Bonus Article: Tips For Helping Your Child With ADHD Start a New School Year
A child with ADHD looks just like all the other kids in class. They are excited by the new school year, loving their new tennis shoes, and wondering when it’s time for recess.
School is difficult for unique thinkers and as these children get older, their problems can become more challenging. The start of each new year can mean a lot of new conversations with new teachers, new kids, just so much new.
If you live your life without ADHD, you have a filter that you use to manage all the new information that is coming in every day. For a child with this challenge, they live without this filter and new input just keeps flooding in. Or more accurately, they have a filter that they don’t know how to use yet.
As this school year begins, focus your attention on teaching your child about processing the new information. Here are three tips for helping them:
Try to Limit Distractions
When your child is studying at home, try to keep distractions to a minimum. Have a set space for doing homework will help keep them focused. Talk with their teacher about strategies for helping them in the classroom. Maybe that means using headphones when the teacher isn’t lecturing. Or it could mean placing their desk in the classroom so it has the least amount of distractions.
Add in Breaks in the Schedule
Sometimes the best way to stay focused on a task is to think about something else. That’s right, taking planned breaks from studying helps kids stay on task when they need to. Depending on their age and the intensity of the work, set a timer for 10, 15, maybe 20 to help them stay on schedule. Study for 20 minutes, then take a 5 minute break to run around outside or have a short dance party.
Prepare them for Transitions
Transitions are hard for everyone but if you have trouble filtering new information by its importance or relevance then changing situations is just another added burden to an overworked system. Plan for changes in their day; let them know what to expect ahead of time. Then, get their attention, make eye contact and explain everything that is going to happen next.
These are just a few steps that you can begin right now to help your child with this new school year. Take your time and be patient. Retraining your brain is an ongoing process. But, helping them to learn to manage the information coming in will help them learn to retain the information that is most important.
