Instead of: Try this:
Dear Adina,
My daughter has a hard time sitting down to do her homework. She plays with the dog, does somersaults etc. It drives me crazy! Why can’t she just get to work, concentrate, do it and be done?
1. It’s normal:
I have to make a confession here. I see where you both are coming from. I personally take a little while to get settled when it is time for me to write. I used to get annoyed with myself. I would be all psyched up to work and then I would check my email, the internet, and now Facebook. I finally realized, with some help from a friend, that it is a little ritual I have to ease myself into writing. That is what your daughter is doing. She needs to pet the dog; it gives her some sensory stimulation and so do the somersaults. It helps her get her brain in gear. However, as a mother, I feel for you. We only have a limited amount of time and it seems like she is wasting it. She really is not.
2.Blowing bubbles:
Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine say that chewing gum helps aid concentration and also reduces stress. It may give your daughter the sensory stimulation that she needs to stay on task. Many kids have tried doing their homework while chewing gum and have found that it does help.
Some children find that music and some noise around them helps them concentrate, while other kids need complete silence. It is helpful when we point out to kids the different things they can do to help them concentrate.
3.Disengage and encourage responsibility:
As I mentioned in previous posts, we do not want to get to involved in our kid’s homework. When we make homework our job, children will relinquish the responsibility of homework to us. If we get too worked up about homework, children will respond by not taking it seriously. Why should they take charge of their homework, when they have someone who is much more capable doing it for them.
In this case, explain to her that the somersaults and the dog petting are her way of getting ready to work. It is actually not a bad thing, but that it drives you crazy. You can say, “Let me know when you are really ready to work and when you actually need my help. I will be in the other room until then.”
As I have said in our last post, try to help her create a schedule for her homework. She might also want to learn how long it will actually take her to do her homework, if she needs that extra stimulation before hand. I know that when I schedule 3.5 hours of writing time, a half hour of that, is me messing around on the computer.
Good Luck,
Adina
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