[Vol.91] How to Catch Drifting Words

“I can’t seem to focus on one thing entirely; Do I have ADHD?” Lately, social media has been featuring vlog videos about the daily lives of people with ADHD, and children who have trouble concentrating and staying still are being described as having ADHD in various child solution programs. The word ‘ADHD’ is becoming
more familiar in our lives. Until a few years ago, conditions like ADHD were often approached as issues of personality and concentration, but nowadays, there seems to be more effort to view them realistically. Additionally, our society has been showing significant interest in mental health recently. There are visible attempts not to hide conditions like depression, and ADHD seems to be riding this wave of increasing awareness.

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder(ADHD) is the most common neurobehavioral disorder found in school-age children, characterized by symptoms of inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity. Children with ADHD experience significant difficulties in school life and social interactions. Due to an inability to maintain focus and a propensity for distraction by inappropriate stimuli, ADHD children often have shorter periods of engagement with learning tasks compared to their peers and struggle with prolonged study sessions. Additionally, they may have difficulty organizing learning materials and lack the ability to think logically, resulting in lower scores on completed tasks. Consequently, academic performance of children with ADHD tends to be low, with a high likelihood of failure in school. Moreover, without appropriate intervention, symptoms of ADHD may persist or worsen into adolescence and adulthood, even with advancement in grade level. Particularly, the fluctuation in behavioral patterns of ADHD children, depending on the environment, leads to a higher likelihood of behavioral issues occurring in school settings, which offer more diverse stimuli and are less familiar compared to home environments.

When approaching writing tasks, students with ADHD encounter several challenges. They find it difficult to concentrate on reading text and frequently veer off-topic. This tendency becomes even more apparent during the writing process, where the topic often changes frequently or becomes disjointed, and writing activities are easily interrupted or become excessively lively.

The difficulties ADHD children face in dealing with written text are compounded by underlying difficulties in foundational skills such as spelling and effective language usage. Moreover, deficits in cognitive processes that sustain goal-directed behavior and executive functions that operate during problem-solving and active engagement contribute to impairments not only in a child's voluntary learning goals but also in creativity, memory, language, and attention. These impairments affect areas requiring integration of complex skills like writing and self-regulation. Additionally, deficiencies in working memory, which involve holding onto information and performing manipulations on it, hinder simultaneous processing and storage of information, leading to a distracted and inattentive demeanor.

ADHD students require educational approaches that cater to their unique needs. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a method that enables teachers to create lessons and assessments accessible to both ADHD students and all students. This approach provides considerate assessment methods for ADHD students with slow reading speeds. It incorporates various teaching strategies and designs lesson content to engage all students’ sensory organs, with examples including diversity in content form, difficulty, and presentation methods. Moreover, teachers should facilitate interaction with students and ensure that instructional materials are provided in a comfortable format for all students. Additionally, the assistance of a support teacher or the appropriateness of the learning material provision space can be vital strategies.

Further explanation of considerate teaching for ADHD students involves removing stimuli that distract them, such as seating them away from central areas, classroom sides, or windows. Eliminating noise and distractions, encouraging participation, and communicating clearly with students using concise sentences and pronunciation can be helpful.

An Individualized Education Program (IEP) can be considered a separate educational curriculum for ADHD students. The advantages of this education plan include better understanding of one’s learning characteristics, awareness of the right to education, and enhanced self-confidence. The execution of this education plan consists of five steps:

Information gathering involves collecting information from parents, students, and staff and conducting pre-assessment based on student/parent consultations, student observation records, and diagnostic assessment results.

Direction setting involves defining roles for members and setting directions considering current abilities and necessary skills. Development of the IEP involves devising subjects and courses needed for the student, considering alternative programs. It includes outlining student achievement levels, annual program plans and goals, and learning expectations.

Implementation involves sharing relevant information with staff and engaging in continuous individualized assessment and modification. Strategies used in this phase include reminding students of rules and directions regularly, providing positive and specific feedback, visually presenting what students need to do, and preparing activities in a way that allows students to progress step by step within their concentration.

The process concludes with periodic modification and documentation of learning objectives.

Individualized education may be mistaken for one-on-one teaching with the student. However, in educational settings, it refers to designing and documenting a tailored program for each child, rather than a school-wide educational plan. In other words, an Individualized Education Program is a special educational plan tailored to the demands of each individual child, rather than a comprehensive plan for the entire school.

Teachers may not be able to treat ADHD students as doctors, but they can fulfill the role of educators by employing various educational methods to teach a diverse range of skills necessary in school. By using appropriate approaches, educators can help children take a step closer to leading healthy lives. This can be achieved through individualized instruction, such as specific strategies in writing that visually gauge a student’s concentration. Applying individualized education plans in school settings can lead to more effective guidance of ADHD students. While progress may be slower, it can foster the growth of individuals equipped with the diverse skills needed in society.

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