Episode 102: Why “Pay Attention” Doesn’t Work (And What to Do Instead) – Jill Stowell

LD Expert Podcast with Jill Stowell
Why "Pay Attention" Doesn't Work
(And What to Do Instead)
Jill Stowell

 

Jill Stowell: How many times have you said to your child, “Pay attention”? Ten times today? A hundred times this week? Here's the crazy thing. We spend years telling children to pay attention, but we almost never teach them what it feels like to pay attention or how to control it.

 

Today, I want to change the way you think about paying attention. Welcome to the LD Expert Podcast, your place for answers and solutions for dyslexia and learning differences.

 

I'm your host, Jill Stowell, Founder and Executive Director of Stowell Learning Centers and author of “Take the Stone Out of the Shoe”. So, you might be sitting there thinking, “Well, wait a minute. What do you mean my child doesn't know what attention feels like? They know they're supposed to pay attention. Their teacher tells them all day long. I tell them all the time.”

 

Exactly. They know what they're supposed to do, but knowing what you're supposed to do and having an internal awareness of what it feels like when your attention is on or off are two very different things.

 

One of the first things that we do with students is actually help them experience what it feels like to pay attention. At our centers, we use a variety of balance and movement activities to do that because in order to balance, you have to pull in your focus.

 

So, one of the things that we do is we have our students walk on a low balance beam. We have them walk forward and backward slowly looking at an X. So, we put an X up on the wall at eye level and we have them focus their eyes on that X. Now, if you're doing this at home, you could put a piece of painter's tape down on the floor. You could have them walk on a curb or maybe a line on the tile or on the patio.

 

We just want the student to be able to walk in a straight line forward and backward and keep their eyes on a target and we use the X. So, when students start to do this, a lot of times they're going too fast, they're kind of wobbly, their eyes are looking all over the place. Maybe they're walking like super stiff or they're not blinking, they're just staring. And so, we want to very gently coach them. Relax your shoulders, wiggle your fingers, blink your eyes, walk nice and slowly forward and backwards.

 

So, we're just going to do a little bit of coaching. Mostly we're going to let them work it out in their own body. And then when they have made a change, so you can see, “Ah, they're starting to settle into it, they're slowing down, they're getting a little more comfortable,” then we have them step off of the balance beam or off the line and just close their eyes if they're comfortable with that and imagine an X and then take a couple of slow breaths.

 

What we're trying to have them do there is to just kind of anchor the feeling of being focused and then we can talk with them about that. We can say, “Okay, just remember what this feels like,” and we can talk about when they first started walking, how they were wobbly or how they were chattering and now compare the feeling to now when they are more focused.

 

Now, of course, this is going to take practice. It's not going to happen just doing it one time. But with some practice, they start to recognize the difference between being focused and not focused. It's really hard to control something when we don't recognize or have a frame of reference for it. So that's the first step that we take in helping kids begin to control their attention.

 

So, you might be thinking, “Okay, but if I'm sitting right there with my child or if I get mad enough, he can pay attention.” Well, yeah, that's true. Getting them to pay attention is very different though from them recognizing their own lack of attention and getting themselves refocused.

 

I always tell my staff, “You can get your child to pay attention.” We work one-on-one. We have a great relationship with our students. So, yes, our team can sit with their student and get them to focus, so that we can teach them something. But the much better thing is if we can help them learn how to recognize their own loss of focus and have a strategy for getting back on. I tell the kids, “You can't carry me around in your pocket. You have to be able to do this when I'm not there.”

 

Kids do well when they can. It's not a matter of I'll pay attention when I want to. It really is a matter of they'll pay attention when they can. Now you might be thinking – I mean, I've heard this for decades. “My child can sit in front of a video game for two hours and be 100% focused.” Well, video games are highly stimulating and highly interesting to them. In a video game, your attention is actually shifting at what feels like lightning speed.

 

So that's really different than the kind of focus that it takes to sit in class and listen to the teacher or to do a worksheet or read a chapter. And we all pay attention better when it's something that's highly interesting to us. Less interesting things like homework or chores are harder to pay attention to. And our students who struggle with attention are lacking the skills to rein in their own attention.

 

This is really important. The child getting the biggest lecture from their parents is often already giving themselves the biggest lecture inside their own head. Our kids with ADHD, they have such good intentions and they feel like they are constantly letting themselves and everyone else down.

 

I want to give you a quick little experience just to give you a taste of what your child might be feeling. So, I'd like you to imagine that you're a student and you're getting ready for school. You're halfway dressed and something catches your attention. Maybe a text pops up on your iPad. Maybe your favorite song starts playing. Maybe your dog walks into the room and you remember something funny that happened yesterday. Whatever it is, your brain locks onto it.

 

In the background, you hear your parents' voice. You know they're talking to you but what has your attention is much more interesting. This is what your parent says. Before we leave, don't forget your Chromebook charger, water bottle, math homework, earbuds, soccer jersey, library book, lunch card and your medicine and don't forget to feed the dog. Without writing anything down and without using your phone, see if you can remember everything your parent just told you to do.

