10 Sensory Quick Fixes to Increase Attention Span

As the end of the school year approaches, the weather gets warmer, the kids get more antsy and attention spans decrease.  Sometimes our bodies need a little extra sensory input to help us maintain an appropriate level of alertness for optimal learning.  Here are some simple, sensory, quick fixes that may help children to increase their attention span throughout the school day:

1. Add movement breaks throughout the school day.  Quick brain breaks can help to increase engagement and attention for the lessons that follow.  Mini Movement Breaks offer 60+ activities that require no equipment to get students moving.
2. Create multisensory lessons that involve different senses – visual, verbal, proprioceptive (heavy work), tactile and vestibular (rotary and linear movement).   Get Up and Learn can help you get started with over 35 activities to incorporate movement with learning.
3. Try flexible seating.  Try standing up, sitting on the floor, lying on their bellies on the floor, rocking chairs, exercise balls, air cushion, etc. to help students stay alert.  Wiggle Worms: A Guide to Alternative Seating can get your started.
4. Switch up lessons between pencil and paper with more diverse lessons.  Try adding in a tactile component.  Sometimes when students can touch and feel something it may increase their level of interest and attention.  Make a game out of the material.  Children love competition.
5. Offer fidgets.  Stress balls, velcro dots under the desk to rub or small manipulatives are nice, quiet fidgets that may help some students focus and attend.
6. Add in gestures when learning material.  For example, while completing letter identification flash cards put your hands on your head when reading a capital letter and hands on your hips when reading a lower case letter.
7. Start singing or add in music.  There are so many songs today to learn new material even for math and science.  Teach the children a song to learn new material or follow a routine.
8. Bright colors or highlight information.  If you need a student to attend to a certain section, paragraph, sentence or word, highlight it or print it on brightly colored paper.
9. Chewing a crunchy snack or gum.  Sometimes chewing on a crunchy snack like pretzels or chewing gum can help students to increase focus and attention span.
10. Drink through a straw.  Ask the students to bring in water bottles with straw lids or provide straws.  The oral motor skills and sucking motion on the straw may help to increase focus.

What is your top tip to increase attention in students?

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Going Outdoors to Improve Attention Span

The Journal of Attention Disorders published research on the benefits of walking in a park to increase attention span. A small group of 17 children with ADHD, participated in a study comparing walks in a park, downtown and a neighborhood. The walks in the park resulted in a significant difference in concentration as scored on the Digit Span Backwards (DSB).

The article also discusses Attention Restoration Theory (ART). The basics of this theory is that interacting with nature results in a type of restoration for the body and the brain. Try to remember a recent event when you spent time outdoors in a natural environment. You may walk slowly and attend to all of your visual surroundings – a bird chirping, a sunset, the green grass of Spring. When you return indoors, you feel relaxed and calm. Now to try to remember that last time you were outdoors in a busier environment, perhaps a city. Your attention may be focused on planning when to cross a street, avoiding cars and other city obstacles. These two environments rely on your brain to use two different types of attention – involuntary and voluntary. Concentrating on topics that interest you or something that grabs your attention involves involuntary attention. Concentrating on blocking out distractions to focus on the topic at hand involves voluntary attention (which can fatigue easily). When the brain experiences involuntary attention it allows voluntary attention to rest and recover.

The authors of this study question whether children with ADHD experience deficits in voluntary attention resulting in the fluctuating attention span that you see in children with ADHD. Therefore, the Attention Restoration Theory when applied to children with and without ADHD can perhaps be very beneficial. Walks in nature are simple to carry out on a daily basis. The “restorative” action of the walks which call upon involuntary attention can possibly help to improve voluntary attention.

With the amount of television and computer time that children are exposed to daily, more time spent outdoors is essential. Here are several ideas to encourage increased nature time for all children:

1. Take hikes and short walks in the woods. If you need a wheelchair accessible path, search state parks for handicapped accessible trails or try bike paths that are paved.
2. Go letterboxing or geocaching – Letterboxing is a great family activity for people of all ages. You can go to www.letterboxing.org for a list of clues throughout the USA. You print off the clues, walk to find them and stamp a marking in your log book.  Use your smartphone or GPS to go geocaching and find hidden treasures.
3. Gardening – plant a garden with children. Plant seeds in pots so that all children can assist.
4. Go on scavenger hunts for outdoor materials – check out Scavenger Hunts e-book for ideas
5. Allow children to play outdoors in dirt, mud and puddles.
6. Go on a bug hunt – see how many different bugs you can identify
7. Start a nature collection such as rocks, acorns, leaves or pine cones.
8. Go fishing, frog hunting, horseback riding or birdwatching.
9. Build a structure out of natural materials i.e. fort, collage made out of sticks or leafs.
10. Encourage teachers and therapists to plan lessons outdoors.

Fresh air makes everyone feel healthier, relaxed and perhaps improves attention. It is a simple way to improve concentration with no side effects (except skinned knees).

References:
Faber Taylor, Andrea, Kuo, Frances E. Children With Attention Deficits Concentrate Better After Walk in the Park J Atten Disord 2009 12: 402-409

Cimprich, B Attention Restoration Theory: Empirical Work and Practical Applications Retrieved from the web on 4/17/09 at http://www.umb.no/statisk/greencare/meetings/presentations_vienna_2007/cimprich_cost_pres_71007.pdf

Why not try yoga for its restorative benefits?  Even better, do yoga outdoors to help with focus and calming the mind.  Check out Yoga Cards and Game Ideas at http://yourtherapysource.com/yogacards.html