Traumatic Brain Injury Jeopardy

Etiology & Incidences

100

What causes Traumatic Brain Injury to occur?

TBI is caused by a bump, blow, or jolt to the head.

200

How severe is the severity of TBI?

The severity of TBI can range from mild to severe.

300

What is the number of people who sustain TBI each year?

1.7 million people sustain TBI annually.

400

What are the majority of TBI's that occur each year?

Majority of TBI's that occur each year are concussions or mild TBI's.

500

What is the number of people who die annually from a TBI?

52,000 die annually of a TBI.

Mechanisms of Injury

100

This type of injury results from bullet wounds, exhibits largely focal ddamage, and as a result, there is penetration to the skull. hint - effects can be just as serious as closed brain injury

Open Head Injury

200

This type of injury results from a slip and fall, motor vehicle crashes, has effects which tend to be diffused, and there is no penetration to the skull.

Closed Head Injury

300

The brain and surrounding membranes are very prone to infections if the special blood-brain protective system is breached. Virusus and bacteria can cause serious and life-threatening diseases of the brain

Infections

400

If blood flow is blocked through a cerebral vascular accident, cell death is in the area deprived of blood will result. If there is bleeding in or over the brain because of a tear in an artery or vein, loss of blood flow and injury to the brain tissue by the blood will also result in brain damage.

Stroke

500

If the blood flow is depleated of oxygen, then irreversible brain injury can occur from no oxygen or reduced oxygen.

Hypoxia or Lack of Oxygen

Techniques for the Classroom

100

What is one thing a teacher could daily post on the board to keep a student on task?

A teacher could post the schedule of the day on the board.

200

How would providing a checklist for a student with TBI help their performance in the classroom?

Providing a student with their own checklist will help them to remember what they have to do and will help to keep the student on task.

300

By having classmates watch videos, read related books, and form peer groups, teachers are preparing students for their...

Return to school

400

What is one way to enforce communication between home and school?

By using a planner.

500

Before talking or giving instructions, teachers should always gain the _________ of a TBI student.

Before talking or giving instructions, teachers should always gain the attention of a TBI student.

TBI Fun

100

Name at least 2 symptoms of TBI.

Headaches, memory loss, fatigue, attention deficits, disorientation, dizziness

200

List one resource teachers can provide to a student with a frontal lobe injury. hint: frontal lobe injury affects problem solving, judgement, planning, emotions, and attention.

Teachers could provide a memory book, sequential lists to complete tasks, limit the number of steps in a task, use real life problems, use checklists to stay on track, model and demonstrate how you can get the answer, and structure thinking using graphs, charts, or timelines.

300

Name one strategy teachers could implement in the classroom for students with temporal lobe injuries. Hint: The temporal lobe controls memory, hearing, sequencing, and language.

Journal writing, a visible calendar with important dates, post a map of the city the students live in, label any cabinets or bins, use repetition, match learning style with instructional method (multiple intelligences), and have students stay with material longer than the class (extended time).

400

Provide 2 strategies teachers could use to assist students with occiptal lobe injuries. Hint: The occiptal lobe controls vision.

Decrease clutter, place text and objects in their view, provide large print books, provide books on tape, and give longer viewing times when introducing new concepts visually.

500

Name 2 strategies teachers could use to assist students with injuries to the cerebellum. Hint: The cerebellum manages balance, coordination, and skilled motor activity.

1. Assist the person with walking and moving positions as needed 2. Follow rec's from OT/PT 3. Decrease written assignments if writing is extremely difficult

Scenarios

100

Jessica had been hit by a car the previous year and was now attending regular high school classes, with resource room supports. The school’s needs primarily focused on Jessica’s relationships with her peers. She was being teased and called names because of her forgetfulness and slowness. She would usually respond by yelling at her classmates, which would disrupt the class for several minutes each day, with the length and frequency of disruption escalating over time.

