Fidget-to-Focus Strategies
How do people with ADHD and executive function challenges stay focused on important yet uninteresting tasks? Tasks they know they need to complete, but ones they find dull, tedious, and mundane? It’s a question that clinical psychologist Roland Rotz has been exploring for decades, and a question he continues to ask those attending the adult…
Read MoreUse Chrome Extensions to Reduce Distraction and Increase Productivity
You’re finally making headway on a project after putting it off for weeks and you have an urge to take a little break. Before you know it, hours have passed, and you missed the deadline. Ugh. Can you relate? Individuals with attention-related challenges often have an excellent ability to focus—it’s just that often the focus…
Read MoreMusic Study: A Dance with Attention
MUSIC STUDY IS A DANCE OF THE MIND, a mind we come to know better and better as it bends and grows with a melody. Music study is process-oriented—it is a journey. Through music study, we build a learner’s toolbox—a personal owner’s manual of our own mind, and discover how we can use it strategically.…
Read MoreThe Downside to Technology for Students with ADHD
IN A STUDY CARREL AT YOUR LOCAL COLLEGE CAMPUS, a sophomore sits with sixteen open windows on his laptop. The latest YouTube video pops up just as he starts to write the first sentence of his International Relations paper. Then three friends text about making weekend plans. Two emails come in regarding campus security alerts…
Read MoreBeyond Fight, Flight, or Freeze—the Fib
When did you first tell a lie? You were likely very young (maybe two or three years old), afraid or ashamed of a situation, and used language to protect yourself. What if some fibbing is not a character flaw? What if fibs are a self-preservation response, an outcome of challenges with inhibition, emotional regulation, working…
Read MoreHarness Fidgeting to Improve Focus
“STOP SHAKING YOUR LEGS. You are making the kitchen table move,” said John’s mother. “John, stop tapping your fingers on the desk, you are disturbing the other students,” said John’s teacher. These and similar comments are probably familiar to many of you as individuals who fidget, as parents of children or teens who fidget, or…
Read MoreThe Sirens of Today: ADHD, Social Media, and Self-Regulation
Don’t Stop the Movement!
HAVE YOU EVER FOUND YOURSELF PACING as you talk on the phone or fidgeting while sitting through meetings and lectures? Perhaps you find yourself concentrating better when you are chewing gum? Children are taught to quietly sit still and pay attention in the classroom. But what if this is actually preventing some children from performing…
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