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Kindergarten Redshirting: Implications for Children with Disabilities

SANDS, Michelle M
MONDA-AMAYA, Lisa
MEADAN, Hedda
2021

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The purpose of this paper is to explore issues and concerns related to academic redshirting in kindergarten and to discuss implications of this practice for children with disabilities. Although parents cite a variety of reasons for redshirting their child, only limited evidence of academic or social benefit can be found. A search was conducted to identify studies relevant to academic redshirting and inclusive of children with disabilities published within the past 20 years, and 17 articles were identified related to the topic. From these articles, three central topics emerged: (a) prevalence, predictors, or parent motivations for kindergarten redshirting, (b) the impact of redshirting on academic achievement and post-secondary outcomes, and (c) the impact of this practice on a child’s behavior. While assumptions can be made based on the research conducted using a general education population, the impact of kindergarten redshirting on the success of children with disabilities is unclear due to the limited amount of research that currently exists. Implications for children with disabilities are discussed.

“It’s not a simple answer.” A qualitative studyto explore how healthcare providers can bestsupport families with a child with autism spectrumdisorder and overweight or obesity

MCPHERSON, Amy C
PEREZ, Arnaldo
BUCHHOLZ, Annick
FORHAN, Mary
BALL, Geoff D C
January 2021

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Purpose: This qualitative study aimed to explore the experiences of parents supporting their child with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and overweight or obesity (OW/OB), including their weight management support needs.

 

Methods: Interview transcripts were analysed using inductive thematic analysis. Nine parents (n = 9 mothers) of ten children with ASD (7 males, 3 females) participated in individual semi-structured interviews.

 

Results: The three themes developed were: (1) Our journey to obtain weight management support; (2) I need real-world solutions; and (3) The what, who and how of our weight management needs. Parents reported being proactive in seeking weight management support for their child but were disappointed with the services offered. Resources were not tailored to the child’s complex nutrition and behavioural issues or their abilities and functioning. A multidisciplinary approach that integrated both disability and weight management expertise was desired, but not experienced. A range of formal and informal programs were recommended.

 

Conclusion: This study provides a call to action for supports that ensure children with ASD and OW/OB receive integrated, individualised support to maximise their health and wellness.

Enhancing Function, Fun and Participation with Assistive Devices, Adaptive Positioning, and Augmented Mobility for Young Children with Infantile-Onset Spinal Muscular Atrophy: A Scoping Review and Illustrative Case Report

LIVINGSTONE, Roslyn
PALEG, Ginny
2021

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Recent advances in medical interventions have changed the prognosis for children with infantile-onset spinal muscular atrophy (SMA-1); however, little has been published regarding rehabilitation management. A rapid scoping review was conducted in November 2020 using Medline and CINAHL databases. Evidence supporting use of assistive devices and equipment to enhance participation, mobility, function, and posture in lying, sitting, and standing positions was sought. From 239 articles, only five studies (describing use of augmentative communication, manual and power mobility, supported standing and orthotic devices) met inclusion criteria. Results are presented alongside a case report of a 5-year-old boy (treated with Nusinersen since 7 months-of-age) who uses a variety of devices to enhance his activity and participation in family life. While reclined and tilted sitting positions as well as power mobility were previously considered for children with SMA-1, this child has progressed to supported upright standing, self-propelling a lightweight manual wheelchair indoors, communicating using multiple methods and taking steps in a dynamic mobility device. Power mobility was introduced in a switch-adapted cart at 11 months and he was independently exploring indoors and outside in his power wheelchair before 20 months. Research evidence is limited, but alongside the case report highlights the importance of a comprehensive and proactive approach to enhancing function, fun and participation with family and friends through adaptive equipment for children with significant and life-limiting disabilities.

