Focus
by Steven R. Wertz
Question from a parent
My teenage son Mark picks things up so easily in a very distracted kind
of way, but when we actually sit down and he tries to focus, I loose him.
When we sit at a table and try to focus on writing or reading, all the
resistant behaviors come up. I want to help him "get it" without
him knowing that he is being taught. I feel comfortable with Mark’s
resistance and difficulty focusing, and I feel that I am exciting and
creative. How can I help Mark to focus directly, and, if I can’t,
how can I teach him academics indirectly?
Response
Have you ever had the experience of not being able to remember a telephone
number, or a person’s name that you knew you should be able to remember
easily? You rack your brain. You say it is on the "tip of your tongue".
You wonder why you can’t remember, and you think that you should
be able to. Then, after a while, you quit. Within a few minutes of quitting,
while you are thinking of something else, you remember the name or the
telephone number. Focusing brought failure. Giving up brought success.
Most of us have had this experience occasionally. But most of the time we can more easily retrieve information and this kind of phenomenon is a rarity. Now imagine that the reverse is true-- that this kind of difficulty with retrieving information is your day-to -day experience, and that it is rare for you to focus successfully and retrieve information.
Some
children have this kind of difficulty. It is actually harder for them
to be successful when they try. The difficulty may involve memory or other
cognitive systems or it may involve motor systems. Some children have
great difficulty "motor planning". They may try to pick up an
object and be physically unable to do so; minutes later, they perform
the action in a way that appears casual, or off the cuff. Often, these
children are misidentified as "not cooperating", or "resistant".
Some children have lived with this circumstance for a while, and they
want to give up before they start.
A particular child’s lack of focus might be similar to what we experience when we have difficulty retrieving information, or it could be very different. Remain open to unusual possibilities, and make observations. No matter what the causes, here are some suggestions.
Suggestions
- Don’t quit. Even if it’s hard for your child or young adult
to respond when he focuses or tries, believe that he can work through
this. Continue to challenge and encourage him, and give him things to
practice focusing on.
- Start with ‘set work’. Use questions and tasks that you
both know that she knows. Get her focusing and responding systems going
with set work. Then build to tasks that are more challenging. This can
be done in a single session.
- If you use set work, talk to your young adult. Tell him that it is
important that he keep trying and that he continues to focus and work.
Tell him that you want to start with simpler material. Explain that
you know that he knows the material. That is not the issue. You want
to start with simpler material so that he can focus and plan his responses.
Say something like "Mark, I know you know this. I know that you
are very smart. I am asking you to do this so you can get your brain
wheels greased. This is the warm up." Then make your first request
and encourage him to make a focused and controlled response.
- Sometimes, people with focusing problems do better when they are in
physical contact with another person. Work with her in contact, then
not in contact, and see if there is a difference in her responses. The
contact could be as simple as a hand on the back.
- React, celebrate and cheer even small responses to known material,
if he does something that you ask him to do. In order to respond to
your request, or answer your question, he has to focus, process and
motor-plan. Every time he does this and responds in a controlled, methodical
and timely manner, he is achieving something great. Sometimes with older
children, the teacher has caught the "I know he can do that"
virus and doesn’t cheer and react enough. Just because he could
do it yesterday, that doesn’t mean he can do it today.
- Look at the ergonomics of the task that you are asking her to perform.
If you are asking her to write, be sure that she is in good position
and that her body is well supported, and that the work is in a good
place in relation to her body. When the ergonomics are poor, the person
has to work harder to support her body and to achieve the task. This
leads to poorer responses and more difficulty focusing, because there
are too many demands on a system that can’t handle them.
- The combination of having real difficulty in focusing, and being asked
to do tasks that have an undetermined length can be lethal. Take a page
from the Teacch Program. Use a visual schedule and a clock to show how
long the focused learning session will be. Start with 15 minutes. Try
to have something relatively fun and easy come before, and something
fun and rewarding come after. (For many kids, this could be computer
time). Also, you can make the task itself visually limited in size.
If you want him to write, you might ask him to complete a work sheet
that has five items on it. As he completes each item, cross it off.
Help him see that he is moving toward completion. (In the Teacch Program,
they would put a task basket on his left and a finish basket on his
right. Items go from the task basket to the finish basket as he completes
them and he can see himself move toward completion. Start now with smaller
and fewer tasks and rebuild his stamina.)
- Adapt tasks so that they correspond to her interests. If she likes
dinosaurs or Pokemon, you can adapt the task so that she is reading
and writing about these interests. Help her see what is "in it"
for her. One of the difficulties with older kids is that they have lived
without certain abilities for a number of years, and they think they
are doing fine. Why should they work to gain more abilities? Help your
child see that she can improve her life and get more of what she wants
by focusing and gaining new skills.
One young man had difficulty focusing on and identifying numbers. His teacher brought him special things in a satchel. He liked opening the satchel and receiving what was inside. One day she put a combination lock on it. Some days, she kept the combination the same, and on others days she changed it. For the boy, there was a new benefit in identifying numbers. Another child liked cooking and food, but she didn’t like to read. They started to cook from recipes. She began to view reading as a thing of value.
- If the student has difficulty with directed learning, I believe in helping them past the hurdle, so that they can learn to enjoy and to succeed at directed learning. But for these children, directed learning sessions might still comprise a smaller part of the day. There are sources for learning in a way that is less directed. For ideas and inspiration about less directed learning, read John Holt’s book "How Children Learn". Check out the website www.holtgws.com. They refer to less directed learning as "non-schooling" and have a variety of materials available for ideas and inspiration.
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1999
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