h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Auditory Processing Disorder - A936416
Author: dolfrog - U207197

I and most of my family suffer from Auditory Processing Disorder (APD). We only found out about APD 4 years ago, when my eldest son was diagnosed.
At the time there was very little information available about APD in the UK. I have had to research APD via the internet, and to try and get the help my son needs to tkat his GCDEs next year I co-founded APDUK, and helped create the APDUK web site, so we could both effectively loby the education system and help others who may have APD.

You say this is a copy of a handout. Does that mean it's not your own work? If so, you will have to remove it, as it is undoubtedly copyright, so h2g2 cannot host it. Please write an article in your own words and I will willingly comment on it for you.

Tango

Hi dolfrog

I think even if you own the copyright to the web site or have permission to reproduce it, what we really appreciate on h2g2 is original writing that hasn't appeared elsewhere. By all means insert a link to the web site, but rather than just copying that information here perhaps you could give us some good stuff that doesn't appear there?

This is a very interesting topic and I'm sure it would very welcome, but for the Edited Guide you do need to write something up afresh rather than just copying it.

Hi Tango

Yes it is an edited version of the handout from the APDUK web site. And I wrote the original handout for the web site. So it is my own work on both counts.
And the web site handout is base on a submission I was asked to write on behalf of my son when his school were applying for Ear Marked Pupil Funding Last year. So I have been responsible for each revision of this description of Auditory Processing Disorder. It is all my own work which also happens to be published as a handout by APDUK.
I also design, edit, and publish the APDUK web site.

Other members of the APDUK executive committee have contributed to some of the other web pages especially the membership pages and the IEP ideas page.


dolfrog

Hi Bels

It took me over a year of editing and using terms which would be understood by nonAPDs to describe what Auditory Processing Disorder is
so that other could understand what I and other APDs have to go through everyday just to survive. APDs like myself have have problems using text to express what we mean in comparision to nonAPDs.
WE have problems processing auditory or verbal information, and so we have more problems reproducing the written word which merely Auditory or verbal code. The one major difference between the handout on the web site and the submitted version is the lack of colour in the text formatting. This formatting is coping strategy APDS use when reading the text of others, or when preparing their own text and is very time consuming. So I hope you understand the reason why i will not be submitting a further text. Especially as It is all my own work anyway, and took months to reach its curent form.

dolfrog

Hi dolfrog

I do appreciate that a fantastic amount of time and effort must have gone into producing the web site, and the result is excellent in my view.

Regarding your very interesting and informative h2g2 entry, I can see no reason why it shouldn't remain part of the Guide. Whether it goes into the Edited Guide section is an entirely separate matter. Not everything that is submitted goes in, but anyway that wouldn't be for me to decide.

But anyone searching here for information on APD will find it anyway, and after a while the search engines such as Google should bring it up too. That would all help to point people to your web site as well as bringing people to this h2g2 site, so I'm sure it's very welcome all round.

By the way, here's a tip: if you put http:// immediately in front of www.apduk.org near the top of your entry that will convert it into a link (http://www.apduk.org), as you have done with the sites mentioned towards the end of the entry. You can also do that with www.dolfrog.com on your Personal Space.

So congratulations on all your hard work, and let's hope the word gets spread and good things happen for you and your family and all the other sufferers.

Bels

If it's all your own work then it could well be a useful part of the guide, edited or otherwise. <./>ThePost</.> might be interested, if it doesn't get into the EG.

Tango

Hi Tango

If anyone wishes to validate that this is all my own work then it is possible to gain confirmation from the other members of the APDUK Executive Committee, who can be contacted via the Contact page of the APDUK web site. http://members.tripod.com/dolfrog/contact_apduk.htm

dolfrog

I saw that you were trying to convert your entry to GuideML...

When editing the entry, you need to remove the added and tags. After that, click the "GuideML" option then "Change style". Once you've done this, you'll need to surround all the paragraphs with and like this: Each paragraph's text.

You can then change the links to this form: Google

RhoMuNuQ

I read the entry to some extent but was turned off by its formal approach, and I skim read the previous comments. Apologies if I have therefore missed the point.

Here are my thoughts on how to make it better, and some questions that you could answer to give it a different angle (assuming I didn't miss the answers).

- as I say I found this quite formal. How about writing it more like you would tell it down the pub. Of course it should stay in the third person i.e. no "I did this"/"I did that"s.
- The Guide isn't great on personal angles, but how about introducing more personal examples to it. Are there any times when it is funny, or funny misunderstandings come as a result of it? Or is life totally miserable as a result.
- What are the odds of it occurring?
- Is it a spectrum of severity? I assume if most of your family have it, it is genetic, but could it have an environmental cause?
- how do you want people to treat you?
- how should spouses/other family members treat you?
- is it treatable?
- how does it get diagnosed? what's the state of research into it?
- you mention dyslexia. how do the odds compare? is it something that will become more prevalent/diagnosed as awareness increases?
- I saw something in your comments about writing it in a way to allow APDs to understand. How about splitting the entry in two. Write a section that APDs can understand, then rewrite it how a non-APDs would. The juxtaposition would perhaps give the reader an idea of what APDs are going through.

Hope this helps,
BBS

Hi RhoMuNuQ

Thank you for your advice, I have done as you suggested.

Unfortunately I do not have as much tiome as I would like to come on site to look at the posts and make changes. Progress has suddenly accelerated on the APDUK charity front, and I have a great deal sort out there. But i will try to fit in this project when I can.

dolfrog

Hi BBS

The ideas and suggestions are good one which i intend to follow up.
Unfortunately time is not on my side at the moment.
My APDUK Charity activities have just recently multiplied, from me sending one or two emails to various parties and the odd reply to contend with, to many email replies needed on a daily basis, and maintining my daily visit schedule to the various disability forums.
All of which is needed to gain more information regarding APD and other related disabilities.

But the many of the changes you suggest will eventually be made.

Thanks for looking

dolfrog

Hmmmm.... If it's going to be awhile (as in, on the order of months), dolfrog, how would you feel about removing the entry from Peer Review and then resubmitting it when you've had time to work on it?


Mikey

Dolfrog last posted on 16 Feb, so I think they've been rather occupied elsewhere, so I'll propose a move to the FM. Should AggGag be alerted to this as a possible for the post, etc?

spelugx -- <./>scout</.>

2nd as to the move.

As to the other stuff, I'm not sure. Essentially, the entry is taken from a handout the author wrote for another website -- I'm really not sure what duplicating the entry as is in the post or AggGag as is would have over just providing a link to the original. I think what we were hoping would happen here is that the author would have time to reshape the material from the handout into something more guide-entry like, more geared towards this audience.

My

Hi Scout and all

I have been sufferring from pneumonia and a re-occuring breathing problem which since the new year. And my computer crashed due a virus in mid_ march, and H ave only just begun to reprogram my computer and return to my old sites.
Also much has happened in the interim, we have ahd a meeting with the new Director of the Institute of Hearing Research of the Medical Research Council, and i was invited to a Lecture about APD at City University London. There was also the first UK APD conference for professional in April jointly hosted by UCL and Great Ormond Street Hosptal.

We have also located the first APD clinic in the UK based at Sheffield University.

So things have been very busy, and due to my own poor health I have not been able to spend time on all my projects. Especially as my computer has been out of effective action for almost a month.


dolfrog