Crimes against humanity: Decades of violence and abuse in Mexican institutions for children and adults with disabilities

AHERN, Laurie
BRIZUELA, Lisbet
MILLAN, Ivonne
RODRIGUEZ, Priscila
ROSENTHAL, Eric
October 2020

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In this report, Disability Rights International (DRI) has thoroughly documented and detailed human rights violations against people with disabilities - a culmination of the 20 years of work that DRI has carried out in Mexico. DRI’s investigations cover a wide range of institutions including orphanages, psychiatric hospitals, institutions for people with disabilities and for homeless people, among others. The documentation of such a large number of institutions provides an overview of a scale of violations of the rights of persons with disabilities in Mexico  

Global education monitoring report, 2020, Latin America and the Caribbean: inclusion and education: all means all

GLOBAL EDUCATION MONITORING REPORT TEAM
LABORATORY OF EDUCATION RESEARCH AND INNOVATION FOR LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN (SUMMA)
UNESCO OFFICE SANTIAGO AND REGIONAL BUREAU FOR EDUCATION IN LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN (OREALC/UNESCO)
2020

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This regional report on inclusion and education in Latin America and the Caribbean offers a deep dive into the core challenges and key solutions for greater inclusion, in a region characterized for having the largest and most challenging socio-economic inequalities in the world.

In the framework of this report, 29 in-depth case studies from the region covering 8 dimensions of exclusion were prepared. The Report covers access to education of Venezuelan migrants in Colombia and Haitians in Dominican Republic; remoteness in Suriname and Brazil; disability in Nicaragua; girls in Peru and boys in Jamaica; sexual orientation in Mexico and Chile; and youth incarceration in Uruguay. It also explores how the Covid-19 pandemic has further exposed and deepened the disparities that already existed in education.

Chapter 2 analyses the role of legal tools in supporting the development of inclusive education. Chapter 3 addresses governance and finance. Chapter 4 discusses the politically complicated issue of how curricula and learning materials are adapted to the principles of inclusive education. Chapter 5 looks at ways teachers can support the case for inclusion, considers their needs, and examines how well governments help them prepare to meet the inclusion challenge.  Chapter 6 examines school-level factors. Chapter 7 examines communities’ crucial role in achieving inclusive education. After these chapters addressing the main inclusion challenges, Chapter 8 looks at them all through the lens of COVID-19. 

A grounded theory of parents’ attendance, participation and engagement in children’s developmental rehabilitation services: Part 2. The journey to child health and happiness

PHOENIX, Michelle
JACK, Susan M
ROSENBAUM, Peter L
MISSIUNA, Cheryl
January 2019

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Purpose: Parents’ attendance, participation and engagement are thought to be critical components of children’s rehabilitation services; however, these elements of therapy are typically under-investigated. The purpose of this study was to develop a substantive theory of parents’ attendance, participation and engagement in children’s rehabilitation services.

 

Methods: A constructivist grounded theory study was conducted. Data collection included interviews with parents (n = 20) and clinicians (n = 4), policies regarding discharge, and child-health records. Data was analyzed using constant comparison, coding and memoing. To promote credibility, authors engaged in reflexivity, peer debriefing, member checking, triangulation and recorded an audit trail.

 

Results and conclusions: The Phoenix Theory of Attendance, Participation and Engagement was developed. This theory is described metaphorically as a journey to child health and happiness that has six components including: parent’s feelings, skills, knowledge, logistics, values and beliefs and parent’s relationship with the professional. The child, parent, service provider, and organizational factors that impact engagement are described. Service providers, policy makers, organizational leaders and researchers can use this information to promote engagement in children’s developmental rehabilitation services.

Teachers’ Perceptions of Disabilities on the Island of Roatán, Honduras

SCHNEIDER, Cornelia
2017

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Purpose: Roatán, a small island in Honduras, is home to six ethnic groups. Due to financial constraints, many children have limited access to schooling. This article is a study on teachers’ perceptions of disabilities and students with disabilities and inclusive education on the island.

 

Method: Twenty seven teachers working in public and private schools, and schools funded by the World Bank, were interviewed in March-April of 2014 in order to explore cultural and social representations of disabilities on the island.

