Elementary-Age Learning
How long is an elementary school-age child's attention span?
It's commonly said that the attention span of an elementary school child is between five and twelve minutes, depending on their age and grade. The intrinsic interest in a task and the challenging nature of the task - how complex it is - also determine how long that child can pay attention. If they're being shown something new and it's highly complex and very hard to process cognitively, they will not be attentive for so long. They'll get overloaded. If, in fact, the task or the new information is not novel enough and not challenging enough, that also can lower attention span.
What are signs my elementary school-age child has a short attention span?
An elementary school child with a short attention span will cut themselves off from pursuing a task that they might want to do themselves. A young child who wants to learn to ride a bicycle will very quickly lose interest when you take them out to ride. If you're trying to get a child with a low attention span to help you do chores around the house, they may be very anxious to help out mom or dad but they will quickly break off from the activity. Either they're distracted or they want to go and do something else, or they just don't keep up with their goal directed behavior.
How can I help my elementary school-age child increase his or her attention span?
I think helping children to pay attention and to stay on task is sometimes a function of the task itself. What we want to do as parents or teachers is to make sure that the task we are having the child do is appropriately challenging, so that they want to try. That is, it has to be a goal that they can achieve, and that they see is achievable for them. If they perceive the goal of the task as too complicated, or not achievable, they they'll break off their attention and their goal-directed behavior.
What elementary school lessons are meant to teach verbal-linguistic skills?
In elementary schools, we teach verbal-linguistics skills almost all the time within all lessons. We want children interacting, we want them explaining and elaborating their thoughts, so of course we're teaching them new vocabulary and verbal-lingusitic skills. We're having the children read and analyze stories, and we're having them gain feedback and speak with the teachers and their peers around them, again improving their verbal-linguistic skills
How can I tell if my elementary school-age child is having trouble with verbal-linguistic skills?
Elementary school children who are having trouble with verbal and linguistic skills are often very silent and don't interact much verbally. These children don't like to talk a lot amongst their peers or with their parents. At a very early age, we might notice that children are misnaming things. They might call a spoon a fork, or instead of naming things that they should know, they'll say, "You know that stuff" or, "That thing again, that thing." They'll use general terms to describe what they should have specific vocabulary for.
How can I help my elementary school-age child learn verbal-linguistic skills?
One of the most fun things we can do as parents is to interact with our elementary school children verbally and linguistically. We can play word games, nursery rhymes and word songs with children. We can read to them from interesting parts of the newspaper. We can rephrase for them stories that we know or things that we're reading. We can also talk to them when we're watching television. We can ask, “Have you ever seen anything like that before?” “Do you know what that is?” “Why do you think that Timmy doesn't want to go with Grandpa to the store?” These types of interaction with children help to build their vocabulary. Of course we encourage them to ask us questions as well.
What elementary school lessons are meant to teach logical-mathematical skills?
The arithmetic and math lessons in an elementary school are meant to teach those logical-mathematical skills. Word problems play a very big part as well because we want children to be able to elaborate on their logical thinking and their mathematical reasoning. Also, when we analyze literature with children and when we analyze problems in stories, we are to a certain degree, working on logical skills at that point too, because part of that whole skill set is the ability to plan, and the ability to predict.
How can I tell if my elementary school-age child is having trouble with logical-mathematical skills?
Young children who are struggling with logical and mathematical skills may show an inability to understand what's coming next or "when is the weekend coming," "what day is Friday," how soon they'll have another birthday. Skills such as those can be a big tip-off. Inability to tell time by maybe the second grade or third grade, struggling to read a clock, and, of course, school problems in math are all signs that children may be struggling in that area.
What elementary school lessons are meant to teach intrapersonal skills?
These days, there's a very strong emphasis on children elaborating their own ideas and feelings. There's a technique that we like to use called writer's workshop, where we ask the children to choose the topics, or if we've chosen the topic, we ask the children to elaborate on one of their experiences related to that topic. I think that a good writing program in an elementary school is very beneficial for self knowledge and self awareness. Also, in most lessons in elementary school, we ask the children to explain not only their answer, but we ask them to explain how they got that answer, and we like to highlight the differences between all the answers that end up being correct.
How can I tell if my elementary school-age child is having trouble with intrapersonal skills?
Elementary school-age children who have trouble explaining themselves - their actions, why they did something - or children who are not very quick to share their ideas with adults or their peers may be struggling with intrapersonal skills. Children who find it hard to be by themselves - to relax, to sit quietly with a book, or to be on their own - may be struggling with intrapersonal type knowledge.
What elementary school lessons are meant to teach interpersonal skills?
Almost the entire elementary school curriculum is centered around interpersonal skills, from the time the children line up cooperatively together in the morning, to the time the teacher asks them to come quietly and in an organized way to the first lesson or to prepare for that lesson. Then, of course, as the day proceeds, the children are asked to collaborate with each other in groups. They're asked to express and share their ideas in front of others, and they're asked to work cooperatively throughout the day, in almost every aspect of school.
How can I tell if my elementary school-age child is having trouble with interpersonal skills?
Children struggling with interpersonal skills are generally having trouble getting along with their friends and their peers, and also making new friends. These children may be reluctant to talk about their day with us; they may not share experiences about what they did with the other kids. Elementary school children love to tell us about what other kids did, about what they did with those kids and what was funny. If we aren't hearing that type of report from our child's school day, we may be a bit concerned over our child's interpersonal relationships.
