How to Focus on School with ADHD
Children with ADHD can be inattentive, hyperactive, distractible, disorganized, anxious, and highly sensitive. These same children can be keen observers, hyperfocused, creative, and empathetic.
Here are some aides to help your child focus on school, capitalizing on their strengths:
Fewer Distractions Because children with ADHD will follow the most prominent stimuli within their purview, finding a room with the least distractions is helpful to keep attention on the work at hand. Distractions come in all forms: voices, music, clocks ticking, colors, reflections. There will always be possible stimuli to take focus off work, but limiting it does help.
Follow Interests Children with ADHD are able to hyperfocus when they find a topic interesting. Seek topics that interest your child and help them learn all about it!
Make Connections Connect the school subject to a topic your child is highly interested in. Demonstrate how the former is incorporated in or relates to the latter. This can make the schoolwork fascinating and important. Your child with ADHD can be highly creative, so helping to make these connections can help make school more interesting.
Kinesthetic Tools Change up the mediums you are using when working on school. Draw on the windows, use chalk on the walls, write on a sandtray. Varying the materials your child uses helps stimulate the brain and keeps the child interested in the work.
Brain Breaks When your child starts fidgeting, take a short break. You can stretch, jump rope, run in place, or any other short exercise to get the blood flowing before refocusing on work.
Healthy Snacks Depending on your child’s dietary needs, find the foods that help your child feel great! Healthy snacks are an excellent way to take a break and refuel the body for future concentration.
Cool Down When frustration rises, take some time to breathe. Some excellent tricks for cooling down are breathing in, count to 3, breathing out, count to 3, repeated several times. Another trick: teach your child to draw the figure 8 on their leg. Breathe in on one loop, breathe out on the other. Cooling down, especially when frustration is high, could be as simple as offering your child a place to sit until they are at peace. No time limit, just be consistent: your child needs to stay in the one spot until they are calm.
Pause If your child has ADHD, they are highly sensitive. When working with your child, take time to think through what it is you want to say or share. You can even say to your child you are taking time to think about how best to phrase what you are thinking. (This is a great example for your child. It is good to think before we speak!)
Use Timers This comes last. Children with ADHD can become hyperaware of time. It is good to use timers to remind a child of scheduled activities. Timers can also be helpful in setting shorter work periods if your child is finding it difficult to focus. If you use timers, use them to a limited degree. The positive hyperfocus of a child with ADHD is better spent on a creative activity than on watching the clock.
Your child has unique traits. Use the aides that work best for you and your child. This will lead to mutual trust and individual flourishing!