[Former Fetus]

When my son was in k-4 there was this little girl in his class who was a textbook example of ADHD... that is, assuming that ADHD is real. She could not sit still for 5 minutes, let alone a class period. I was then a teacher at the school, and it broke my heart to see her sitting in the office to see the principal again. Well, I dont' work there any longer and I understand she's one of the best behaved kids in first grade. I saw her the other day... she's gained some 30 pounds, walks dragging her feet, has no expression... Why aren't parents such as hers charged with child neglect?

[3catsanadog]

This whole ADD/ADHD is just the result of touchy-feely disciplining trends, the abundance of indoor "toys" (video games, television with 300 channels, etc.), lack of hard physical chores for children to be responsible for, easy access to junk food, day care institutionalization. In other words, kids are being raised completely opposite of how they were raised for thousands of years. We have a nation of spoiled brats and everybody is afraid to get tough with them.

And now the know it alls are curtailing recess activities because they think kids get too rough.

[SauronOfMordor]

I'm homeschooling my two oldest. My middle daughter had some trouble in first grade, and the school wanted to get her on drugs.

We finally found out that she's hypoglycemic -- if her blood-sugar drops below a certain threshold she goes nuts and has hysterics. What fixes it is to give her a low-carb, high-protein breakfast which includes some meat (meat digests slowly, keeping her blood-sugar fairly level for a longer period), and making sure she gets an afternoon snack at about 3pm. Presto! No more psychotic episodes to deal with