 

Now, imagine that this isn't a game. Imagine that if you forget something, you'll disappoint someone. Your parents spent time reminding you. They're going to think you weren't listening. They might say, “I just told you,” or “You need to pay attention.”

 

Listen to the list again. Here's what your parent told you to bring. Chromebook charger, water bottle, math homework, earbuds, soccer jersey, library book, lunch card, medicine and don't forget to feed the dog. Did you remember every item?

 

Maybe the better question is, “Did you remember some of it and had every intention of remembering all of it but still missed something?” And if this happens day after day after day, how are you going to feel? Frustrated? Embarrassed? Like you're always letting someone down? Like no matter how hard you try, people think you're not trying? Hold on to those feelings because now it's time for school.

 

All right, class, today I want you to listen to something. It's really important. It's not long, but I do want you to take really good notes because as soon as we're done, we're going to have a little quiz and I'm going to let you use your notes. So be sure and take really good notes.

 

[Audio plays] [0:11:34]

 

Jill Stowell: Okay. How did you do? Did you stay focused the whole time? Are your notes clear? Do they make sense? Did you find your attention drifting? Are you feeling frustrated or mad? That was only 90 seconds. So just imagine if paying attention took that much energy all day long.

 

Understanding that is the first step. Empathy goes a really long way. So, you might be thinking, “Okay, so my kids want to do well. They get disappointed in themselves when they don't. But what do I do about the battle over homework every night?”

 

This is a little tough, but the worst time to solve a homework problem is usually during the homework problem. In the neuroscience world, attention and stress are looked at on a continuum of arousal. Way up here at the top end of the continuum, the person is operating basically in fight or flight. They're totally overwhelmed or frustrated or agitated in very high alert.

 

At the other end of the continuum, they're just zonked. They have no mental energy to do anything. So, neither end is going to be a good place to try to solve a problem. The best place for rational thought, for thinking, for discussion, for problem solving is going to be somewhere in the middle in what is called the “zone”.

 

A mom told me once, “Every afternoon at four o'clock, I turn into a person I don't like.” Her son would come home from school, sit at the table and do anything except his homework. He would sharpen his pencil 10 times. He got a snack. He went to the bathroom. He stared at the paper. And she would say, “Just get started. Why is this so hard?”

 

The problem was that by the time they were having that conversation, both of their nervous systems were already at the top of the arousal continuum. He was overwhelmed. She was frustrated. Neither one of their brains was available for problem solving. So, when do you talk to them?

 

Well, you got to talk to them at a neutral time, when everybody's calm, not when you're pulling your kid away from a video game or in the middle of a tense situation. I remember when my son was, I don't know, 14 or 15, if I wanted to have a real discussion with him about some kind of a problem or something we needed to address, we would go out to Round Table Pizza. That was a very neutral spot for us. We could have really great rational conversations at Round Table Pizza.

 

Now, I'm not suggesting that the only way you can solve a problem with your kid is to go out for pizza, but you do have to find a neutral time when you can really sit and talk about it and you're all in the zone. And when you're going to talk about a problem, any problem, you want to start with empathy. So instead of saying something like, “Why do you always wait until the last minute to get started?” try, “It seems like getting started is really hard. Tell me about that.” So neutral time and neutral, empathetic opener to the conversation.

 

All right, let's get back to the question, “Can attention really be taught?” There are lots of factors of impacting attention, but to a great degree, attention is a skill and skills can be taught. So here are the four basic steps in attention-focused training.

 

Number one, we already talked about what does it feel like to be focused? And what does it feel like when I'm not? So that's where that walking forward and backward on the line, walking on a low balance beam or a curb, that's a really great activity to do to start to understand what it feels like when I'm really honed in, when I'm focused. And what does it feel like when I'm not?

 

Number two, what do I do when I'm off? So, some kids, when their attention is off, they chatter a mile a minute. Some kids, you know, they bring up something that is totally off from what you're talking about or what you're working on. Some kids pop up and down from their chair. Some need to go to the bathroom five times. Some stare off into space or maybe their eyes dart around the room. If you have a child who struggles with reading, you might find that they start reading okay, but it takes a lot of focus. And as their focus starts to waver a little bit or it becomes really challenging, you're going to see maybe they start going really fast or they start to really slow down and make a lot of errors and stumble over things you know they know.

 

Whatever it is, you just want to stop. We will notice when our students get off and we'll notice before they do. They don't even realize it a lot of times. So, we have to stop them and say, “Hey, what do you think I noticed?” or “What were your eyes doing just now?” or “What were you telling me about? And what are we doing right here?”

 

So, we don't want to make them pay attention. We just want to stop and have them think about what their body was doing or what they were doing and recognize, “Oh, when I am off, when my attention drifts, this is what I do.”

