Tips to improve concentration please

[MSC]

This is an old inactive thread but what a useful one!

I wonder if there are new 11+ parents who would like to share their experiences too, after more than a year of this thread being dormant.

Thanks.

[Yamin151]

My DS was a truly terrible "going to sleeper". Once he was asleep, he was fine, but he could NEVER go to sleep like my other kids did. We despaired. Because he would get up and sneak about and do naughty things. Stairgate - climbed over it. Nothing worked. I used to sit outside his room telling him to get back into bed every couple of minutes for HOURS. It took us ages to realise that he really just didn't need the sleep.
We would get him up ridiculously early, thinking that it would surely tire him enough to have him go to sleep more easily at night. No, didn't work. We took him on long bike rides/walks as he got older, but all we ended up with was a fit child and exhausted parents.
Now eleven, he still isn't asleep until gone 11pm, frequently much later, and we have finally realised that there isn't much we can do about it.
We wondered if he had ADHD, but no, only traits, mostly the HD as his concentration was never too poor.
We tried dietary changes, fish oils etc, but nothing worked. We are really really careful to look what has gone into his food in the way of additives, but he is still sometimes climbing the walls with energy, when we are nodding off.
With age, he has become more easy to reason with, and he will amuse himself fairly safely when sent up to bed, rather than getting up to no good.
I think he is just one of those people that needs very little sleep. He stopped his daytime sleep at less than 18months (my mum says I stopped mine at 12 months) and I foolishly thought that would help him get off in the evening, but it didn't.
At least your DS is actually tired. Mine never was and still isn't. I think he runs on long life batteries.
Good luck.

Golly this could be one of my sons!
The one big difference is that my awake boy tends to go a few days with not sleeping until late, then on, say, the 4th night, he will be totally vile and fall asleep at 8pm! They (twins) are both in ready for bed and upstairs, bit later now, by 8, I read until 8.15 then they read by themselves with limit of 9pm. We still sometimes get difficulties though, with the one especially. He has always been a poor sleeper and real problems with self soothing. Now at 10 we can reason with him better, so he isn't yelling at us in the middle of the night, but he does still come in occasionally and just touch my cheek (sweet!) then back to bed. Sometimes though he will appear downstairs in the evenings 2 or 3 times and its really hard for him to get off to sleep. The light evenings don't help of course. Not sure what the answer is and suspect that as in general he functions pretty well he just doesn't need the sleep.

[Peridot]

The penny finally dropped for us when, after years of DS's poor sleep and nightmares, we researched the side effects of the drug in asthma preventer inhalers (the brown ones). We made a decision to stop them and just use the Ventolin (with our GP's backing) and hey presto, instant full nights' sleep from then on.

[Yamin151]

The penny finally dropped for us when, after years of DS's poor sleep and nightmares, we researched the side effects of the drug in asthma preventer inhalers (the brown ones). We made a decision to stop them and just use the Ventolin (with our GP's backing) and hey presto, instant full nights' sleep from then on.

Fab result!

We have no interactions of this sort. Its just the way he is. If one more person had suggested 'lavender' to me when it was bad I think I'd have screamed!!! (And they had no screens back then, at all)

[Peridot]

Yeah we did lavender ad infinitum, bed up at an angle/bed flat, bath before bed/no bath, reading until sleepy/no reading, heavily screening any TV that might be scary/staying up late watching tv to occupy brain, early night/late night, different foods blah blah blah. And it was the drugs that did it.

[MSC]

This is great. One thing for me, Nintendo DS 3D turned out to a culprit too. Almost all his games are "educational" , for example Professor Leyton Series, which I think are great for the problems and puzzles they have to solve to progress in the games, other seemingly "innocent" games such as Animal Crossings, whilst involving a lot of creativity, are quite addictive. He end up daydreaming - thinking of the next move, story lines etc. So, restricting them for now for a weekend treat.

Anyone had similar experience?

and definitely no Angry bird / Flappy bird!!!

[salsa]

Today DS2s teacher called me in to say his concentration has become a serious problem. He is falling way behind his targets, not completing work in class, easily distracted and slow to settle, forgetting and losing school books and homework. I noticed that homework he;d completed at home on time had gone into school and come back unmarked three weeks in a row. Seems he'd forgotten to hand it in. His teacher says he is now falling very far short of his expected targets. Twice this week he's had to complete classwork at home because he hadn't done it, and it was WELL within his capability.

At home I've noticed he is very distracted. He's always been quite dreamy but it was getting far worse. Did a Bond comprehension recently and scored 35% because he just wasn't concentrating and only answered about 1/3 questions (and that was with help and prompting.)

He is scatterbrained and dreamy by nature but since Christmas there's been a sharp decline. Two possible reasons:

He got an i-pad for Christmas and oh my how he uses it! He has clubs, sports, tutor, friends round, lots of family time too, but he's plugs into it whenever he has free time.

He sleeps very poorly. Always has, since birth, but since Christmas has often been unable to get to sleep until around 11pm, despite age-old routine of bath, supper, stories, prayers and lights out by 8.30-9pm. He's only 9.

Any advice or tips? Games or strategies?

From today he's earning screen time with hard work and help around the house and we're back to tick charts for progress (I do loathe those things, but the school has requested them and they are instigating one too, for him.)

Hi, did you get your son to concentrate and sleep in the end?
Thanks,

[Turtlegirl]

Our now Year 9 daughter is still struggling with concentration, and with transition between school years too. We ended up going to the GP when she was in Year 8, who referred us first to CAMHS who then sent us to the schools counselling service. Through them she had an excellent course of CBT which helped her with going to sleep. The therapist also suggested we paint her bedroom, which was a rather zingy shade of pink. It's now a calm combination of blue and silver grey.

School have been helpful, ensuring she sits in the front of classes, and making sure that teachers are aware that she has concentration issues, although I've had rather more meetings with the head of year and headmistress than I would have liked. I'm now more inclined to call it a version of ADD than dyslexia, although her symptoms aren't bad enough to need medication. I read an online magazine called ADDitude, which has many helpful tips on how to help the highly distractable. She is also swimming three times a week at a club, and concentrating on her swimming strokes seems to help her concentrate on other things.

Despite her difficulties, she is thriving in her grammar school, doing well academically and thoroughly involved in many aspects of school life. Concentration problems are a challenge, especially for homework, but they are not insurmountable.