My son has ADHD and I have had a lot of problems with him doing his homework. He can’t stay seated long and what it does he rushes through without paying any attention to the quality of work that he does. He is in the 4th grade and the work is very demanding i.e. reading comprehension, time tables etc.
Re: Homework
I can relate to this one. My dd’s homework took 2+ hours a night in 1st grade before all of her “differences” including ADHD were identified. By 2nd grade I learned better - during the 1st grade I had become the task master teacher, no longer her parent, spending virtually all of her non-school time in a negative situation with her. We explained the situation to her 2nd grade teacher at the beginning of the year - she advised that 2nd grade homework shouldn’t take longer than 40 minutes per night and that we should use our judgement when to cut if off depending on dd’s frustration level. While some nights we went beyond 40 minutes, there were only a few nights during the school year that we didn’t complete everything - it was a relief for me (dd didn’t know this) to know that we could cut it off if needed. We also would write down how long she spent on the assignments right on her paper so that the teacher could gauge what was going on. DD started medication which wears off at 5:30 - she gets off the bus at 4:00, gets about a 1/2 hour of down time, then we do homework before dinner while she still has the benefit of the meds. The teacher also told me, “you’re the parent, not the teacher”, an important lesson. Her philosophy, and I completely agreed, was that life is too short for family life to be miserable or frustrating due to homework. My job is to give her the environment which will give her the best chance of succeeding on her own. On the other hand, we continue to stress to our kids that education is important and school is their “job”. We have rules and routines with homework. Homework done at kitchen table, same time every day, no radio, TV, etc. unitl homework is done, and the work is acceptable. Actually, by the end of the school year, we were beginning to have days where we didn’t have to sit down next to her while she was doing it, just be in the same room.
You can take two approaches to this. You can talk to his teacher and try to have his homework amount reduced or trimmed down to the essentials.
With my own son, I knew that wouldn’t be possible at his school so I took the other approach. I spent hours every night with him. I “grounded” him. Together we walked through the homework and with that kind of one-on-one he was able to contend with his ADD and his homework.
Sometimes you can find a family member to help with it and I have friends who’ve hired college students inexpensively to do the same thing. ADHD/ADD kids can sometimes be “grounded” by the presence of another person sitting right with them and helping them with every task. While it takes a commitment of time, it can get the job done.