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To accomplish any task you need to be able to concentrate your attention for a time. It is a requirement for learning. Kids not only need to be able to focus on tasks but to stay in the one place long enough so they can listen to and follow instructions.
These reports and articles can help you inform your child of what to do in such situations.
Study Shows Active Children Focus Better In School
Children who are active during the school day are more likely to be better focused and more on-task than their more sedentary peers, an East Carolina University researcher has found.
In a 12 week study of 62 third and fourth graders at Grifton Elementary School, a team of ECU researchers led by exercise and sport science professor Matt Mahar found children were more attentive and on task after participating in physical activity.
We evaluated in this study the effectiveness of a classroom based physical activity program on elementary school aged children's physical activity levels during the school day and on on�task behavior, Mahar said. We found that the kids not only are more physically active, which helps combat the obesity epidemic, but also probably learn better after the Energizers because their on task behavior is better.
The Energizers are a set of 10 minute long movement oriented exercises developed by Mahar and other ECU researchers to promote both physical activity and learning. The teachers were trained to lead their students in a 10 minute activity every day for 12 weeks. The Energizers, which were developed for both elementary and middle school students through funds from the N.C. Department of Public Instruction, are available to anyone and can be found at the DPI's physical education web site: Energizers.
Mahar, whose findings were published in December in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, is concerned with the lack of emphasis on physical activity in public schools and sought, through the Energizers, to integrate movement with age appropriate educational activities.
It's important because even if you can demonstrate its benefit in terms of health, people are more likely to do it if it can help academic performance of students, he said. I think this study shows teachers that that they can have their kids be physically active in class and not only maintain academic performance, but improve it.
Mahar found that the group of students who performed the Energizers were significantly more active during the school day, as compared to groups of students who did not. In all, 243 children in grades kindergarten through four participated in the physical activity segment of the study.
The amount of activity that can be accumulated over the course of a school year from inclusion of just one 10 minute Energizers activity per day is substantial, said Mahar.
We found it is the equivalent to moving about 70 miles per year, he said. He also noted that the effect of the Energizers on on task behavior seemed to be especially strong in students who were least on task before the activity. The low on task students had an increase in on task behavior by 20 percent after participation in 10 minutes of physical activity, according to the study.
Through a grant from the Pitt County Memorial Hospital Foundation, Mahar worked with ECU professors Jeannie Golden and Tom Raedeke, researchers Tamlyn Shields, former ECU graduate student Sheila Murphy, and former ECU professor David Rowe are the on task assessment. He also worked with Rhonda Kenny, Donna Scales and former graduate students Gretchen Collins and Tiana Miller to develop the Energizers.
5 Ideas to Improve your Child's Concentration
To accomplish any task you need to be able to concentrate your attention for a time. It is a requirement for learning. Kids not only need to be able to focus on tasks but to stay in the one place long enough so they can listen to and follow instructions.
Most kids, from time to time, will experience some concentration or focusing difficulties. This is particularly true when they are over tired, over stimulated or over loaded. However some children due to either their physiology or psychology have greater difficulty focusing on tasks and on people than others. Either they find settling into or starting a task a problem or they lose focus easily and leave tasks half done.
There are many things you can do at home to impact on children' concentration levels. Like any skill concentration can be enhanced and made automatic. The trick to effective concentration is to know what to concentrate on and what to filter out.
Here are five ideas you can use to help kids to concentrate better:
Attend to their physiological needs: Most children and teenagers concentrate best after nine hours sleep so make sure they get sufficient sleep. Reduce sugar intake and increase protein levels with lean meat, almonds and eggs. This stimulates their dopamine levels which make concentration easier, particularly for lethargic kids. Frequent breaks for exercise have a similar effect.
Remove distractions at home: List the distractions at home that may prevent your child from concentrating. These include; noise, people, lighting, fighting, fatigue and hunger. List ways to eliminate or reduce and work at them systematically.
