Personal Narrative: My Experience Of Working With Kindergarten Children

“ADHD is one of the most common chronic behavioral disorders encountered by primary care physicians” (Ambalavanan and Holten 1). Many children across the world struggle with this disorder everyday, hoping for a sensible solution. ADHD develops to become most apparent in children during preschool and early elementary years (Ambalavanan and Holten 1). It is challenging for these children who posses this disorder to control the way they act or their ability to pay attention, especially for longer periods of time such as a school day. It begins to not only affect the child's physical and mental well being, but also the child’s ability to learn and complete their school work. It can also potentially hold a child back from being their best self, and living life to its fullest potential. This disorder often begins to

The increase academic and social demands of formal schooling, as well as stricter standards for behavior control often illuminate the problems of the child with ADHD. Elementary school teachers typically report that this type of child has difficulty in working independently, completing seat work, and organizing work. Restlessness and distractibility are also very common. These problems are more likely to be observed in repetitive or taxing tasks, or tasks the child perceives to be boring, such as completing worksheets or doing homework.

I have been a preschool teacher, teaching mixed age children from 18 months to 5 years, for over 10 years. I started as a work study employee, while attending the Community College of Philadelphia in 2006, to a part-time teaching assistant while attending Temple University in 2010. This led me to a lead-teacher position after graduation and then to a program coordinator. I have developed effective working relationships with children in the past years. This position has helped me improve my teamwork and interpersonal skills by cooperating with other teachers in planning teaching materials according to the Reggio Emilia approach and by sharing teaching resources. I decided that working with children, understanding and assisting in their education,

From the research, children with ADD/ADHD seem difficult to control and teach. It has been discovered that these children act different in home and school. At school, they have difficulties sitting still for a long time, blurting out, distracting others, and completing assignments in a timely manner. Joined with other children in the class, the teacher is unable to give them the one-on-one time that is needed to make sure everyone succeeds, academically. Most of the time, preschools children with ADD/ADHD fail their grade and do not learn the required information in education because of the common disorder that takes over their body and mind.

When growing up, nothing is more frustrating then giving your best effort in your school work and continuously being unsuccessful. The effect it can have on a child is very damaging. Students may feel inadequate and non-intelligent in the classroom setting growing up, not to mention, being confused all at the same time about why school is such an ongoing battle for them. Why are these children trying so hard and never having any success? It is more and more common today; more than ever we see children having these problems inside and outside of classrooms all over the world. Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) can become very problematic in a child’s

After reading the articles Driven to Distraction and Lost in Translation, both from Today’s Parent magazine, I have learned many new things. I learned that it is sometimes not very easy to pick out a child with ADHD, even if it is your own child. It could take years to discover that a child has ADHD. It can be easily detected once the child has entered elementary school. One of the signs of ADHD is falling behind in school, or acting up and not being able to pay attention for long periods of time. This causes frustration for the child, the parents, teachers and the other students in the classroom. It is difficult for parents because they do not want to believe that their child has a disability. It is even harder

I'm not only an educator working directly with these children but a mother living with a child with this challenge and a learning disability. My viewpoint comes from my direct experience on a raw and personal level. In the end we made the decision not to medicate our daughter for the ADHD, although we were highly encouraged to do so. If the same information was given to me five years earlier, I would have gone right out and gotten the prescription from our doctor. But, my experiences and research told me it wasn't the right path for us at that time. I wanted to try and help our daughter with a natural approach, using medication as a last resort. Of course, I'm in no way saying that medication is bad. I've actually seen it work incredibly well with many children over the years. On the other hand, I've seen the terrible side effects children have to endure when the medication is wrong or the dosage is not right. Treating attention issues is a personal decision every family has to make based on the individual needs of the child and family. There is no one size fits all cause or treatment for attention disorders. Every person is different and comes with individualized needs. In my next blog post I will outline the things I have tried as both an educator and mother to help children

Carbone’s rationale for his research begins with his knowledge that students with ADHD do not have a mental retardation, but the disorder holds them back from grasping important information being taught when they behave inappropriately or are mentally detached during a lesson. Evidently, he says these psychological facts prove that teachers now have to work more on a student’s strengths rather than do nothing for a child who will grow to have a worse condition. Carbone believes that too often, teachers make changes in the classroom after a child’s inattention has caused him or her to fall significantly behind. The article recognizes the increasing importance of teachers being prepared for the likelihood that

Like many people everyone wants to find their calling and figure out where they belong. My parents moved to the United States risking their lives on a boat from Haiti but soon separated while in america . My mom did a great job raising four kids on her own and I being the second child took part in raising my two younger siblings. In elementary school I struggled in many subjects but excelled in art, when I finally learned to read and went to middle school my grades were high enough to have honors reading and social study classes and even apa classes in highschool. I continued to excel in a lot of my classes, turns out I was smarter than I thought and all I need to do was learn to read and have people who took the time to teach me.

I am in agreement that many parents, teachers and some experts use the diagnosis of ADHD as an easy answer and way to deal with difficult children. I feel that T. E. Elder also makes a very significant point that the age and maturity of children entering kindergarten also

Being a child suffering from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is not an easy thing to overcome or to live with. Children who suffer from ADHD often also have dyslexia, which is just another obstacle to overcome. I understand where children with ADHD could also develop behavior defiance issues stemming from always being told what to do and how to do it. Just because a child has ADHD does not mean that you should take any creativity or a learning opportunities away from them. For the children that are old enough to understand the difference, Ritalin is a vital tool in

Children who are diagnosed with ADHD struggle with managing behavior in school environments. As research has shown, students have difficulty paying attention and can be disruptive in class. This often leads to a decline in their academics and can hurt future academic achievements. There are a number of tools, programs, contracts, and classes that are available to students with ADHD. Along with a lack of attention and an abundance of hyperactivity, “twenty to thirty percent of ADHD children have an associated learning disorder of reading, spelling, writing, and arithmetic” (Daley & Birchwood, 2010). It can be difficult, as a teacher, to manage a classroom with children with ADHD. It is important that teachers, parents, and students, understand the opportunities available to them to help the child succeed.

In recent years, the issue of inattentive students has been sweeping the nation, especially with the youngest children, Kindergarteners. According to Curwood (n. d.), Kindergarten has changed into First grade and First Grade to Second (p. 1). With more strenuous standards to meet, 5-year-olds have been subjected to longer school days, with most communities “[mandating] full-day attendance” (Curwood, n.d., p. 1). Children at this age are not cognitively developed enough to remain focused during their 6-hour long days. Furthermore, The United States has also seen a growing case of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) diagnoses. Having been diagnosed with the disorder myself, I can attest to the difficulty of lasting through an entire school day with the disorder. Along with longer days, standards focused schools are cutting

In recent years, the issue of inattentive students has been sweeping the nation, especially with the youngest children, Kindergarteners. According to Curwood (n. d.), Kindergarten has changed into First grade and First Grade to Second (p. 1). With more strenuous standards to meet, 5 year olds have been subjected to longer school days, with most communities “[mandating] full-day attendance” (Curwood, n.d., p. 1). Children at this age are not cognitively developed enough to remain focused during their 6-hour long days. Furthermore, The United States has also seen a growing case of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) diagnoses. Having been diagnosed with the disorder myself, I can attest to the difficulty of lasting through an entire school day with the disorder. Along with longer days, standards focused

In a classroom of 30 children, 1-3 of them will be diagnosed with ADHD, and a quarter the of children with ADHD have serious learning disabilities such as: oral expression, listening skills, reading comprehension and/or math difficulties. (Ryan, 2010).