Assessment of Learning Disabilities: Rediscover the Joy of Learning at CERC

Our booklet of 60 mathematical problems for the first cycle of primary school contains problems related to addition and subtraction. In each problem, there is important information for solving the problem, but there is also superfluous information. Students must therefore use their reasoning to eliminate superfluous information and use only appropriate values. Each problem must be solved in four stages: determining what needs to be found, establishing a mathematical equation, drawing or calculating in relation to the values found, and giving an appropriate answer. The aim is to establish an effective approach for students using this tool. In this way, the adult or teacher can better support the student's success in mathematics. This tool is relevant for all learners working on the concepts of subtraction and addition.

Taken from the book "De l'opposition à la communication" written by our director, Dr. Benoît Hammarrenger, the Emotion Curve helps us to understand how all emotions are experienced by children and adults alike. For the parent or caregiver, the Emotional Curve helps to understand a child's sudden bursts of anger or crying spells, and above all to synchronize our interventions so that we can position ourselves as a team with the child or teenager, rather than entering into the cycle of opposition and argumentation.

In 1981, American psychologist Russell A. Barkley proposed the opposition cycle, maintained by endless argumentation between the parent (or caregiver) and the child. According to this model, the parent who seeks to explain his or her request, to justify it, and to put rational arguments behind it, is merely giving the child material with which to argue and oppose even more. Argumentation and explanations thus become the fuel of opposition. In 2022, our director Dr. Benoît Hammarrenger proposed an alternative model in which opposition is constructed, maintained and amplified within the anger cycle. The child's irritability or anger triggers and sustains the adult's irritability and anger, which in turn amplifies the child's anger, in a cycle that can only be explosive.