (not all) are indeed boys.

Boys are overwhelmingly represented in exclusions, suspensions and similar bad results.
US educators are just waking up to the over-medicalisation of the problem?? of kids who have too much energy for those poor weary teachers. And to the hard fact that many boys are being pushed aside by the education system in the race to get ahead. Most at risk are working-class boys and dark-skinned boys who scare teachers, who then too quickly blame, shame label and punish them.

Unfortunately so-called problem kids get lost in the complexity of Departmental memos, Sydney-Hobart-Canberra squabbles and so on.

This is a great discussion and highly important to parents.

Bravo

Thanks for the article Linda.

I agree with you and a number of other posters who point to the changing nature of society, changes to the education system, less time spent with kids by the parents, even poor nutrition.

My brother had ADHD and was prescribed meds (can't remember which sort, they're the ones which are basically a milder form of speed) to help him out. My brother said that the meds helped him concentrate at school, but he just didn't feel himself when on them. When he was about 16, he took about a dozen of them. He wrote a kick-ass song that night, but he wasted much of his teenage years and early twenties smoking far too much weed. (He's been clean for a year and a half now, which is fantastic. I finally have my brother back.)

Sorry for the little testimonial there Linda. But there are some interesting points I don't know the answer to. Is there a correlation between taking of ADHD meds and use of illicit drugs? The risk factors for ADHD seem to be fairly similar to those for drug use.

There was one hell of a lot of tension in our family as we grew up. What do you think of Rommel's comment, suggesting that bad parenting is a problem? I've noticed among some of my friends’ kids, that the less attention given, the worse the brat.

General question- My mum reckons I show symptoms of ADHD too, and occasionally point to various people as exhibiting ADHD symptoms. Do people get the impression there is a tendency to try and share the problem around- a bit of transference going on? (grobble toodylooo poo wee... oops, that was my ADHD talking.) I've never really paid much attention to it- it was a conscious decision not to fall for the effect Linda talks about- internalizing the idea that there is something wrong with you.