Does your child with ADHD have no problem spending hours playing with their favorite toys or video games, but suddenly can’t seem to find the motivation to start their homework?
It can be frustrating, but the truth is that ADHD simply isn’t a motivation problem.
Hi, I’m Jennifer Davis, and I’m an occupational therapist. Today, we’re going to talk about why children with ADHD often struggle to start important tasks and how we can help them thrive.
Why Kids with ADHD Struggle with Homework but Not Their Favorite Activities
If your child is able to focus on their preferred tasks for hours on end, but struggles with the important things like homework, oftentimes it can feel like your child is just unmotivated to do the work. People with ADHD often do great with interest-driven tasks, but struggle with importance-based tasks. When you ask a child, “Would you like to play with your toys, or do your homework?” More often than not, the answer is going to be, “play with their toys.” Playing with their toys has high intrinsic motivation. It’s enjoyable and it’s interesting. Doing things like your homework, your chores, those may be of high importance; but if they don’t hold an area of interest for the child, they’re not going to do them. They may really want to do them. They know they’re important. They know they’re going to get in trouble if they don’t do them. They may know they get a reward if they do them. The motivation is there, but the ability to switch from interest-based tasks to important-based tasks is hard for a child with ADHD.Why Rewards and Punishments Don’t Always Work for ADHD
In general, getting started sometimes is the hardest part. Children with ADHD often have a hard time shifting and transitioning their attention from one task to another of high importance. This may seem counterintuitive, because oftentimes children with ADHD tend to shift from task to task with high frequency; but this is shifting from one area of interest to another area of interest. When you’re shifting from an area of interest to an area of importance, that transition becomes much more challenging. Oftentimes, parents will use rewards or punishments to try to motivate their child to do these important-based tasks. Those things often don’t work. Our children with ADHD need help with finding the intrinsic motivation to do the tasks, find the interest in that activity, or create an interest in that activity so that they’re able to transition to it and maintain attention to complete the important activity.How to Help Your Child Get Started on Difficult Tasks
When working with children with ADHD, it’s important to find the motivation and interest in the activities, and break activities into small, approachable chunks. When you’re looking at a pile of work and a pile of things that is not interesting to you, finding the motivation to do that large overwhelming task can be insurmountable. When you’re able to break the task into small approachable chunks, the child is going to be more willing to start that activity. Once we’ve started the activity, we’re able to help them keep rolling from one activity to the next and get through that pile of work. As I mentioned before, a child with ADHD often really does want to do well; but when they’re presented with something that seems unmanageable, they’re going to be less likely to even try. When we’re able to break apart the task, make things manageable, find a way for it to be interesting, the child is going to be much more motivated to participate in the activity. This also allows for them to participate without shame or blame on themselves that they’re not able to do it. When a task seems too big and you feel that you’re not capable, you’re not going to try. When the task seems easy and approachable, a child has more confidence to try, which will allow them to be successful.Helping Your Child Feel More Confident and Successful
In our clinic, we work with families every day and teach them how to recognize some of the signs of overwhelm and stress in their child and help parents understand how we can break apart everyday activities so that the child is able to participate more easily in those tasks. When parents understand how to break apart things and present them in a way that is approachable for their child, the parent is less upset because the child is not doing the activity, and the child feels more successful and supported in their ability to do those tasks, develop and learn. If you find that you’re having a hard time with breaking apart tasks, having your child be motivated to do the important things, and are overall stressed out on those tasks, reach out to us. We’d be happy to help identify what some of the barriers your child is having, what things motivate them, and how we can break apart tasks so both you and your child can be on the road to success.
Jennifer Davis
Jennifer is a pediatric occupational therapist who earned her master’s degree in Occupational Therapy from San Jose State University and has been working with children with special needs since 2005. She has extensive experience supporting children across a wide range of developmental and neurological conditions, with specialized expertise in autism, feeding, swallowing, and sensory processing. Jennifer is passionate about helping children build the skills they need to succeed through individualized, family-centered care.
