After a brief parent teacher talk, I was curious to know if you all have any in-class and home activities for lengthening a kids’ atenttion span?
I suggested to this parent that she and her hubby play board games at home, with the TV off, and read stories to their kids at bedtime. Subtle, but it works.
Your tricks…er, I mean…concentration-enhancing methods?
I’m thinking of doing a larger class with other parents who have the same difficulties.
Back in the mid 60s my dad did it with a belt. (belt used lightly though, I do not want to tell lies about my good father, he was not a kid beating maniac but—he was Old Skool)
Sadly the technique does not give lasting results; I am-40 years later-still prone to spacing outttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt.
:roflmao: :joker: :roflmao: :joker: :roflmao: :roflmao: :roflmao: :roflmao:
Oh JD, you’re SUCH a kidder!
Mi Papa was manos de la piedra in pre Roberto Duran days.
But that was not usually a concern.
Now, with the YoungCowboy, its an issue with both him and the Tai Tai.
I don’t know. I wish I did. But I don’t.
Candy and pizza.
Walk around with really bright colored clothers and bells hanging from various places of your clothing. Die your hair pink, too.
I don’t know. Kids don’t come with instructions.
put yourself in the child’s place. Did you have a long attention span when you were in a class you didn’t like? Doubt it. Most kids respond to what they like. As adults we tend to judge kids upon where we are at in life but we have to remember where we where when we where kids.
The best way to get a kid to pay attention is to make the activity intersting for them, and to remeber they arent’ adults. They don’t have the experience or hindsight to grasps the impact of lack of attention.
In other words , put yourself in their shoes…
Turning the TV off is probably the best thing to do. Read to the kids. Spend time with them rather than dashing them off every which way…
And most importantly:
Realize that children have short attention spans naturally and that as they get older, their attention spans will get longer.
Do not expect a 3-year-old to sit still for a 30-minute circle time (or even worse, a lesson in a chair at a desk or table).
Edit Just found this little article through google, reinforcing that reading to a child is key to helping them maintain focus on one activity:
littleonesreadingresource.co … ldren.html
I like to slip my kids some RITALIN anal-rectally when they’re not looking. Ritalin is chemically similar to cocaine and works on the brain in a similar manner, except that it takes longer to take effect and lasts longer, decreasing its addictive qualities.
Give a minute of attention span for each year old the child is. Build from there.
Related topic:
Apparently it requires an enormous amount of brain power to look at someone’s face, because we try to ‘read’ it and interpret every nuance of expression.
Kids engaged in difficult mental activity tend to avoid the distraction by looking away so that they can focus on the problem. I’m glad I don’t teach kids because I’d be one of those teachers jumping up and down saying “look at me and answer the question” instead of letting them concentrate.
Try teaching with a paper bag over your head.
There
I studied the Montessouri method for a while. Many of their activities are geared to getting the student to lengthen his or her attention span. One of their main tenets is that when a child focuses their attention on one task it aids in the developement of their intellect.
The toys they use involve stuff like stacking things or arranging things or pouring water into things. Whether or not it works, I don’t know.
[quote=“Richardm”]I studied the Montessouri method for a while. Many of their activities are geared to getting the student to lengthen his or her attention span. One of their main tenets is that when a child focuses their attention on one task it aids in the developement of their intellect.
The toys they use involve stuff like stacking things or arranging things or pouring water into things. Whether or not it works, I don’t know.[/quote]
I think it does. It is controlled playing IMHO. Children who are TAUGHT to play by their parents, in my experience, have better concentration skills. Parents who say, “Go play” and don’t encourage young children, under 4, or show them HOW to play lack good concentration skills.
I like the Monstersorry system, but DAMN, it ain’t cheap.
Actually, Montessori activities don’t necessarily rely on buying their equipment per se. You can cut different-sized wood blocks for stacking or use paint sample cards from a home improvement store to help kids sort different colors (two of the Montessori activities my school has the real deal for, but can be made for much cheaper that what they spent). The Montessori method focuses on children mastering skills one at a time and not moving on until they do. In essence, it almost punishes children for not focusing. But then again, I’m not the biggest fan of Montessori as a teaching method. There are many different approaches for teaching young children.
The ability to pay attention is a learned one, not an innate one. You have to practice it to get better at it. If a child spends all his or her free time sitting in front of a TV where a single scene might last for a few minutes and be full of noises and actions, then it’s not hard to figure out why they can’t handle doing a single task in school in silence.
