The Causes and Symptoms of Spina Bifida essays

The Causes and Symptoms of Spina Bifida essays Research has shown that mothers who have some form of prenatal education, and who are cared for by qualified physicians, have significantly lower risk pregnancies. Education is a key factor in preventing possibly severe birth defects such as, "spina bifida." Each day an average of 11 babies are born with neural tubal disorders or NTD's like spina bifida, or anencephaly. "Ninety-five percent of neural tube defects occur in women with no history of neural tube affected pregnancies." NTD's can occur early in pregnancy, often before a woman even knows she is pregnant. "In September, 1992, based on randomized control trials and observational studies, the United States Public Health Service published a recommendation, stating that "all women of childbearing age in the United States should consume 0.4 mg of folic acid daily to reduce the risk of having a pregnancy affected by a neural tube defect." (The Spina Bifida Association of America 1). "Each year, 300,000 to 400,000 infants worldwide are born with spina bifida and anencephaly," (Oakley S116). If new mothers, and even young women in general, were more educated about how their diet, and actions effect their babies, the number of cases of NTD's would be greatly diminished. Spina bifida occurs when the spine fails to close properly during the first few weeks of pregnancy. "The central nervous system and spine develop between the 14th and 28th day after conception" (Bloom 79). "Spina bifida occurs when there is a failure of development of the boney canal which surrounds the brain and spinal cord. In the spine, the affected vertebrae have a defect posteriorly (at the back) so that a boney ring does not completely surround the spinal cord. This leaves a gap so that, instead of the posterior arm being whole it is divided - that is bifid. The fault may occur in one or more of the vertebrae but it is most common around waist-level," (Association for Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus 1). People ...

Convince Me! A Persuasive Writing Activity

Convince Me! A Persuasive Writing Activity ​As your child starts learning more complicated types of writing, she’ll be introduced to the idea of persuasive writing. If she’s the type of kid who frequently challenges or debates what you have to say, then the hardest part of persuasive writing will probably be the writing itself- she’s already working on the persuasion piece! The Convince Me! activity is an easy way for you and your child to practice persuasive writing at home, without the worry of getting a good grade. Persuasive writing puts the everyday challenges and debates into a written form. A good piece of persuasive writing explains the issue at stake, takes a position, and then explains the position and its opposing stance. Using facts, statistics and some common persuasive strategies, your child’s argument essay tries to convince the reader to agree with her. It may sound easy, but if your child doesnt hold her own well in arguments or has trouble doing research, she may need some practice to become convincing. What Your Child Will Learn (or Practice): Persuasive writingResearchAnalytical thinkingNegotiation and written communication Getting Started with the Convince Me! Persuasive Writing Activity Sit down with your child and talk about she needs to do to make somebody else see her side of an issue. Explain that while sometimes she argues, when she backs up what she’s saying with good reasons, what she’s really doing is convincing the other person, given the other person justification for seeing things her way.Prompt her to come up with some examples of situations in which she tried to change your mind about something she didnt agree with. For example, maybe she’s successfully negotiated an increase in her allowance. Tell her that the word for what she did was to persuade you, which means she was influencing what you thought or was convincing you to look at things differently.Together, brainstorm words and phrases that can to try to persuade someone and write them down. Talk about things that happen around the house that you and your child don’t always agree on. You may want to stick with topics that are not going to cause huge fights since this is supposed to be a fun activity. Some ideas to consider include: allowance, bedtime, how much screen time your child has daily, making her bed, the time frame in which laundry has to be put away, the division of chores between children, or what types of food she can eat for after-school snacks. (Of course, these are simply suggestions, there may be other issues that come up in your household that arent on that list.) Choose one and let your child know you might be willing to change your mind about it if she can write a convincing and persuasive essay explaining her reasoning. Make sure she knows her essay has to say what she thinks should happen and use some persuasive words, phrases and strategies.It is absolutely crucial to make sure to set the conditions under which you’ll give in. For example, maybe her goal is to try to convince you to change your mind about eating sugary cereal over the summer, not for the rest of her life. If she convinces you, you must live with the change. Set the rules for engagement first, and dont change them.Read the essay and consider her arguments. Talk to her about what you thought was convincing and which arguments didnt convince you (and why). If you’re not totally persuaded, give your child the opportunity to rewrite the essay with your feedback in mind. Note: Don’t forget, you really need to be prepared to make changes if your child is persuasive enough! It’s important to reward her if she writes a very good piece of persuasive writing.