What if children do not pay attention? There is a reason you don\’t know

Recently, I have seen a lot of messages from parents about their children’s attention problems. I chose the following two as the beginning of today’s article. Message 1: \”When telling stories to children, they are always absent-minded and looking around. They also like to move around. Why is their concentration so poor??\” Message 2: \”Our child is 3 years old, but he is always impatient when doing things, including playing with toys. I lost it in less than two minutes. I couldn\’t concentrate at all. What should I do in kindergarten??\” Almost every message is followed by more than two punctuation marks, and some even reach six or seven. It can be seen how anxious the parents are. I am not unfamiliar with these issues, and I am also very familiar with parents’ reactions. Because in the process of my own teaching, my parents often give feedback on similar questions, and the key words around them are \”attention\”. Psychologically speaking, what we mean by \”attention\” is \”attention.\” The so-called attention refers to the direction and concentration of mental activities on certain things. It is the premise and basis for all our activities. The level of persistence and stability of attention will have an important impact on children\’s future learning, emotion, perseverance and quality. It can be seen that parents are right to be anxious. However, being anxious will not help improve children\’s attention. You might as well calm down and understand the development characteristics of children\’s attention together. In psychology, attention is divided into: unintentional attention and intentional attention. Unintentional attention refers to the psychological state that is generated and maintained unconsciously, which is what we often call inadvertent. Parents may have this experience. Some words have not been taught to their children, but one day they can hear them in their mouths. At this time, the question is usually: \”I haven\’t taught her this, how could she say it?\” In fact, you may have said this accidentally one day, and the child heard it, and then she absorbed it. This is unintentional attention at work. Children often remember advertising slogans better than the children\’s songs you have worked hard to teach them, and it is precisely for this reason. Because children in early childhood pay mainly unintentional attention. Intentional attention refers to attention that requires conscious control through volitional effort. In other words, everything that requires you to deliberately remember and spend effort to learn is achieved through intentional attention. Children of preschool age (0-6 years old) are in the initial stage of intentional attention, so the stability of attention is poor and the maintenance time is short. Therefore, the reason why preschool children are always \”unable to sit still\” is because their brain development is not yet complete, their nervous system is highly excitable, and their inhibition is poor. At school age (6-14 years old), as the central nervous system matures, children\’s ability to maintain attention will gradually improve. After understanding the characteristics of children\’s attention development, we can talk about strategies that can be adopted to cultivate children\’s attention. Strategy 1: Multiple choice is not as good as single choice. When I was working in an early childhood education institution, whenever parents said to me: \”Children can\’t concentrate at all when playing with toys, touch this, touch that.\” My first words were rhetorical questions: \” How many toys do you provide your children at a time?\” Usually the parent\’s answer is: \”There is no limit.Yeah, all the toys at home are there. \”Children before the age of 3 have very poor selective attention ability. They cannot ignore additional distractors and are easily affected by irrelevant stimuli. Research by Miller and Weiss respectively found that even children aged 7-10 years old Children cannot filter out stimuli that interfere with current activities very well, and thus cannot concentrate on current activities. Therefore, it is recommended that parents, if they want their children to concentrate on doing one thing, play with the same toy. Surrounding distracting factors The less the better, multiple choices are not as good as single choices. Strategy 2: Create a simple and pleasant atmosphere so that children can concentrate on doing things. Parents should avoid doing things that distract their children, such as when children are concentrating on building blocks. Don’t be too concerned and ask your children “Do you want to drink water?” “Do you want to pee?” “What are you spelling?” and other words or behaviors that may interrupt their attention. It is worth reminding that when children insist on completing One thing, even if it is small. Parents should also pay attention to giving praise in a timely and appropriate manner, so that children can experience the joy, thereby increasing their motivation to concentrate. Strategy 3: Set a specific time to complete specific activities Goals Generally speaking, the more specific the activity goals are, the more helpful it will be for children to clarify what they need to do and thus maintain their attention for a longer period of time. Therefore, in daily life, parents can consciously practice their children to focus on specific goals. habits. For example, parents can print or purchase observation charts suitable for their children\’s age, show two pictures that are basically the same except for a few places, and let the children find the differences in the pictures within the specified time. Strategy 4: Through games Games are children\’s favorite form to cultivate children\’s attention. Game activities can increase children\’s concentration of attention. Here we recommend to parents 2 games that are easy to implement and effective at home to train attention. Game 1: \”What\’s missing\” game preparation: 3-5 toys familiar to children Game process: Place several toys in front of the child at the same time, prompting the child to recognize and remember the types of toys. Then ask the child to close their eyes, and the parents will randomly Take away one or several toys. Ask the child again: \”What toy is missing?\” Let the child concentrate on recalling. Game 2: Boccia (older children can play catch or badminton) Game preparation: Watermelon ball game process: Parents and children face to face with a distance (within 1 meter) and prepare. The parent rolls the ball towards the child, prompting the child to pay attention to the direction of the ball and catch the ball. Then roll the ball back to the parent, and the game repeats. Depending on the specific situation of the child, the distance can be extended or shortened, and the interval between serves can also be faster or slower. Cultivating children\’s attention is not something that can be achieved overnight. It is a task that parents need to work hard on for a long time. Therefore, parents cannot rush. If you use the right method, a development perspective, maintain a normal mind, and work hard in a planned and conscious manner, you will definitely achieve certain results.