We recently had a meeting with the teacher of our child who is LD. She said he has “learned helplessness” , has been frustrated, cries easily and does not correct his mistakes when given the 2nd opportunity., Has anyone ever heard of learned helplessness and what can we do? Some of the behaviors that she has described sound like LD and ADD- the very problem…. thanks, concerned mom
Re: parent teacher meeting
I agree with Socks and have seen overwhelmed children behave this way. I think it’s a learned response which serves a purpose (although not a conscious one). It gets other people to do things for them. Parents and teachers step in and help. If the adults did not step in, the child might attempt more, but it’s a hard line to draw, i.e., between what the child truly can’t do and what they can do and won’t try, because they’ve found that an adult will step in.
Best approach, I think, is to find lots of encouragement strategies and ask the teacher to do the same. Accusing a child of “not trying” is not an encouraging strategy.
Carol
Learned helplessness
was discovered while experimenting with dogs— when they were given shocks they could not escape, they eventually gave up trying, even after they were given a way to escape. Kids with learning differences can begin to feel like nothing they do makes a difference, so why keep on trying? They do not expect to be successful after so many unsuccessful experiences. The “cure” is lots of successes— break things down into very small pieces that he can handle, give him lots of reinforcement for trying, and gradually increase the difficulty as he begins to experience success. ADD kids often want to “get things over with”- going back and correcting mistakes is torture— it was awful enough trying to complete the assignment in the first place. Cut the workload way back, and he may be more willing to make those corrections.
Re: Learned helplessness shows that the learning environment
is hostile to the child. I agree with all of the other posters. The problem is not with the child, but with an environment that does not meet his needs in such a way that he can hope to be successful. He has learned that, no matter how hard he tries, he will fail. The solution is to re-design the learning environment so that he can start to be successful.
Mary
Re: parent teacher meeting
You can continue to be encouraging and supportive and to help your child whenever they need it. The teacher on the other hand, needs to approach your child as if they are capable of success and as if she believes in his right to achieve it. This is not the same as being easy, this is tailoring expectations so that they are challenging and achievable- and communicating that fact uequivocably to the student. “this is harder- but you can do it” and then keeping the quantity such that it is reasonable but not overwhelming. When confronted with this sort of behavior in a child it is the teacher who needs to take the lead in making a change- she is the adult after all- and the child has already been trained.
Robin
Re: parent teacher meeting
I think 2nd grade is awfully young for anyone to say the child has “learned helplessness.” I would agree with you. His frustration in school more likely stems from inabilites deriving from his learning differences.
Ask her why she thinks his learning differences are not the problem?
This is a common term used to describe a child who is overwhelmed with what is expected of him.
I am sure others will have a different opinion. My children were termed this on many occassions. Frankly,unless the teacher has hard data to show he is quite capable of doing the work and won’t,I don’t buy it.