Teachers felt need for a daily planner to help her get and stay organized, urged the use of a tape recorder, and encouraged that the resource room teacher provide Jessica a program to structure her time and activities before and after school. These cognitive interventions would ultimately enhance Jessica’s functioning and her success in the classroom, and, as a result, decrease ridicule by her peers. Asking to be excused allowed her to remove herself from potential conflict, thus, giving herself time to calm down in a quiet place. The teachers were encouraged to allow Jessica to leave the classroom for brief periods, whenever she experienced increasing fatigue or agitation.

200

Julie was referred for psychoeducational evaluation when she was six. Her teacher was concerned about her, as she seemed immature, accident prone and unfocused. Yet, her parents and teacher also knew Julie to be highly verbal. She was from a family of high achievers: expectations ran high. Her history was ‘normal’. She was a full-term baby, was healthy, and had reached all developmental milestones as expected. One historical fact should have flashed a warning light, but didn't: She had been in a car accident when she was two years old.

After two years, Julie's parents requested a reevaluation, as she was “falling behind” in school and they felt that she might benefit from exposure to “mainstream expectations of learning”. At 10, Julie’s IQ had declined to the low average range. She no longer evidenced verbal strengths and continued to show weaknesses in short-term memory. Speech/language evaluation indicated delays in receptive vocabulary, word-finding difficulties and poor articulation. Julie was observed as being restless, distractible, anxious and depressed. She was again classified as LD, but, largely because of parental pressure, she was transferred to a mainstream class, with a continuation of speech therapy and counseling. Our staff suggested that the school psychologist reassess Julie using a cognitive battery designed to pinpoint Julie’s cognitive deficits/strengths. This assessment will give her teachers and therapists a better idea about how to reach and teach Julie in the future.

300

Yvette is a 15-year-old, who prior to her brain injury was earning A’s and B’s and was on the honor role. In the ninth grade, she was in a car crash that left her in a coma. After regaining consciousness, she underwent rehabilitation for several weeks. Five months after injury, neuropsychological testing revealed that Yvette’s major cognitive problems were in the areas of memory, information processing speed and executive functioning. Her verbal skills and reasoning remained relatively intact and serve as cognitive strengths.

To help compensate for memory problems, the use of a lap top computer and tape recorder was recommended. To help her avoid distractions, it was recommended that her desk be placed away from competing stimuli (e.g., the window, door and ‘noisy’ classmates). In terms of teaching style, it was recommended that directions be broken down into steps and that concrete demonstrations be used in ‘translating’ abstract ideas/concepts.

400

Sometimes one person’s story can convey the stories of a thousand people. One such story comes from a mother, who is also a special educator. Wearing her special educator ‘hat,’ she was attending a workshop on TBI when she realized “her son was being described.” This child, who is now five, was brain injured when he was 18 months old. So, for over three years, she felt she had been “living in a fog” − a fog of not knowing what his problem was nor how to really help him. No one had put together the fact that her son’s brain injury was the cause of his subsequent problems, including expressive language difficulty. He had been getting speech therapy all along, but his progress was so slow that this mother was beginning to feel her child was possibly retarded.

Following formal evaluation, her son is now working with a speech therapist who specializes in working with children with TBI. This mother has learned a variety of ways to reach him, to get around his deficit. Her experience in solving the puzzle of her son has been an awakening for her, to the point that she now wants to become an advocate for children with TBI. She says that one of the things she has learned in this experience is that as a teacher of children with learning disabilities she has usually taught to the child’s deficits. As a mother of a child with TBI, she now sees that she must primarily work to the strengths of her son.

500

My name is Sabrina, I go to Edward Millen Community School. I am 18, I live in Sioux with my family. When I was 13, September 20th 1995, I was hit over the head with a lead pipe. I was rushed to the hospital with a 10% chance of living and I don’t remember anything from the hospital. I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t eat, I remember how to swallow. I couldn’t remember how to do anything. I was really lonely after the accident. I felt that nobody understood what I was going through because they haven’t been through what I have been through going through Speech Therapy, seeing a counselor, learning how to talk, eat, even to walk again, couldn’t even say popsicle in the hospital.

Have an aid work with Sabrina, allow for accommodations and modifications (fpr example, writing), wheel chair and handicap accessability, and allow for time to talk about her struggles (for example with the teacher or school counselor).