ADD Student

Archive for October, 2008

Is your ADD child a visual learner? Many people with Attention Deficit Disorder are visual learners. That means they learn best with visual aids, like charts and pictures.

Auditory learners (who learn best by listening) typically have the easiest time in school because most classrooms are structured as listening environments. Visual learners are sort of in between auditory learners and kinesthetic learners when it comes to success in school.

Here is a very basic visual representation of that idea:

Better grades –>
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Kinesthetic learners Visual learners Auditory learners

You can find out what kind of learner your child is by taking this simple test.

If your child scores high as a visual learner, here are a few ideas to help them succeed in school:

Before they read any assigned text, have them skim through the pages looking for charts and pictures. Ask them to spend some time with these, seeing if what they represent makes sense. It will make it easier for them to understand the text when they read it.

Encourage them to draw pictures of concepts or ideas to help them make sense. Sometimes mapping something out on paper helps them understand the underlying relationships. For instance, studying Henry VIII and all of his wives might be confusing, but if you drew out a chart, it would make more sense. It also helps with retention.

Look for visual aids to help your child understand. A movie about how earthquakes happen, or a chart showing the development of a butterfly. Your child’s textbooks are a good place to begin, not only in the book itself, but also on the publisher’s website. Most textbook publishers these days have a site with extra information.

Use language as a visual tool. For instance, let’s say your child has to memorize something that has 5 components. Take the first letter of each part; let’s say they are f, d, e, i, and c. Now make a compelling visual sentence from those letters: fat dogs eating ice cream. That will bring up a visual in their head and help them remember what the parts are.

Remember, images are the way your child thinks, learns, and remembers. Use them to your advantage whenever you can.

Do you have a kinesthetic learner? If you have a child with Attention Deficit Disorder, you might.

Kinesthetic learners learn best with hands on styles of instruction. They often struggle more in school because a good portion of what’s being taught doesn’t utilize hands on methods. In addition, they have a need to get up and move around – they actually learn better if they can – but you can see how that wouldn’t work in school.

There are a couple of things you can do at home that might help:

Encourage them to move as they study, if possible. Reading can be done while pacing, and so can studying for an exam.

Find something small and quiet for them to fiddle with, preferably something that they can use in school. I have a pen with little beads attached to the top of it – something like that might work. Giving their hands something to manipulate helps calm that need to move around. Also, the tactile experience of feeling the same thing in your hand that you had when you were studying can trigger memory and help retention.

Whenever possible, find multi-media resources to reinforce what they’re learning. An online video, for example, or a movie made from the book they are reading. A great place to start is the textbook your child is using. Many publishers these days are supplementing their books with websites that have more information. That could be just what your child needs.

If you don’t know what learning style your child is, there are several tests available online, including mine.

Recently, I wrote about the way that school is taught these days, and how the basic process hasn’t changed in too many years.

The same is true for how classrooms are managed, especially when it comes to assignments and homework.

One of the most common questions that I get comes from parents who are struggling with the homework issue. Either their child is forgetting that there is homework, not bringing the materials home, or failing to turn the homework in the next day.

Here’s the process:

The teacher tells the class the next day’s assignment.

Your child has to:

hear it
write it down
remember it at the end of the day and bring the proper things home
do it
bring it to school the next day
be able to find it and remember to turn it in at the right time

The only thing that’s changed in this process in a hundred years is that kids have paper and pencils now instead of slates and chalk.

Guess what? Kids today have computers, too, and internet access. Even if the family doesn’t own a computer, there are ones available at the local library.

Here’s a radical idea: why not use the wonder of the internet to solve this problem once and for all? After all, kids had ADD a hundred years ago and struggled with their homework. That part isn’t likely to change, but the process can.

You know, teachers and professors in college give their class a syllabus. It’s an overview of the coming school term, including when assignments are due, what the assignments are, and when to expect tests or special projects.

I’ve mentioned this idea to various teachers over the years and they look at my like I’ve suddenly grown another head. Somehow, that idea is just not possible or practical for them.

Are you telling me they start each school term not knowing what they’re going to teach? Doesn’t the textbook follow a logical order? Are they really so disorganized that they are leaving the possibility of meeting the curriculum goals up to chance? Don’t tell me that something might happen and the schedule would be wrong; that’s what revisions are for.

Here’s what I think the new homework rules should be:

Start each school term with a detailed syllabus. Hand it out the first day and email one to the parents in the first week. Most school forms these days ask for an email address, or at least they should.

If revisions are necessary, hand out a new syllabus and email one to the parents.

Give students the option of emailing their homework to you. They don’t lose it and you don’t lose it (yes, teachers lose things too). Require that they request a receipt when they email it, or set up an automatic reply from your email to let them know you got it.

These few changes can make a huge difference in the lives of ADD kids and their parents. I guarantee you grades will go up once assignments are being turned in regularly.

If you’re a parent, maybe you can share this idea with your child’s teacher, school, or PTA.

If you’re a teacher, I hope you take this to heart. I’ll even make you a deal: if you can’t do this within the framework of your school’s computer system, email me and I’ll tell you how to do it on your own, for free. My advice, and the software for free, with minimal time involved.

Let’s start making a real difference and drag homework into the 21st century.