Click here for great holiday gift ideas for everyone on your list 6 ways to make homework less of a battle when your kid has ADHD A child psychiatrist on getting through the after-school hours without a standoff. Tonight’s homework is a single worksheet. Your kid has sharpened every pencil in the house, visited the bathroom twice, and is now face-down on the floor insisting it’s impossible.
You can feel your patience slipping by the second. If homework battles turn your evenings into a standoff, you’re far from alone, especially if your child has ADHD. About 1 in 9 US kids have been diagnosed with the condition , and the American Academy of Pediatrics says it can profoundly affect a child’s academic achievement.
For families managing ADHD, the after-school stretch is often the hardest part of the day. There’s a reason those hours are so trying. By the time a child with ADHD gets home, they’ve spent “six or seven hours working harder than their classmates to sit still and focus,” says Michael Morse, MD, a board-certified child and adolescent psychiatrist who directs the ADHD & Anxiety Center at Alvord Baker and is an associate professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University.
That effort is used up, and for many kids the medication has worn off too, so “the after-school brain is often a tired brain.” The resistance usually isn’t a matter of defiance. Executive function, the set of skills needed for getting started, planning and keeping track of steps, develops more slowly in kids with ADHD. That’s why a child can freeze in front of an assignment they’re fully capable of completing, and why the thing that helps is making the first step smaller rather than pushing harder. **Related**6 ways to make mornings smoother when your child has ADHD Here are six ways Morse says parents can make homework less of a fight for everyone.
The worst time to start homework is the moment your child walks through the door. The school day has already drained the same systems homework demands, so Morse suggests framing the immediate after-school window as a time to refuel. Movement comes next, whether that’s riding a bike or walking the dog, which burns off the day’s tension and helps many kids with ADHD settle.
Make the break predictable with a clear end, and pick a consistent homework time that comes after the break and well before your child is too fried to think. Most importantly, hold off on screens. Many kids with ADHD freeze in front of a big assignment because their brain can’t break it into steps on its own, so the task is to shrink the first step until it feels easy.
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