“You’re changing the pattern”: cognitive analytic team formulation with learning disabilities care staff

Purpose This study aims to explore how care staff working with people with learning disabilities experienced psychologist-facilitated team formulation sessions in a cognitive analytic style (contextual reformulation). Design/methodology/approach Eleven participants attended at least one contextual reformulation session regarding a client their team referred because of challenging behaviour. Post-intervention semi-structured interviews were analysed using qualitative inductive thematic analysis. Findings Five themes were developed: multiple roles and functions of sessions and clinicians; challenging behaviour in relationship; making links – understanding can be enlightening, containing and practical; the process of developing a shared understanding and approach; and caught between two perspectives. Findings suggested contextual reformulation helped staff see challenging behaviour as relational, provided them with the space to reflect on their emotions and relate compassionately to themselves and others, and ultimately helped them to focus their interventions on understanding and relationally managing rather than acting to reduce behaviour. Research limitations/implications Qualitative methodology allows no causal inferences to be made. Ten of 11 participants were female. Originality/value This qualitative study adds to the limited research base on team formulation in learning disabilities settings and specifically that using a cognitive analytic approach.

Advancing inclusive research with people with profound and multiple learning disabilities through a sensory-dialogical approach

People with profound and multiple learning disabilities are often excluded from the processes of knowledge production and face barriers to inclusion in research due to cognitive and communicative challenges. Inclusive research—even when intending to be inclusive—tends to operate within criteria that exclude people with profound and multiple learning disabilities. The aim of this article is to provide a state-of-the-art review of the topic of inclusive research involving people with profound disabilities and thereby challenge traditional assumptions of inclusive research. The review presents themes that will inform a discussion on how to challenge the criteria in ways that make it possible to understand inclusive research for people who communicate in unconventional ways. We argue that a fruitful way of rethinking inclusive research is by applying a sensory-dialogical approach that privileges the dialogical and sensory foundations of the research. We suggest this might be a way to understand inclusive research that regards the person’s communicative and cognitive distinctiveness.

Attitude of teachers towards inclusion of students with learning disabilities in the regular schools in Obio/Akpor local government area

The study investigated attitude of teachers towards inclusion of students with learning disabilities in the normal school settings in Obio/Akpor Local Government Area of Rivers State. A descriptive survey design was used for the study. Six research questions and six null hypotheses was formulated to guide the study. The population of study involved 3025 teachers in the area. A stratified random sampling technique was used in selecting a sample of three hundred and ninety nine (399) teachers. Chisquare was used in testing the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Out of the 399 teachers, 253 were involved in the study. The result of the findings shows that teachers only teachers training and teacher’s age significantly influence inclusion of students with learning disability whereas teacher’s gender, experience, qualification and marital status had not significant effect on inclusion of students with learning disability. The finding also indicated that generally teachers had positive attitude towards inclusion of students with learning disabilities. The attitude of teachers is perceived to have been influenced by lack of provision for additional programme that will improve education of students with learning difficulties and required training for teachers in special needs education.

Advantages and Limits of Remote Care and Stress Management Experienced by Mothers of Students with Specific Learning Disabilities During the Covid-19 Period

These instructions give you guidelines for preparing papers. Use this document as a template if you are using Microsoft Word. Otherwise, use this document as an instruction set.. Define all symbols used in the abstract. Do not cite references in the abstract. Do not delete the blank line immediately above the abstract; it sets the footnote at the bottom of this column. Page margins are 1,78 cm top and down; 1,65 cm left and right. Each column width is 8,89 cm and the separation between the columns is 0,51 cm. Abstract-Introduction : The period of confinement due to the COVID-19 pandemic has harmful consequences on the psychological state of parents and their children, especially those with psychological or neurocognitive problems. The care of these children plays a primordial role in their development, particularly during the COVID-19 period. For this reason, our objective is to assess the state of stress among mothers of children with learning disabilities during the COVID-19 period in Morocco, as well as the support of these children. Materials and methods : This is a cross-sectional study that was conducted during the period from April to June 2020. To realise it, we used a investigation form which contains three parts. To evaluate the state of stress in mothers, we used the "PSS10d" scale adapted to the Moroccan context. The target population is composed of mothers of children with learning disabilities who are being monitored by Moroccan Association for Learning Disorders and Difficulties (MALDD) in Casablanca. Results : During the period of confinement, only 13% (n=15) of mothers reported that their children "Dys" had benefited from remote remediation by specialists According to the Odds Ratio calculation, the risk factors influencing the care of "Dys" children during this period of confinement are: lack of cooperation from the child (Odds Ratio= 16.8; IC95%=[3.5-79]). 1]; P-value=0.001), the educational level of mothers (Odds Ratio= 9.4; IC95%=[2.4-35.7]; P-value=0.001), the economic situation (Odds Ratio= 5.1; IC95%=[1.5-17.4]; P-value=0.01) and technical problems (Odds Ratio= 5.1; IC95%=[1.5-17.4]; P-value=0.01). Conclusion : According to our results, we noticed that the psychological state of the mothers is influenced by the remote care of the "Dys" children. For this the responsible authorities in Morocco must support this population.

