ADHD can affect a student's ability to focus, pay attention, listen, or put effort into schoolwork. ADHD also can make a student fidgety, restless, talk too much, or disrupt the class. Kids with ADHD might also have learning disabilities that cause them to have problems in school.
ADHD affects learning by causing kids to have difficulty paying attention in the classroom, overlook details, have difficulty following directions, and struggle to finish schoolwork on time.
Students with ADHD are often in constant physical motion. It may seem like a struggle for these children to stay in their seats. Kids with ADD/ADHD may jump, kick, twist, fidget and otherwise move in ways that make them difficult to teach.
Children with ADHD struggle more with boredom and putting mental effort into challenging tasks. Virtual learning or in-person school with more rules may lack the novelty and excitement. Teachers may need to find new ways to keep children with ADHD from being bored and keep them engaged in learning.
Common, noticeable characteristics of ADHD include inattentiveness, dis- ruptive behavior, restlessness, irritable, aggressive, and impulsive behavior. Therefore, many students with ADHD struggle to comply with social cues.
Nerissa Bauer. “If a child constantly fidgets, doesn't wait their turn, forgets homework, doesn't pay attention, cannot complete tasks or is not learning as expected, it is also cause for concern.” Any of these symptoms may lead a teacher to believe that the child has Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).
hyperactivity, such as fidgeting, talking a lot, and feeling restless. inability to focus or difficulty paying attention. impulsivity, such as having trouble waiting, acting on urges without considering the consequences, and making hasty decisions.
Areas of social functioning that are impacted include: listening to others, initiating conversations at appropriate times, frequently interrupting, missing social cues, withdrawing, and talking excessively. These challenges can influence everyday interactions at school, at home, and within the community.
Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is not a learning disability; however, it does make learning difficult. For example, it is hard to learn when you struggle to focus on what your teacher is saying or when you can't seem to be able to sit down and pay attention to a book. You can have both.
The students with ADHD also performed better in certain subject areas than those without ADHD. These included the arts, creative writing, science discovery, and architecture. (Their achievement was self-reported.)
Best Occupations for People with ADHD
Because of their unique ability to solve problems and create systems when interested in their work, Roberts says many people with ADHD do well as entrepreneurs, computer programmers, and within creative industries.
Thinking outside the box is a common thread among people with ADHD. They are nonconformists and they can generate powerfully imaginative ideas because they do think outside the boundaries that impede others. While this can be a problem in school, it can become a true asset in many different fields of work.
It is a medical condition. Children with ADHD do not learn in the same way that so-called “typically developed” kids learn. If the disorder is not compensated for, the teacher and the student are both destined for frustration and failure.
Students with ADHD benefit from consistent routines and classroom expectations. “Educators will see success when they provide explicit instructions and reminders regarding expectations for behavior,” Woodward says.
Common ADHD-Related Problems
Impulsive spending or overspending. Starting fights or arguing. Trouble maintaining friendships and romantic relationships. Speeding and dangerous driving.
ADHD may result in some symptoms that can make a person “socially clumsy.” If you often find yourself saying and doing inappropriate things during conversations, you might be experiencing social awkwardness.
It might be embarrassing small talk or something private about someone else. But for many people with ADHD, “oversharing” can be a more frequent problem. Oversharing is saying something personal or inappropriate in the wrong setting or to the wrong person. It's usually not something people with ADHD do on purpose.
There are several pieces of ADHD that make it difficult for kids to make friends. Kids with ADHD tend to be socially behind their peers. They often times play better with younger children, but at recess they are thrown together with their peers. Often, kids with ADHD aren't sensitive to the social cues of others.
A lack of self-acceptance. Prohibitively expensive medications. Here, commiserate with fellow ADDitude readers as they share some of their biggest challenges of managing life with ADHD or ADD. > Creating rituals to keep track of things.
All types of ADHD may include weaknesses in executive functioning. Thus, children with ADHD are more likely to have problems getting started on things, and have difficulty with planning, problem-solving, and time management.
Masking is when a person with ADHD acts in a “socially acceptable” way to fit in and form better connections with those around them. This usually involves camouflaging their symptoms by controlling their impulses, rehearsing responses, and copying the behaviors of those who don't have ADHD.
Sometimes, being argumentative or even saying mean things can stem from an inability to slow down and recognize how other people are reacting or feeling. This again falls into impulsivity and hyperactivity. But if you were to call out someone with ADHD as rude, they may respond by being defensive.
Kids with ADHD are very curious by nature. They cannot wait to see or do interesting things, and they resist boring or repetitive things. This can be stressful for parents, since it turns things like homework and bedtime into battles. Kids with ADHD may argue or throw tantrums to get out of boring things.