Create the mood for concentration: Calming background music, placing a fish tank (with fish) in a place of work and removal of fluorescent lights are some simple ways to make the environment more amenable for concentration. These strategies have been used successfully in overcoming concentration problems in many 'boy friendly' schools.
Introduce sequencing and organization activities: The link between sequencing and concentration is a strong one. Following recipes, setting the table and putting things in alphabetical order are great activities for kids whose have concentration difficulties. Board and card games (such as Concentration!!) promote children's ability to focus on tasks as well.
Figure out what activities your child focuses on best: Some kids concentrate better when they are involved in hands on activities, while others focus better when there are plenty of visual cues to help them. That's why teachers use hand signals such as hands on heads, and fingers on lips to indicate quiet. Look for activities that your child gets lost in; those activities that they can spend literally spend hours in. These activities enhance children's concentration levels.
Like any skill, concentration can be improved and made automatic. Anyone who has learned to drive a car will have had the experience of thinking, How will I concentrate on all these things? Extensive practice allows for the pathways of concentration.
It helps before you begin to assist kids to concentrate better if you pay close attention to their pattern of concentration and see if there are links between diet, their energy pattern, sleep and your own behaviors.
6 Techniques for Improving Focus and Memory
Do you frequently find you or your children forgetting things, such as names, dates and phone numbers? You and your children can learn some memorization techniques, which will help you, remember more than you ever thought possible. Remember names the moment you learn them, recall dates, and telephone numbers, all with ease and consistency.
By learning these memorization techniques, you will discover how to hold onto information instead of constantly having to write things down. These memorization techniques include repeating the information, thinking in pictures and even writing little songs or stories about the information.
Successful Techniques for Memorizing
These are just a few of the techniques you can use but they will help you memorize things like you never imagined:
Mnemonic techniques Mnemonic techniques are specific memory aids. Mnemonics are word games tools or memory strategies. Mnemonics help store and retrieve information from your long term memory. They are an occasion to be creative and have some fun while studying.
Mnemonic Strategy Acronyms. An acronym is a word that is made up by taking the first letter from each word that you want to remember and make a new word from all those letters. Example: if you wanted to remember the names of the Great Lakes, you could learn the acronym HOMES Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior.
Acrostics An acrostic is a sentence which is made by taking the first letter from each word or symbol that you want to remember and then insert another word beginning with that same letter. For example, to help you: remember the planets in our solar system the acrostic is: Man Very Early Made Jars Stand Up Nearly Perpendicular. M = Mercury, E = Earth, J = Jupiter, U = Uranus, P = Pluto, V = Venus, M = Mars, S = Saturn, N = Neptune
Rhymes Thirty days hath September ...(months with 30 days) Step right in, do not be left out. (Movement of blood in and out of the heart) Alphabet Technique: Identify a word that begins with the same sound as each letter in the alphabet. Associate the word's image with the thing to be remembered.
Create A Story to Help Memorize This great memorization technique involve writing a story to help you remember things. If you want to remember these memorization techniques, you might think of a man who goes to the store for a gallon of milk. He keeps repeating the order for milk but the man does not seem to remember where it is. Finally, he shows a picture of milk to the clerk to help him remember what he is supposed to be looking for. Finally, he tells the man a story of how milk is made. Lastly, the man remembers, gives him his gallon of milk and tells the man not to forget to pay for it.
Memorizing through repetition This is probably the one aspect of studying that most people know and dread. However, even though most of us know that we should have lots of repetition, we do not know how important it actually is. In addition, repetition, in the context of memorization, means different interactions with the new material. In other words, it is more than a simple rereading of notes. It could include making flashcards, talking as you draw your mind maps, and writing lecture summaries.
Think in pictures to memorize People with photographic memories think in pictures. When trying to remember the number two, for example, they may think of a light switch that has two settings. Remembering things by thinking in pictures is a great memorization technique that works with many things, especially phone numbers and addresses.
