Smart Child, Struggling to Focus? Check These 4 Things First

Shouldn’t a smart child find it easy to focus?

A lot of people expect a bright child to focus with ease. When that does not happen, two answers come fast. One says try harder. The other says he’s lazy. To us, a bright child who drifts off does not look lazy. It looks like a child whose focus has not been taught yet. We wrote more about the bright child who struggles at homework.

Being smart and holding attention on a page are two separate things. A large population study by Katusic and colleagues (2011) looked at this. It found ADHD at similar levels in children with high, average and lower IQ. Rommelse and colleagues (2016) found ADHD holds up in children of high ability, too. So attention trouble turns up in bright children as well. These studies do not say why any one child drifts off.

Maybe your child plays a game for hours without looking up. That does not mean they are choosing not to focus on homework. Here is our reading of the reward research. A plain task feels flatter right after an exciting one. That idea comes from studies of adults and animals, not children. So treat it as a fair guess, not a fact about your child. One easy thing to try is homework before the game, not after.

What else looks exactly like a focus problem?

Before anyone decides what your child’s attention trouble means, check the ordinary things. Each one looks like inattention from across the table.

• Sleep. Short or broken sleep leaves a child foggy all day. A tired child looks a lot like an unfocused one.
• Hearing and vision. A child who mishears the teacher looks like a child who isn’t listening. The same goes for a page or a board that is hard to see.
• Worry, or avoiding the work. A worried child looks distracted. So does a child dodging a task that feels too hard. Avoiding the work is not the same as being unable to stay with it.
• A reading, writing or math skill that is still hard. If reading the words still takes hard work, that work uses up attention. Little is left for the task itself. A child still working to read the page will look inattentive at it. The same goes for writing and math.

None of these is a verdict. We have no way to tell which one, if any, fits your child. And checking one does not rule out the others.

For hearing, vision or a medical worry, a professional check is the right step. Might reading, writing or math be part of it? Our free Learning Difficulties Analysis asks what you have seen at home. A screener is a starting point, not a diagnosis. Only a professional evaluation gets formal school supports, like an IEP or 504 plan.

How do you build focus, and where does ADHD fit?

The usual advice comes as a fork with no middle. One road says try harder. The other asks less of the child. Neither one teaches focus. If a support is offered, ask one question. Is this support building the skill, or replacing the expectation that it gets built?

Our position is that focus is a skill built through practice. It is not a fixed trait a child has or lacks. What we see is simple. Children who practice staying with a task stay with it longer. Start with a stretch of work short enough to finish. Then make it a little longer. Here are some ten-minute focus exercises to start with. And here is more on focus as a skill you build.

Maybe ADHD is on your mind. The CDC describes it as trouble in three areas. Paying attention. Controlling impulsive behavior. Being overly active. A psychologist, psychiatrist or pediatrician makes the diagnosis. There is no single test for it. Here is more on how attention trouble differs from ADHD. No need to wait for an answer before you build focus at home. Do both.