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The OP makes an assumption that kids in American are over-diagnosed...which may be true. On the other hand, the children in France may be under-diagnosed.
What I don't understand, is why has there been this explosion of supposed ADHD cases? When I was in grade school, no one was diagnosed, and everyone was able to pay attention in class.
Ha ha - the reason is because common sense would dictate you shouldn't MAKE kids sit still and have propaganda poured into them 6 plus hours per day. That if you do try that, you will have many kids who "can't pay attention." Teachers seem to LOVE kids on drugs - doctors LOVE to diagnose them, and drug companies LOVE to have the RX's for TOXIC SUBSTANCES filled.
And parents who drug their kids are guilty of child abuse, in my book. I understand why they do it - cuz there is so much pressure - but it's just wrong.
I wonder if the cases of ADHD skyrocketed, after recess was shortened or eliminated, and after PE was eliminated in some schools. That would be an interesting study to do.
The worst situation I ever saw was at the junior high where I student taught many moons ago. Like most student teachers, I was struggling through my student teaching (actually, I wasn't struggling...but there's a lot to learn in student teaching, and most of it is teaching by doing). Midway through the semester, I said to my sponsor teacher, "How come there are so many students here who are on Ritalin? It was over 20% of my students. My sponsor teacher said, "It's a disgrace. And if you ask everyone of those parents who their child's physician is, it'll be the same doctor in every case. And they couldn't blame it on one doctor in a small town...this was in a large suburban area of Rochester, NY.
In the United States, at least 9 percent of school-aged children have been diagnosed with ADHD, and are taking pharmaceutical drugs. In France, the percentage of kids diagnosed and medicated for ADHD is less than .5 percent. How has the epidemic of ADHD—firmly established in the U.S.—almost completely passed over children in France?
And that's just so called ADHD American schools push to drug even more kids for other stuff.
I think it's insane and part of our drug culture which starts early. I also think most of the "educators" don't want boys being their natural rambunctious selves and encourage them to be drugged...I think it's disgraceful.
Pssh. You're wasting your time, nana. A good chunk of CD doesn't science, ya know? Alternative facts and new age-y nonsense. Disobedient kids just need Jesus, a stern talking to, and a whoopin'.
What I don't understand, is why has there been this explosion of supposed ADHD cases? When I was in grade school, no one was diagnosed, and everyone was able to pay attention in class.
You really sure about that?
The minute I read your post, I immediately thought of three kids from elementary school -- back in the 1950s -- who were ADD or ADHD. And I just looked up Facebook one of my primary contenders, and sure enough there he was...a guy who literally posted the same photo on his Facebook page...21 times.
But I'll tell you where some of those kids may have been -- in a special ed classroom that they didn't need to be in. And where were those sped classrooms? In the old days there were often down some dead-end hallway, or in the case of my junior-senior high school, literally in a room behind the stairs.
I wonder if the cases of ADHD skyrocketed, after recess was shortened or eliminated, and after PE was eliminated in some schools. That would be an interesting study to do.
There is a lot of evidence that kids with ADHD need physical activity - especially time outdoors - to perform well in school. Some kids with ADHD have extra time in PE class added to their curriculum. IMO, if a child with ADHD isn't given any PE class he/she may do worse academically in school.
What I don't understand, is why has there been this explosion of supposed ADHD cases? When I was in grade school, no one was diagnosed, and everyone was able to pay attention in class.
It may not be an explosion, rather, diagnostic criteria and methods improved with research. If a set of neurological behaviors were poorly understood, researched and defined, due to lack of available research, it doesn't mean kids didn't present with those characteristics and traits. They just didn't have a name for it yet. Kids still exhibited these traits and characteristics but were born to generations that "managed" them as an issue of poor, disobedient, rambunctious behavior and disciplined accordingly. So, yeah, boys may have exhibited traits of hyperactivity and impulsivity, among other traits, and they got butt whoopings, stern lectures, disciplined harshly, if not downright abused.
There could be many factors for why and how ADHD manifests.
The same has been said about ASD. Yes, ASD existed in the olden days, it just wasn't understood or observed to be a neurological disorder in the way we have come to understand ASD through decades of modern research. Back then, kids who were "odd" or different were kept away, said to be "touched in the head," sent away to inpatient facilities, called "special" and the awful R-word. I had two aunts who exhibited symptoms of ASD. One of them would be in her 90s now and the other in her mid-60s. These disorders have always existed. We're just learning about them in recent decades thanks to new research.
What I don't understand, is why has there been this explosion of supposed ADHD cases? When I was in grade school, no one was diagnosed, and everyone was able to pay attention in class.
You did not see people who could not pay attention, but they were still there.
ADHD was first mentioned in 1902. British pediatrician Sir George Still described “an abnormal defect of moral control in children.” He found that some affected children could not control their behavior the way a typical child would, but they were still intelligent.
The APA first recognized the disorder under a different name in 1968. In 1980, it became ADD with or without hyperactivity.
Quote:
ADHD cases began to climb significantly in the 1990s. There may be a few factors behind the rise in diagnoses:
doctors were able to diagnose ADHD more efficiently
more parents were aware of ADHD and are reporting their children’s symptoms
more children were actually developing ADHD
There is a genetic link to the disorder and just as with autism, children are being diagnosed more often because doctors recognize the signs more now.
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