First and foremost, turn off the TV. Second, as smell the glove mentioned, put them to bed at a decent hour and give them a normal routine. They get predictable routines at school and then as soon as they get home: chaos. They sometimes watch TV at all hours of the night, rarely have a set bedtime, and even get dragged out of bed to go to an all-night buffet after midnight…
[quote]The ability to pay attention is a learned one, not an innate one. You have to practice it to get better at it. If a child spends all his or her free time sitting in front of a TV where a single scene might last for a few minutes and be full of noises and actions, then it’s not hard to figure out why they can’t handle doing a single task in school in silence.
[/quote]
bing
go
Many parents would disagree. Kids find it easier to focus on something they’ve chosen themselves and are interested in. The expectation of one minute for every year of age might be reasonable for a planned craft or other activity before moving onto something different, but if a child is really interested in something and is allowed to explore it at his/her own pace (and without distraction from those around, including proud mom and dad), he might surprise you with how long he can focus.
It’s the reason people are moving away from toys that entertain, to simple toys that allow children to explore them and come up with different ways to play with them, like plain blocks without cartoons or other pictures on them, flat squares of fabric, simple dolls that don’t poop or drink from a bottle, etc.[/b]
[quote=“braxtonhicks”]
It’s the reason people are moving away from toys that entertain, to simple toys that allow children to explore them and come up with different ways to play with them, like plain blocks without cartoons or other pictures on them, flat squares of fabric, simple dolls that don’t poop or drink from a bottle, etc.[/b][/quote]
ACtually, this is what I was talking about BC. My son and I used to play with those mega blocks, and build huge towers, and he would go on to build garages for his hotwheels and airplanes to crash into the walls.
My fault for not clarifying. When I said teach them how to play, I meant NOT how to play organized games, but how to have fun with anything. 
jds
Modeling play and the language one can use for interacting is very useful for children. When I taught young children for whom my class was their first experience playing with people outside of their families, I often had to model play, appropriate play language, and let them see ways the toys could be manipulated before they felt comfortable doing it by themselves and coming up with their own creative play. I helped them gain an interest in some areas (especially with dress-up since it was such a new concept to a lot of them), helped them find constructive ways to use toys (like making different kinds of transportation or objects with Tinker Toys rather than making guns and swords), let them see how the toys worked (how to put together the wooden train track), and demonstrate how to take care of the toys gently so others could use them and how to return them in their appropriate places when finished. Often I would have to intervene to show them more appropriate ways to play and manipulate toys when play became violent or hurtful to others.
The last ECE meeting I attended talked about open-ended play and toys versus goal-oriented play and toys - Legos versus Speak and Spell and a return to natural materials instead of everything being made of smooth plastic. It was a very interesting workshop that gave me a lot of ideas. It also explained why my nephew prefered stacking my mother’s many different candle jars on the floor and hearing the sounds they made when he tapped metal lids on them (while supervised by his Auntie Tare-Bear for safety, of course!) over playing with the plastic vet clinic set he got for Christmas.
I wonder if videotaping them in “bad” behavior and talking about it as we wached the videos together would help…
[quote=“jdsmith”][quote=“braxtonhicks”]
It’s the reason people are moving away from toys that entertain, to simple toys that allow children to explore them and come up with different ways to play with them, like plain blocks without cartoons or other pictures on them, flat squares of fabric, simple dolls that don’t poop or drink from a bottle, etc.[/b][/quote]
ACtually, this is what I was talking about BC. My son and I used to play with those mega blocks, and build huge towers, and he would go on to build garages for his hotwheels and airplanes to crash into the walls.[/quote][quote=“ImaniOU”]The last ECE meeting I attended talked about open-ended play and toys versus goal-oriented play and toys - Legos versus Speak and Spell and a return to natural materials instead of everything being made of smooth plastic. It was a very interesting workshop that gave me a lot of ideas. It also explained why my nephew prefered stacking my mother’s many different candle jars on the floor and hearing the sounds they made when he tapped metal lids on them (while supervised by his Auntie Tare-Bear for safety, of course!) over playing with the plastic vet clinic set he got for Christmas.[/quote]
Great stuff. I absolutely agree. When I was a kid we had some Playmobil figures but also a lot of big wooden blocks including some interestingly shaped offcuts from a carpenter we knew. We used the blocks to make intricate houses with secret passages and hiding places for the Playmobil people.
We used to go to a kind of new-agey hippyish farm for a week every summer. The carpenter there built a “treescraper” mostly from pallets. Probably not very safe, but great fun to play in.
The imagination is a wonderful thing. Who was it who said that the best pictures are on the radio?
:bravo: :bravo:
“And now, the REST of the story…” Paul Harvey