Did you/do you zone out in class?

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I have an eleven year old son who does well academically -- not stratospherically academic, but good enough -- and does fairly well socially, but I am finding out that he just sits in class, totally zoned out. He is on Strattera, but I don't think it helps much in class. He will be handed an assignment, and just not do it while everyone else IS doing it. He will be in math class, and the entire class will be spent explaining the homework assignment for that night, and he will have zoned out completely, and we have to RETEACH whatever it was he was supposed to have been taught that day in class.

Did you do this? Is there any way to help him pay attention in class? Some concept that I'm completely missing?

Kris

All the time. Every second of every day.

I was just like this.

It's like you can't do the work, not that you don't want to. Your brain organises the world into what's important and what's irrelevant, and you know where parroting the curriculum falls on the line. It's like we can't focus on that or we'll miss something else that we're thinking about or something in our environment - it's very strong, like our life might be endangered if we're distracted by the seemingly pointless lesson plan of the school.

Your son needs to be made aware that his brain does this and that it's okay, but that he can and should take control of it to get into his school work. Sometimes cutting just a little slack with the provision that the reduced pressure is so that he can learn to focus, is all a child like [I was] needs to do the tasks set for him.

Last edited by Unknown_Quantity on 30 Oct 2007, 9:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

During high schools I'd be the one answering all the questions and leading discussions in class, but when it came to exams.. I just could not concentrate for three hours straight. I'd look out the window for five minutes in between questions. If I didn't have to do exams I would have gotten 20% more for every subject at least I swear.

I totally zoned, the teacher would have to be totally interesting or entertaining to keep my attention. Either that or I'd have to take notes, and use different colored pens. Or....I was lost.

I think a substantial part of the reason I got clinically depressed this year was the many years I spent in the classroom trying to listen to boring lectures. They weren't stimulating enough for me. I had more stimulation going on inside my head, so I zoned out. All those years sitting in the classroom with nothing to do but daydream understandably got to me!

I spent all my time in class drawing and s**t, I almost never payed any attention.
So of coarse I failed most of my classes. I regret nothing.

Yeah, that happened to ME also! I'll never forget this one stupid teacher I had in the 6th grade.(Ms. Nudyke) YIKES! I NEVER even remembered homework being assigned!

I got so stressed in school that I stopped doing half my homework. I still passed most of the stuff tho. Or when I decided to only do half, I would get less stressed out and suddenly feel like doing the whole thing anyway.

I did that. I still do, sometimes. My problem is that I get caught on a train of thought started by something the teacher said. The teacher moves on to something else and I don't, so I miss what's said. I'm focused, but not on the current topic. I learned to write down as much as I could of what was said to stay on topic. Some teachers in grade school don't allow that because some kids will doodle instead of taking notes. Will this teacher allow taking notes?

In 5th grade I was fascinated with military stuff so I would imagine little army men fighting a battle on my desk or in the school room. Long story short, I was never a very good student.

For me its not that I wasn't interested or that I couldn't do the work, but I just couldn't focus. Military, or cars, or cash registers, etc. There was always something else that I was thinking about. Maybe try to get your kid obsessed with school, and get him off those drugs if he has as. An as mind is a beautiful thing and it shouldn't be interrupted by drugs.

Side effects for strattera:

[u]Common side effects with Strattera may include:

* Nausea—A common side effect may be nausea.To possibly minimize nausea, your doctor may advise your child to take Strattera with food.
* Tiredness—Another common side effect can be problems with tiredness.To possibly minimize tiredness, your doctor may advise you to adjust the time of day your child takes the medication.

Less common side effects
* Suicidal thoughts—An analysis of clinical trial data conducted by Lilly has indicated that suicidal thoughts were more frequently observed among children and teens treated with Strattera (4 out of every 1,000 patients, or about ½ of 1%).There were no suicides in patients taking Strattera during clinical trials.There was no indication of an increased risk of suicidal thoughts or behaviors among adult Strattera patients.

Parents should monitor their child carefully to see if they appear more subdued, withdrawn, or have persistent feelings of being hopeless, helpless, or worthless, or show expressions of self-harm. Children may also act out, so watch for signs of irritability, agitation, anger, or aggression. While none of these signals alone means your child is feeling suicidal, they may be signs to talk with and listen to your child about his or her thoughts and feelings. Pay close attention to changes in his or her moods or actions, especially if the changes occur suddenly. If your child has thoughts of suicide or sudden changes in mood or behavior, contact your child's doctor right away.
* Liver damage—Strattera can cause liver damage in rare cases. During the first two years on the market there were 2 reported cases of severe liver injury out of more than 2 million patients who had taken Strattera. In both of these cases, the patients' liver function recovered after discontinuing Strattera. Call your doctor right away if your child has itching, dark urine, yellow skin/eyes, upper right-side abdominal tenderness, or unexplained "flu-like" symptoms.

