Korean Job Discussion Forums

marista99 · Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Location: Incheon

There's a kid in one of my classes who is about 8 years old and has severe ADD/ADHD. He literally doesn't sit still, ever. You'll be talking to him and he'll just walk off in the middle of a sentence. And because he has trouble following what's going on in class, he goofs off much of the time and distracts the other kids in the process. I spend a large portion of the class telling him over and over to be quiet, or sit down, or whatever.

Without this kid, class goes fine, but when he's there it just goes to hell. My director says I should just ignore him, but of course that's basically impossible. He generally ignores me when I give him a punishment, and this usually results in my Korean assistant teacher having to stand right next to him in the corner and make sure he keeps his arms up (this being the standard punishment at our school for kids this age).

What can I do about this kid? Even if the director comes in and yells at him in Korean, he behaves himself for the rest of the class and is back to his old self the next day. It's making the class useless for the other kids.

Hobophobic · Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2004 8:53 pm Post subject: ahhhh....same here

I used to teach a boy who would do very much the same thing...he would also leave class when he wanted and wander the halls...sometimes leave the building and not come back until the buses came....in the end I found he wanted extra attention and was socially inept...

so I kept squatting near his desk - the other kids knowing he was 'different' didn't mind, as he was driving them nuts also...he quieted down...I helped him stay focused by assisting him and complimenting him....it was hell teaching him for about a year, but now after 2 he's one of my favorite students

Falstaff · Joined: 14 Jan 2004 Location: Ansan

Give him something physical to do. I've given students stress balls to squeeze in class. The challenge is finding something he enjoys and using that as a carrot. If he's good, he gets to do X. If he's bad, he doesn't. As tempting as it is, I've found yelling at ADHD kids makes very little differnce. They are so used to being yelled it, that they have become inured to it. Positive reinforcement tends to work best, even though there will be times you want to launch him out of a window. I wish you luck and patience.

You'll need both.