Sit.

One of the first things children need to do before they are ready to do some learning.

Sit.

One of the precursors in determining the attention span of a child.

Of course,not because a child is sitting down does not mean that the child is ready to learn.

For children with language processing problems, this is how to tell them to sit down. Not “Come sit here on the red chair.” or “I need you to sit now so we can start our lesson.” Chances are they will not be able to grasp if the message was about coming, sitting, the red chair, the starting, the lesson.

Why do children need to learn how to sit?

They sit when they eat. They sit when they do table top activities. They sit when they need to have a haircut. They sit in church. They sit when they are traveling. They sit when they wait for their turn at the doctor’ clinic. They sit when they watch tv and play with their computer games.

On the other hand, sitting does not mean that there is learning happening. There are those who just sit and not squirm but are not really learning anything.

Some children learn better when they are on the move.

Those schools that have the “Sit-down-and-listen-to-the-teacher” method should be avoided, if there are other alternative school. Children are active individuals and they won’t sit still for a long time. It is important to alternate both movements and table-top activities for them.

Click these Symptoms of ADHD and What to do if you Suspect Your Child has a Learning Disability?

This article, A Letter to My Grandmother by Dale S. Brown describes what she went through when she was growing up.

Another wonderful read: Beware the Sitting Trap.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 28th, 2008 at 2:38 pm and is filed under ADHD, Autism, behavior modification, Being a (Special Ed) Teacher, Learning Disabilities, special education, Teaching Techniques. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.