Poor School Academic Performance and Benign Epilepsy with Centro-Temporal Spikes.

Background: Poor academic performance of students with epilepsy seems to be a multifactorial problem related to difficulties in reading, writing, math, and logic skills. Poor school and academic performances refer to learning problems in a specific academic area due to learning disorders and learning difficulties not excluding the ability to learn in a different manner during school and academic life. Sometimes, school, academic difficulties, and Rolandic epilepsy can coexist together, and there may be comorbidities.

Gross motor proficiency and intellectual functioning: A comparison among children with Down syndrome, children with borderline intellectual functioning, and typically developing children.

This cross-sectional study examines differences in gross motor proficiency as a function of different intellectual functioning profiles. Two motor areas have been investigated as being equally essential to gross motor functions in every-day life: locomotion and object control.It aims to compare gross motor skills endorsed by children with Down syndrome (DS), children with borderline intellectual functioning (BIF), and typically developing children (TDC).

Improving Children's Coordinative Skills and Executive Functions: The Effects of a Football Exercise Program.

Recent studies have focused on the positive influence of regular physical activity on executive functioning in children. Coordinative skills (agility) and executive functions (updating, attention, inhibition and planning processes) were investigated in children before and after 6 months of a Football Exercise Program compared to a control group of sedentary peers. The participants were 44 children aged 8.

Investigating the Improvement of Decoding Abilities and Working Memory in Children with Incremental or Entity Personal Conceptions of Intelligence: Two Case Reports.

One of the most significant current discussions has led to the hypothesis that domain-specific training programs alone are not enough to improve reading achievement or working memory abilities. Incremental or Entity personal conceptions of intelligence may be assumed to be an important prognostic factor to overcome domain-specific deficits. Specifically, incremental students tend to be more oriented toward change and autonomy and are able to adopt more efficacious strategies.

Motor and cognitive growth following a Football Training Program.

Motor and cognitive growth in children may be influenced by football practice. Therefore the aim of this study was to assess whether a Football Training Program taken over 6 months would improve motor and cognitive performances in children. Motor skills concerned coordinative skills, running, and explosive legs strength.

Physical Activity Engagement in Young People with Down Syndrome: Investigating Parental Beliefs.

Background: Despite the wide documentation of the physical/psychological benefits derived from regular physical activity (PA), high levels of inactivity are reported among people with Down syndrome. This study aims to explore parental beliefs concerning involvement, facilitators/barriers and benefits of PA in young people.

Method: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 13 parents of young people with Down syndrome.

Motor and cognitive development: the role of karate.

Background: regular physical activity has an effect on biological responses in both muscles and organs that, in turn, alter the structure and functions of the brain. Therefore, this study aims at comparing motor (sprint, coordination ability and explosive legs strength skills) and cognitive abilities (working memory, attention, executive functioning) in children.

Methods: 39 children with average chronological age of 9 years were divided in: Karatekas (n=19) and Sedentary (n=20) groups.

Improvement of gross motor and cognitive abilities by an exercise training program: three case reports.

Background: This work examined the efficacy of an integrated exercise training program (coach and family) in three children with Down syndrome to improve their motor and cognitive abilities, in particular reaction time and working memory.

Methods: The integrated exercise training program was used in three children with Down syndrome, comprising two boys (M1, with a chronological age of 10.3 years and a mental age of 4.

Self-esteem at school and self-handicapping in childhood: comparison of groups with learning disabilities.

Recent research has focused on the role of self-esteem and self-handicapping strategies in the school domain. Self-handicapping refers to maladaptive strategies employed by adults and children for protection and maintenance of positive school self esteem. In this study the self-esteem and the self-handicapping strategies of children with dyslexia, reading comprehension disabilities, and mathematical disabilities were compared to a control group with normal learning.

Temporal abnormalities in children with developmental dyscalculia.

Recent imaging studies have associated Developmental dyscalculia (DD) to structural and functional alterations corresponding Parietal and the Prefrontal cortex (PFC). Since these areas were shown also to be involved in timing abilities, we hypothesized that time processing is abnormal in DD. We compared time processing abilities between 10 children with pure DD (8 years old) and 11 age-matched healthy children.

Personal conceptions of intelligence affect outcome in a multimedia reading training program.

Personal conceptions of intelligence seem to make a significant contribution to overcoming a reading deficit, as indicated in our earlier research. The present aim was to assess improvements in reading-decoding following training of children with reading-decoding problems and different conceptions of intelligence (incremental or entity). It was expected that treatment of children with an incremental representation would improve more.

Personal conceptions of intelligence, self-esteem, and school achievement in Italian and Portuguese students.

Educational research places emphasis on the fact that different cultures have different self-construals. These construals can influence cognitive, emotional, and motivational processes in individuals. Great importance is attached to individuals' implicit conceptions of the nature of their intelligence (incremental or entity) and self-esteem.

Theories of intelligence in children with reading disabilities: a training proposal.

A recent trend in the study of reading difficulties promotes multidimensional intervention, focusing on the reciprocal influences exerted by cognitive and emotional-motivational variables. This study evaluated improvements in reading performance as a function of metacognitive training in 36 children (M age = 8.7 yr.

Reading comprehension: think and know verbs.

Verbs such as think, know, remember, and guess play a pivotal role in understanding, monitoring, and transformation of internal states. We focus on the specific words as think and know, polysemous cognitive verbs that show hierarchical organization and high frequency of use in children's and adults' lexicons. According to Booth and Hall's model, think and know present a conceptual organization that involves low conceptual levels (perception, memory, comprehension) and high conceptual levels (evaluation, metacognition, planning).