 

Results: The findings show that many of the teachers’ representations can be analysed under the lens of different models of disability - the medical model, the social model, and a religious-moral model. Inclusive education is perceived less as a means of including children with disabilities in the regular classroom, and more as a method of creating institutions to take care of their needs.

 

Conclusion: There is a strong intersection of poverty, post-colonialism and disability which makes working under an inclusive lens very difficult for teachers. The cultural norms influence ideas of normalcy and disabilities, and the blame is on parents for having children with disabilities.

Association between Zika virus infection and microcephaly in Brazil, January to May, 2016: preliminary report of a case-control study

DE ARAUJO, Thalia Velho Barreto
et al
December 2016

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The microcephaly epidemic, which started in Brazil in 2015, was declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern by WHO in 2016. Preliminary results of a case-control study investigating the association between microcephaly and Zika virus infection during pregnancy are reported. A case-control study was carried out in eight public hospitals in Recife, Brazil. Cases were neonates with microcephaly. Two controls (neonates without microcephaly), matched by expected date of delivery and area of residence, were selected for each case.

The Lancet Infectious Diseases,  Vol. 16, No. 12, pp. 1356–1363, Dec 2016

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S1473-3099(16)30318-8

Visual health screening by schoolteachers in remote communities of Peru : implementation research.

LATORE-ARTEARRGA, Sergio
et al
September 2016

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An assessment was carried out of the adaptation and scaling-up of an intervention to improve the visual health of children by training teachers in screening in the Apurimac region, Peru. In a pilot screening programme in 2009–2010, 26 schoolteachers were trained to detect and refer visual acuity problems in schoolchildren in one district in Apurimac. To scale-up the intervention, lessons learnt from the pilot were used to design strategies for: (i) strengthening multisector partnerships; (ii) promoting the engagement and participation of teachers and (iii) increasing children’s attendance at referral eye clinics. Implementation began in February 2015 in two out of eight provinces of Apurimac, including hard-to-reach communities. An observational study of the processes and outcomes of adapting and scaling-up the intervention was made. Qualitative and quantitative analyses were made of data collected from March 2015 to January 2016 from programme documents, routine reports and structured evaluation questionnaires completed by teachers. Partnerships were expanded after sharing the results of the pilot phase. Training was completed by 355 teachers and directors in both provinces, belonging to 315 schools distributed in 24 districts. Teachers’ appraisal of the training achieved high positive scores. Outreach eye clinics and subsidies for glasses were provided for poorer families. 

 

Bulletin of the World Health Organization, Volume 94, Number 9, September 2016, 633-708

http://dx.doi.org/10.2471/BLT.15.163634

Enabling education review, issue 4

ENABLING EDUCATION NETWORK
December 2015

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This newsletter contains a variety of articles about inclusive education in several countries around the world. The topics focus mostly on funding, managing and sustaining inclusive education; engaging and empowering beneficiaries in finding solutions; facilitating parental and child involvement and early childhood education

Enabling Education Review, issue 4

Guardianship for young adults with disabilities as a violation of the purpose of the individuals with disabilities education improvement act

KANTER, Arlene S
2015

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“The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEIA) was originally enacted in 1975 as the Education for All Handicapped Children’s Act. The purpose of the IDEIA is to “provide a free appropriate public education” to children with disabilities and to prepare them for further education, employment, and full participation in society. Under the IDEIA, all students are required to have a transition plan to facilitate their movement from high school to life after school. Although the transition planning process does not require parents to become guardians for their children with disabilities, many parents throughout the United States believe that becoming their adult child’s guardian is the next step in the transition process as their child reaches the age of majority. As a legal procedure, guardianship cedes decision-making authority from the young adult child to the parent just at the time in the young person’s life when he or she should be supported to exercise decision-making authority so as to live the most independent life possible. Further, schools, parents, and courts often fail to consider less restrictive alternatives to guardianship, such as supported decision-making, for those young adults who may need help in decision-making. Supported decision making has gained international attention recently due to the adoption of the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities, which calls for support for people with disabilities rather than substituted decision-making, which is included in most guardianship laws. This article presents the view that guardianship as part of the transition planning process for young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities undermines the language and purpose of the IDEIA.”

