The Massachusetts General Hospital Guide to Learning Disabilities: Assessing Learning Needs of Children and Adolescents

268 Pages·2019·3.33 MB·English

by  H. Kent Wilson

Current Clinical Psychiatry
Series Editor: Jerrold F. Rosenbaum
H. Kent Wilson
Ellen B. Braaten Editors
The Massachusetts
General Hospital
Guide to Learning
Disabilities
Assessing Learning Needs of Children and
Adolescents
Current Clinical Psychiatry
Series Editor:
Jerrold F. Rosenbaum
Department of Psychiatry
Massachusetts General Hospital
Boston, MA, USA
Current Clinical Psychiatry offers concise, practical resources for clinical
psychiatrists and other practitioners interested in mental health. Covering the
full range of psychiatric disorders commonly presented in the clinical setting,
the Current Clinical Psychiatry series encompasses such topics as cognitive
behavioral therapy, anxiety disorders, psychotherapy, ratings and assessment
scales, mental health in special populations, psychiatric uses of nonpsychiatric
drugs, and others. Series editor Jerrold F. Rosenbaum, MD, is Chief of
Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, and Stanley Cobb Professor of
Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School.
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/7634
H. Kent Wilson • Ellen B. Braaten
Editors
The Massachusetts
General Hospital Guide
to Learning Disabilities
Assessing Learning Needs of
Children and Adolescents
Editors
H. Kent Wilson Ellen B. Braaten
Massachusetts General Hospital Harvard Medical School
Boston, MA Boston, MA
USA USA
Current Clinical Psychiatry
ISBN 978-3-319-98641-8 ISBN 978-3-319-98643-2 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98643-2
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018961697
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Preface
Every child in the United States has the right to a free appropriate public
education. While estimates vary, roughly 8–10% of children are identified as
having learning disabilities, and over 20% of children have a diagnosable
mental illness than can impact learning and school functioning. Intervention
for children experiencing such challenges supports a positive developmental
trajectory, and a comprehensive assessment to better understand the etiology
of the learning challenge and to inform the intervention choices is essential.
This book enlists the help of experts in the field of child assessment and
treatment to provide child psychiatrists with knowledge in evaluation and
special education programming. This book provides a review of the latest sci-
ence behind common learning disabilities and psychiatric conditions that
present in childhood and also includes best practices in the assessment of
these conditions and the school-based interventions that are indicated. With
this knowledge, the reader can be a more informed consumer of assessment
reports and can help to advocate for their patients’ school-based needs more
effectively.
The book is divided into four parts. The first part is comprised of a single
chapter that provides the reader with background behind the principles of
standardized assessment. The second part, which includes eight chapters on
neurodevelopmental disorders like learning disabilities and ADHD, and the
third part, which includes three chapters on other common psychiatric disor-
ders in childhood that impact school functioning, provide a review of the
science of the disorder, best practices for assessment of the disorder, and
interventions that are commonly indicated for the disorder at school; these
chapters also include a case example to highlight issues in the assessment of
these conditions. Finally, the fourth part is comprised of two chapters that
cover issues relevant across disorders including a chapter on managing the
needs of transitional age youth and another chapter detailing special educa-
tion laws and procedures.
We believe this book will be a valuable reference for all child psychiatrists
as well as other professionals who treat children on an outpatient basis who
encounter school-related difficulty. We hope that the book will help support
more efficient/effective use of assessment for understanding and managing
learning challenges.
We would like to acknowledge the authors for their contribution to this
project as well as the staff and our patients at MGH; being trusted with the
assessment of someone’s child is an honor, and through this work we learn
v
vi Preface
how to more effectively support a child’s development. We would like also to
acknowledge and thank the Springer Editors, specifically Nadina Persaud and
Karthik Periyasamy, for their patience and support from the inception to the
completion of this project.
Boston, MA, USA H. Kent Wilson, PhD
Boston, MA, USA Ellen B. Braaten, PhD
Contents
Part I I ntroduction to Assessment
1 An Introduction to Assessment .......................... 3
H. Kent Wilson and Ellen B. Braaten
Part II N eurodevelopmental Disorders
2 Reading Disorders/Dyslexia ............................. 21
Amanda Ward, Hillary Bush, and Ellen B. Braaten
3 Mathematics Disorders ................................. 39
Ellen H. O’Donnell
4 Disorders of Written Expression ......................... 59
Ellen H. O’Donnell and Mary K. Colvin
5 Language Disorders ................................... 79
Drew C. Coman and Nicholas D. Mian
6 Nonverbal Learning Disability ........................... 103
Nathan Doty
7 Intellectual Disabilities ................................. 119
Brian L. B. Willoughby
8 Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder
and Executive Dysfunction .............................. 133
Nathan E. Cook and Gina A. Forchelli
9 Autism Spectrum Disorders ............................. 149
Drew C. Coman
Part III Common Psychiatric Disorders in Childhood
10 Mood Disorders ....................................... 173
Julie A. Grieco and Mary K. Colvin
11 Anxiety Disorders ..................................... 195
Jamie A. Micco, Julie Edmunds, Sophie Baron, Christian
Hoover, and Jennifer M. Park
12 Disruptive Behavior Disorders. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
Alisha R. Pollastri, Cecilia Rosenbaum, and J. Stuart Ablon
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viii Contents
Part IV S pecial Considerations
13 Special Education: Laws and Procedures .................. 223
H. Kent Wilson and Eileen M. Hagerty
14 Managing the Needs of Transition Age Youth .............. 245
Nathan Doty and Johanna Nielsen
Index .................................................... 261
Contributors
J.  Stuart  Ablon, PhD Think:Kids at Massachusetts General Hospital,
Boston, MA, USA
Sophie  Baron Child and Adolescent OCD Institute, McLean Hospital,
Belmont, MA, USA
Ellen  B.  Braaten, PhD Learning and Emotional Assessment Program
(LEAP), Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
The Clay Center for Young Healthy Minds, Boston, MA, USA
Hillary Bush, PhD Learning and Emotional Assessment Program (LEAP),
Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
Mary K. Colvin, PhD, ABPP-CN Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA,
USA
Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
Drew C. Coman, PhD Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical
School, Boston, MA, USA
Nathan E. Cook, PhD Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School,
Boston, MA, USA
Learning and Emotional Assessment Program, Massachusetts General
Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
Sports Concussion Clinic, MassGeneral Hospital for Children™, Boston,
MA, USA
Nathan Doty, PhD Achieve New England, Concord, MA, USA
Julie Edmunds Child CBT Program, Massachusetts General Hospital, and
Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
Gina A. Forchelli, PhD, NCSP Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical
School, Boston, MA, USA
Learning and Emotional Assessment Program, Massachusetts General
Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
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