Review of Journal Article on ADHD

                The journal article that I chose to review was focusing on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).  The title of the article is ADHD in the Classroom: Effective Intervention Strategies.  The authors’ purpose of the article is to address the need for effective school-based interventions that correlate with behavior, academics, and home-school communications.  It address the issues of the whole ADHD child.  The article stresses the need for collaboration between the classroom teachers and the school professionals in order to state the current problems and come up with effective solutions.  It does not undermine the need for strong home-school communication either. 

                The authors strongly suggest that interventions work best when the behaviors and academic issues are identified and addressed as early as possible.  They suggested clear and applicable strategies in the areas of behavioral interventions, self-regulation interventions, academic interventions, and home-school communication programs that classroom teachers can put into place immediately.  They go into detail to explain the most effective interventions in each of these categories and what research has shown to be the outcome of these methods.  A strong component in each method includes starting as early as possible, consistency, and balance of proactive praise with reactive consequences. 

                The article continues by discussing the difficulties that children with ADHD face socially.  Peer-relationships are influenced by the behaviors exhibited by the ADHD students.  There is limited research on social relationships for students with ADHD, which makes interventions difficult to develop and address.  Consistency is also hard to manage when the students are encountering social situations in and out of school.

                The article concludes with a strong endorsement for collaborative consultation between the classroom teacher and the school psychologist.  The authors site research which suggests positive outcomes in both behavior and academics when this collaboration takes place effectively. 

                I feel this article is extremely relevant.  It lists very applicable suggestions and I can see that these strategies would be helpful within the general education classrooms.  While I understand that identifying the issues and applying interventions early creates a more favorable outcome, sometimes the child is not diagnosed early on.  I think this happens especially with the inattentive, non-hyperactive children.  They tend to slip through the cracks in the early years, because they are compliant and don’t cause a disruption within the classroom.  Their issues are not often identified until middle school or later, when they are expected to function more independently.   In these situations, the article does not really offer suggestions for intervention strategies to use with secondary students.  It does address this failure in the very last sentence of the article, calling for more research.   

                Overall, this was a very worthwhile article to read.  I would recommend it to parents and classroom teachers, as well as other school professionals.  It might even be worth the time for those with higher functioning ADHD.  It offers a lot of detailed research, but ultimately it offers hope.

Reference:

DuPaul, G. J., Weyandt, L. L., & Janusis, G. M. (2011). ADHD in the Classroom: Effective Intervention Strategies. Theory Into Practice, 50(1), 35-42.