Evaluation of Disabled STEAM -Students’ Education Learning Outcomes and Creativity under the UN Sustainable Development Goal: Project-Based Learning Oriented STEAM Curriculum with Micro:bit

This research aims to discuss the impact of the STEAM curriculum on students with learning disabilities and their learning outcomes and creativity. Teaching for creative thinking is the strategy to deliver a STEAM-structured curriculum and to reach the SDG4 targets. The content is designed in line with project-based learning (PBL), while the micro:bit and paper cutting are used as materials to support it. Methods and Procedures: The single-case research approach (A-B-M) was applied to study three students with special educational needs in primary school. The entire curriculum takes up to 10 weeks with 12 STEAM lessons with activities. The independent variable was the PBL-oriented STEAM curriculum, and the dependent variables were the learning outcomes and TTCT results of pre-tests and post-tests for creativity. There were immediate learning outcomes and retention effects found on the three participants. This paper addresses that the STEAM curriculum had a positive impact on their creativity, which gives affirmative feedback on the curriculum. Conclusion: This PBL-oriented STEAM curriculum under the SDG4 targets gave students with disabilities creativity competency and positive learning outcomes in these case studies. These teaching materials enable teachers to deliver the STEAM curriculum to students with learning disabilities.

Factors associated with excess all-cause mortality in the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK: A time series analysis using the Clinical Practice Research Datalink

Background Excess mortality captures the total effect of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on mortality and is not affected by misspecification of cause of death. We aimed to describe how health and demographic factors were associated with excess mortality during, compared to before, the pandemic. Methods and findings We analysed a time series dataset including 9,635,613 adults (≥40 years old) registered at United Kingdom general practices contributing to the Clinical Practice Research Datalink. We extracted weekly numbers of deaths and numbers at risk between March 2015 and July 2020, stratified by individual-level factors. Excess mortality during Wave 1 of the UK pandemic (5 March to 27 May 2020) compared to the prepandemic period was estimated using seasonally adjusted negative binomial regression models. Relative rates (RRs) of death for a range of factors were estimated before and during Wave 1 by including interaction terms. We found that all-cause mortality increased by 43% (95% CI 40% to 47%) during Wave 1 compared with prepandemic. Changes to the RR of death associated with most sociodemographic and clinical characteristics were small during Wave 1 compared with prepandemic. However, the mortality RR associated with dementia markedly increased (RR for dementia versus no dementia prepandemic: 3.5, 95% CI 3.4 to 3.5; RR during Wave 1: 5.1, 4.9 to 5.3); a similar pattern was seen for learning disabilities (RR prepandemic: 3.6, 3.4 to 3.5; during Wave 1: 4.8, 4.4 to 5.3), for black or South Asian ethnicity compared to white, and for London compared to other regions. Relative risks for morbidities were stable in multiple sensitivity analyses. However, a limitation of the study is that we cannot assume that the risks observed during Wave 1 would apply to other waves due to changes in population behaviour, virus transmission, and risk perception. Conclusions The first wave of the UK COVID-19 pandemic appeared to amplify baseline mortality risk to approximately the same relative degree for most population subgroups. However, disproportionate increases in mortality were seen for those with dementia, learning disabilities, non-white ethnicity, or living in London.