ADD Student

Archive for November, 2008

The other day on Twitter, someone asked me a very interesting question: is there a relationship between Attention Deficit Disorder and overeating?

Actually, yes there is. In fact, almost any behavior that is taken to an extreme can be a form of what is called self-medicating. It’s an attempt to soothe anxiety, fight off boredom, or burn off excess energy, and it can take many forms.

Overeating or emotional eating is one way a person with ADHD might soothe themselves. This is especially true for children, who have fewer outlets than adults, but lots of women can relate, too.

Drinking too much – whether it’s alcohol, coffee, or Diet Coke – is another way to self-medicate. Others include using drugs (legal, illegal, over the counter – even cough drops all count), gambling, shopping (to extreme) – even sexual behavior.

The fact that it is happening is a sign that action needs to be taken. Clearly the person is uncomfortable on some level, whether it’s anxiety, boredom, or too much energy.

The first step is to figure out what’s triggering the behavior, and then you can start to address it. Just because it’s called self-medicating doesn’t mean that a prescription is needed, although there’s nothing wrong with that if it’s warranted. If it’s a case of too much energy or just a low boredom threshold, you can probably come up with some healthy and easy to do solutions.

Whatever you do, don’t ignore such behavior. And once again, we’re talking about extreme behavior. Everybody gets bored or hyper once in a while, but if you’re noticing new behaviors in an attempt to deal with it, there’s a problem. Take care of it while it’s still small, before it escalates into something worse.

I can’t even imagine what you must think today’s post is about

In fact, it’s about two ideas that work well together to help your ADHD student study more effectively.

Breaks are a cardinal rule when it comes to Attention Deficit Disorder – and not just when it concerns studying.

Your brain, whether it’s ADHD or not, needs a break about every 15-20 minutes to absorb and store new information. Learning something new without taking a break almost guarantees that your brain will lose some information.

A break doesn’t have to be long; a minute or two is fine. Take a bathroom break, get a drink, stretch – whatever. Just give your brain a little rest.

Chunking is the idea of taking a chunk of information and studying it at once.

Let’s say your child needs to read a chapter in their history book for homework. Sitting down and reading start to finish will accomplish very little and allow your child to retain next to nothing.

Instead, think of each chapter section as one chunk. Take 15 minutes to read just that section and understand it. Look at the pictures, the words that are in bold or otherwise highlighted. Try to get as much meaning as possible from that small chunk of information, then take a break.

The break will allow your brain to take what you’ve just put in and file it correctly so that you can retrieve it later.

These are two simple concepts that, when put into regular practice, can make a big difference in your child’s grades and overall learning.

I’m not sure “spatial learners” is an actual term, but the idea behind it is. What I mean by a spatial learner is someone who needs concrete, hands on tools to manipulate and learn.

Kinesthetic learners are often described as hands on learners, but more precisely, they need the movement that comes with hands on types of experiences.

Spatial learners need to see things in concrete form in front of them. Now that doesn’t mean that if you’re learning about farming that you have to drive a John Deere through the classroom, but it does explain the value of field trips.

Spatial learning concepts can be used for learning about things that are more of an idea than an actual thing. Using M&M’s to teach basic math skills or the concept of grouping is an example.

You can take the idea even further – after all, six M&M’s is still a pretty concrete example of the number 6.

Let’s say you want to teach a basic spelling concept, like how q is always followed by u. And let’s use those M&M’s again. Let’s say all the red M&M’s are the letter q, and all the yellow ones are the letter u. The rest of the M&M’s are other letters in the alphabet.

You can show your child how the red ones have one very best friend – the yellow ones. But the yellow ones are more friendly, social and outgoing. They have lots of friends. So if you see a red M&M, you will always see a yellow one with it. But if you see a yellow one, it might have a red one with it, or maybe a green one or brown one. Get it?

Spatial learners basically need something concrete in their hands to go with the ideas they are trying to grasp. You might want to go easy on the M&M’s though. Lego’s might be a better idea.