 

Journal of International Aging Law & Policy, Vol. 8

Using Postcolonial Perspectives to Consider Rehabilitation with Children with Disabilities: The Bamenda-Toronto Dialogue

NIXON, Stephanie A
COCKBURN, Lynn
ACHEINEGEH, Ruth
BRADLEY, Kim
CAMERON, Debra
MUE, Peter N
SAMUEL, Nyingcho
GIBSON, Barbara E
2015

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This article discusses tensions in children’s rehabilitation that came to light through a series of ‘postcolonial dialogues’ amongst Canadian and Cameroonian participants. We defined ‘tensions’ as conflicts, contrasting ways of seeing things, and/or taken-forgranted ideas that shape issues related to rehabilitation for children with disabilities. These tensions were identified, articulated, and deconstructed through an iterative, multi-phase dialogue among eight individuals who identify as people with disabilities, rehabilitation providers, and/or rehabilitation researchers in Cameroon and Canada. The tensions discussed in this article problematize conceptualizations of disability and of client-centred care, the role of pain as a reinforcement tool in rehabilitation, and assumptions about poverty and religion in the context of rehabilitation practice. We present this synthesis to achieve several aims: (1) to provide multiple ways for rehabilitation providers and others to better understand these particular substantive issues; (2) to model the use of a critical lens as an approach for thinking about rehabilitation that promotes reflective and deliberate practice and that can be applied across contexts; and, (3) to promote dialogue about postcolonial and other critical perspectives on rehabilitation with children and with other groups.

 

Disability and the Global South (DGS), 2015, Vol. 2 No. 2

For Michael Charlie: Including girls and boys with disabilities in the global South/North

STIENSTRA, Deborah
2015

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Recognizing that there are pockets of the global South in the global North, I illustrate in this paper how Indigenous and northern children with disabilities and their relationships with their care providers have been rendered invisible and excluded by jurisdictional disputes between levels of government, an ongoing drive to institutionalize children with disabilities and longstanding colonial and capitalist values and systems. The paper highlights how Jordan’s Principle, an Indigenous childfirst response offers a small first step in ensuring children with disabilities in Indigenous and northern communities in Canada, access to necessary services in their communities.

 

Disability and the Global South (DGS), 2015, Vol. 2 No. 2

Quantitative Exploratory Evaluation of the Frequency, Causes and Consequences of Rehabilitation Wheelchair Breakdowns delivered at a Paediatric Clinic in Mexico

TORO, M L
GARCIA, Y
OJEDA, A M
DAUSEY, D J
PEARLMAN, J
2012

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Purpose: The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities recognises assistive technology such as wheelchairs (WCs) as a tool for social inclusion for this population. In less resourced settings, organisations lack information about effective models of WC service provision. The goal of this study was to investigate the lifespan of WCs and whether they provided reliable mobility, at one clinic in Mexico.

 

Methods: Caregivers of children, who had requested replacements for their WCs from a clinic in Mexico, were interviewed in Spanish. Among others, the questions pertained to repairs/modifications, adverse events and WC usage characteristics. The owners exchanged their WCs for new ones at the clinic, and the maintenance status of each returned WC was evaluated using the WC Assessment Checklist (WAC).

 

Results: Twenty-three donated WCs, used by children aged 3 to 14 years for an average of 19 months, were evaluated. Brakes (n=18), seat and back-sling upholstery (n=11 and 7 respectively), and armrests (n=14) were the components that failed most frequently. A total of 26 adverse events due to WC failure were reported. Adverse events were significantly associated with poor WAC scores (rs=-0.544, p=0.007).

 

Conclusions: Poor WC reliability, associated with adverse events which could undermine social engagement, indicates the need for a stronger WC and for regular maintenance. For instance, brake failures which were most often associated with adjustment issues, could have been resolved with maintenance, while seat and back-sling upholstery and armrest failures suggest that the WC may not be appropriate for the environment. Future work should investigate the robustness of these WCs using standardised methods (ISO 7176), as well as the impact of maintenance interventions on WC reliability.