 

I know for myself, I'm very distracted auditorily. So, if I'm on the phone with someone and I hear something happening outside of my office door and suddenly it's like, “Oh, do I need to be involved in that?” And what'll happen is I'm on the phone and then my voice will sort of slow down. And because I know that's what happens when I get off, I'll say, “Oh, I'm so sorry. My attention drifted,” and I'll pull myself back on.

 

Well, that's what we want to have happen for our kids to recognize, “Oh, I'm doing this thing. That means I'm off,” and that's the first step then in being able to correct that.

 

Step number three, what caused me to get off? So it could be that the task they're doing is really hard. It's just too hard. Maybe they don't have the skills for it or maybe it takes an exceptional amount of focus to do it. So, then you have to deal with whatever those skills are. It could be like me, that they're distractible auditorily. They hear something and they have to know what it is, what got their attention.

 

It could be that they are visually distracted. Someone gets up and goes to the pencil sharpener and they are now watching all the way and they've forgotten what they're doing. So, we just have to have them recognize what it was that got them off. I remember a boy that he was very distractible and, in our workspace, we had two workstations next to each other that were divided by a room divider, but you could still kind of hear some of what was going on, on the other side. And so, we were working and then on the other side, they turned on a metronome. A metronome, if you don't ever use one, it just makes a click like this. And so suddenly Hector is like looking around. What is it? What is it? What is it? And so, we said, “Okay, let's find out what that is and then we don't have to listen to it anymore.”

 

So, we investigated and then we came back and he was able to say, “Oh, okay, I know what that is. Now I can focus.” So, recognizing what caused them to get off.

 

So, so far, our steps are number one, “What does it feel like to be focused?” Number two, “What do I do when I'm off?” Number three, “What caused me to get off?” And number four, choose a strategy to get back on. And there are a number of strategies. I'll give you a couple. One is if your child is doing some work that's really challenging, if they seem really frustrated, making a lot of mistakes, a good way to get focused again is to stand up and do cross crawls. So cross crawls are when they cross one hand to the opposite knee.

 

That's a very integrating activity. They will try to do it super-fast. We want them to slow down and just kind of be more mindful of what they're doing. So one hand to the opposite knee, do that for about 30 to 60 seconds. That will help to refocus them. When we have our students do any kind of balance and movement activity, like walking on the balance beam, when they're done with that, when they've made some change, we have them stop and anchor and remember that feeling.

 

So, close their eyes, think about an X, take some nice slow breaths and remember the feeling. And then we tell them, now you can remember that feeling whenever you need it. If you're working on homework, if you're at school, if you're here in our sessions, you can stop, take a breath, think about an X and just let yourself settle again.

 

For the kids who tend to get something in their mind and they just have to tell you. They just cannot continue with what they're doing because this thing that they're thinking about, they have to tell you. Well, we don't ever want kids to think that what they have to say is not valuable, that we don't care about that. We do, but they do have to learn to inhibit that and wait. So, what we do is we have them imagine a thought box and they can make their thought box however they want it and they can describe it. It can be very cool. And then we have them set it on an imaginary shelf.

 

So, when the student starts to talk about going to the beach on Sunday and you're working on a math paper, we're going to stop and say, “Hey, what are we working on right now? So, you started to tell me about going to the beach and that's really cool and I want to hear about it. But is that what we should be talking about right now?” Where could we put it? Oh, we can put it in the thought box. And then when we're done, we can ask them, “Hey, is there anything in your thought box that you want to share with me?” Often, they don't have anything they want to share from their thought box. But the point of the exercise is them learning to recognize, “Ah, I'm blurting out something that isn't relevant to what we're doing. That needs to wait. This isn't the time, but it's still important and valuable.”

 

So, our fourth step is to choose a strategy to get back on. So, the breath and the X, cross crawls, thought box, those are all examples of that. When we're doing attention training, sometimes we have little contests with students.

 

If I catch you and remind you to pay attention, I get a point. But if you catch yourself, you get a point. And that seems to be really motivating to kids and it helps them to start catching themselves. And I love it when students start to catch themselves.

 

I remember a little girl who said, “Wait a minute, my brain just went away.” That is the beginning of attention control. I lose focus, you lose focus, every person listening to this podcast loses focus. The difference is that successful learners recognize it and know how to come back.

 

Attention training, like any other skill, takes consistent practice and lots of it. But it's a great long-term investment in your child's future and everyone's sanity. If your child is struggling with attention, I want to encourage you to try these attention steps. And please feel free to leave comments and questions about how it's going for you. We do answer them.

 

At Stowell Learning Centers, we help children and adults move beyond learning and attention challenges, including dyslexia, by strengthening the underlying skills that make learning easier. When those skills get stronger, everything changes. Reading, writing, focus, confidence, even stress around school.

 

If you're listening and thinking, “This sounds like my child,” you can learn more, explore free resources, or connect with one of our learning specialists at StowellCenter.com. You can also follow us on social media. We’re @StowellCenter on all platforms.

 

If this episode encouraged you, please share it with another parent or educator who needs to know that real change is possible.