Articles

At the elementary level we suggest that homework is brief, at your child’s ability level and involve frequent, voluntary and high interest activities. Young students require high levels of feedback and/or supervision to help them complete assignments correctly. Accurate homework completion is influenced by your child’s ability, the difficulty of the task and the amount of feedback your child receives. When assigning homework, your child’s teachers may struggle to create a balance at this age between ability, task difficulty and feedback.

It is important to set a family rule for homework time, such as “homework must be done between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. Homework time should not be assigned late in the evening nor when your child is tired. Enforcing time schedules for homework is an effective way of increasing the number of assignments completed. However, when you do not monitor the time schedule, you may discover that your child will not maintain the schedule independently.

The key step in this process is to provide children with positive directions. This step assists parents and educators in determining whether punishment, management or skill building is the most appropriate intervention at the time.

A number of years ago I offered a metaphor to help parents accept and understand the nature of ADHD. In light of the emerging body of research reflecting the delayed development of self-control in children with ADHD, it is worth re-visiting this concept.

Excessive correction reduces everyone’s motivation and increases feelings of low self-worth. Be sensitive when providing feedback. Learning occurs in safe environments where children do not need to defend their actions, strategies or opinions.