Rocking the cradle : ensuring the rights of parents with disabilities and their children

NATIONAL COUNCIL ON DISABILITY
2012

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"The report analyzes how U.S. disability law and policy apply to parents with disabilities in the child welfare and family law systems, and the disparate treatment of parents with disabilities and their children. Examination of the impediments prospective parents with disabilities encounter when accessing assisted reproductive technologies or adopting provides further examples of the need for comprehensive protection of these rights"

Collective action and emancipatory aims : applying principles of feminist practice in a shelter for domestic violence survivors with disabilities

ALI, Alisha
MOWRY, Randolph
HO, Kimberly
April 2011

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This paper outlines that there is a need for need for domestic violence shelters that serve women with disabilities and highlights Freedom House, a fully accessible New York City shelter for domestic violence survivors with disabilities and their families. It presents the Freedom House as one approach of a viable feminist and liberatory model of care that is essential to recovery from trauma among domestic violence survivors with disabilities. Using a combined theoretical framework of the psychological theory of empowerment feminist practice and feminist disability theory, the paper concludes that this emergent model provides both a theoretical argument for empowerment and a framework for responsive feminist practice for women with disabilities within a shelter setting

Evaluating the impact of conflict resolution on urban children's violence-related attitudes and behaviors in New Haven, Connecticut, through a community–academic partnership

SHUVAL, Kerem
GROCE, Nora
PILLSBURY, Charles A
CAVANAUGH, Brenda
2010

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Numerous schools are implementing youth violence prevention interventions aimed at enhancing conflict resolution skills without evaluating their effectiveness. Consequently, we formed a community academic partnership between a New Haven community-based organization and Yale's School of Public Health and Prevention Research Center to examine the impact of an ongoing conflict resolution curriculum in New Haven elementary schools, which had yet to be evaluated. Throughout the 2007-08 school year, 191 children in three schools participated in a universal conflict resolution intervention. We used a quasi-experimental design to examine the impact of the intervention on participants' likelihood of violence, conflict self-efficacy, hopelessness and hostility. Univariate and multivariable analyses were utilized to evaluate the intervention. The evaluation indicates that the intervention had little positive impact on participants' violence-related attitudes and behavior. The intervention reduced hostility scores significantly in School 1 (P < 0.01; Cohen's d = 0.39) and hopelessness scores in School 3 (P = 0.05, Cohen's d = 0.52); however, the intervention decreased the conflict self-efficacy score in School 2 (P = 0.04; Cohen's d = 0.23) and was unable to significantly change many outcome measures. The intervention's inability to significantly change many outcome measures might be remedied by increasing the duration of the intervention, adding additional facets to the intervention and targeting high-risk children.

Health Education Research, Volume 25, Issue 5, October 2010, Pages 757–768
https://doi.org/10.1093/her/cyq030

Successful leadership : country actions for maternal, newborn and child health

PARTNERSHIP FOR MATERNAL, NEWBORN AND CHILD HEALTH
2008

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This document provides country-specific summaries of actions taken on a national level to improve maternal and child health. The summaries do not provide a comprehensive assessment of the progress made by individual countries, but demonstrate the importance of five factors: 1. Successful political leadership (Thailand) 2. Sound health policies (Indonesia and Tanzania) 3. Effective financing (Mexico) 4. Strong health systems (Nepal and Senegal) 5. Action to achieve equity (Bangladesh and Chile). Each summary covers: progress on MDGs, supportive policies and interventions, outcome, and key lesson

Listen to our stories : words, pictures, and songs by young people with disabilities

HILLYER, Linda
2008

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Listen to Our Stories highlights poetry, essays, interviews, songs, journal writing, letters, and pictures that tell the personal stories of young people with disabilities. The contributors are young girls and boys aged 5 to 21, from varied backgrounds, different talents and a range of disabilities. This website may be useful to anyone interested in personal life stories and experiences, written or told by children and young adults with disabilities

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