Hypnotherapy and
Hypnosis articles
Is there an emotional link to learning difficulties?
by IAPH therapist Kathleen Freeman
In The past decade, more children have been diagnosed with Attention Deficit
Disorder (ADD) and ADD with hyperactive behaviour (ADHD) than in any previous
decade. In this article, reference to ADD refers to both conditions. Two
years ago, after Dr Anke Koelman was interviewed on television regarding
the work with ADD at her learning centre in South Australia, She assessed
and treated fifty children, all of whom had been diagnosed as having ADD
symptoms. Some of these children were on medication, others had been advised
to take medication, but the parents were looking for alternatives. On the
basis of her educational assessment, she concluded that in forty-eight of
the fifty children (96 percent), the so-called ADD behaviour was caused
by emotional and learning problems. As soon as the learning problems and
related stress were resolved, the concentration problems were resolved as
well. In most cases, concentration was not specifically addressed in her
session with them; it became a non-issue. How is it possible that so many
children had been misdiagnosed?
Symptoms
of ADD / ADHD
According to Dr. Harry Nash, “Children with both types of ADD suffer
from difficulties in certain basic components of behaviour which most of
us take for granted. “Dr. Nash and other experts in the field of clinical
neurology describe children with ADD as sharing the following symptoms of
behaviour...
- slow selective attention
- inability to sustain attention or block out distractions
- poor goal setting
- lack of organisational and planning skills
- difficulty in initiating relevant tasks
- inability to persist through to completion
- weak handwriting skills
- inability to anticipate behaviour of others or
consequences of their own behaviour
- speech and language disabilities
- difficulty in self-calming
The majority of these symptoms can also be the direct
result of a learning problem or an emotional challenge. For example, speech
and language problems almost always result in reading, writing and spelling
problems. Difficulty in initiating relevant tasks is often the result of
a learning problem, because the child knows there is another insurmountable
obligation ahead. Poor concentration and inability to persist are often
the result of a long history of trying in vain to do the task. This leads
to a continuous feeling of being overwhelmed.
The child who is under
chronic pressure to perform has an increased sensitivity to distractions,
along with other symptoms of learning problems. Poor organisational and
planning skills can also be the result of incomplete sensory and brain integration,
for which drugs are no solution.
What is happening at school?
The child’s teacher plays a very important role, because the teacher
is often the first
to discuss the possibility of a childs challenges due to children behaving
differently at home because they are in a safe and familiar place with the
parents.
The teacher may often suggest seeing a medical practitioner or child psychologist
and will often put the behaviour or the learning difficulty down to ADHD,
the child is almost always condemned to a drug trial, whether or not he
or she has ADHD/ADD.
If the child does respond to the drugs, he or she then qualifies for a life
sentence of medication! However, A child with “true ADHD” is
I believe, a child who cannot concentrate in any context, even if he or
she wants to. If the student is able to concentrate while playing football,
enjoying computer games, or when otherwise involved, yet is unable to concentrate
in the classroom, then the ability to sustain attention is there. This child
does not have true ADD, and the reason for the lack of concentration may
be that the child is anxious to do well, to please the teacher and just
be the same as his or her class mates. How well can you concentrate when
you are under emotional strain or just bored, uninterested or tiered or
cannot do what is expected of you? Often girls will daydream or start talking
when they switch off, whereas boys will tend to fidget and look for distractions.
Each child has an individual switch– off behaviour pattern that occurs
when he or she is faced with the stress of not being able to learn with
peers. Therefore a child’s inability to concentrate in the classroom
may be the actual cause of these ADHD symptoms.
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