If the teacher cares, then your son will just need to catch up on what was said by himself. Just find out what you son is supposed to know and tell him to study it. I zoned out all the time. I can concentrate better when I draw but I got into trouble for doing that.

Yes, I'm still in school and do this all the time. When I can't focus on or understand the work, I'm more likely to focus on something else, and compose music or write computer programs or write about things or draw, usually on paper, sometimes in my head. The teacher gives me sheets of problems, or parts of the textbook to do, and I just ignore them.

For example, today in the computing college I was supposed to be finishing the brief for a project I handed in a term ago, or finding another piece of work that didn't quite achieve the standard and polishing it, in an attempt to get credits before exam leave/christmas holidays begin Friday week. Instead I re-created the Windows screensaver where it looks like you're flying through space. I coded my own version, then added things like a way to speed up/slow down, and a way to turn left or right. No 3d code, just pick random pixels, color them white, and accelerate them away from the center. Suddenly, there's stars zooming past your face. Anyway, I didn't get any schoolwork done. At all. But I had fun, learned lots, and got a lot of work done, and practiced coding. If I hadn't been sitting in front of a computer, I would have got paper and a pen. If I didn't have those, I would've sat and day-dreamed.

A good teacher will make a huge difference - and that's going by his definition of a good teacher, not someone with a shiny degree. Tutoring or smaller classes may help a lot - I've always done better with a tutor than in a class, and done better in the classes where the teachers take a more individual approach to teaching. I don't think there is one magic solution that'll make you son care about class.

I've also found that sometimes I can't do the work. It seems that the are so many other, better things that I could be doing, and the work in front of me is stupidly easy, or insanely hard, and I just want to get away from the classroom. It's incredibly frustrating, and in that sort of mood there is zero chance of me getting any classwork done. When I'm distracted really badly I just don't turn up to class. I go home, or sit in the cafe with a pen and some paper, and actually get some work done.

This seems similar to what Unknown_Quantity described - especially that part about dividing the world in the important and the not important/not interesting/irrelevant/boring, then putting class on the unimportant side of the line.

Last edited by -Main on 31 Oct 2007, 3:17 am, edited 1 time in total.

Have you talked to your sons doctor about this? I used to suffer from these:

Absence Seizures
http://www.epilepsy.com/epilepsy/seizure_absence.html

Of course. 99% of my school days teachers simply were not capable of being up to par instructors. They were tedious, boring, cruel and lacked imagination to spark the children. They should never have chosen the profession of *teacher* to begin with. Entire generations were subjected to really bad teachers and equally bad teaching institutions and it's no wonder society reflects this back as chaotically as it does.

Parents, wake up. It's really not your kid, who is fine, beautiful and needs more stimulation via the instructors, but actually it is a system that's broken from its foundations and your kids are being shamed, bullied and tortured because of the lack therein. When you walk into a school - there needs to be first of all - a sense of safety and acceptance, then comes respect. Then comes sharing. Then comes instruction, then comes praise. Not safe in school? No school, then. Start home-schooling your children and you will be throwing out that Ritalin within a week. And if you can't *handle* your children and can't teach? Then get another parent to co-teach with you. But make it a safe and loving environment. And let your kids grow.

I am the same sometimes. I would like to do what you do but unfortunately I get nagged at for being absent.

I think the type of work has something to do with it. I'm rubbish at sorting things into categories. I recently got two pieces of work that involved that and just found them insanely difficult to do. My head hurt and I couldn't concentrate and I just wanted to go wind down somewhere by reading a book or watching some TV or something. But I couldn't. I had to sit there and keep working at it, which made me even more stressed.

And I also get stuck when it comes to really important work like coursework. In Biology I've been able to hand in all my little assignments but now the big one has come along I find myself completely frozen. I've been trying to do it now but my mind just strays elsewhere - generally onto how important the work is. I kind of wish teachers just didn't tell us it was important. If I thought it was another basic assignment I probably would have managed to do it. God, I am a bit weird...