Attention and concentration have made their way into the educational limelight. Parents and educators now recognize that intelligence and academic skills are only a small part of the formula for educational success.

Soft academic skills, such as concentration, also contribute to how well students do in their studies.

Parents and educators often make concentration an issue of willfulness, expecting children to exercise control over their ability to pay attention. However, concentration is a study skill that depends on several factors, including age, expectations and environment.

Parents can attest to the fact that children in middle and high schools are better able to concentrate than children in the lower grades. Older children have developed the skills that are needed to regulate their ability to concentrate, resulting in their being less distracted and impulsive.

Many teenagers try to convince their parents that their expertise in concentration extends to completing calculus homework while listening to their favorite music. Parents should be leery of such claims, however, since concentration for complex tasks diminishes in noisy surroundings.

Young children are easily distracted because they are less organized and strategic in their approach to tasks.

For example, elementary school students make decisions based on one or two comparisons rather than judging the range of possibilities. When children choose the "right" answer, adults assume that the child has concentrated on all of the relevant information when, in fact, the child may have stumbled upon the best answer.

Concentration also depends upon having a good match between what parents and educators expect of a child and the child's skills. Low expectations and high skills or high expectations and low skills can result in problems with concentration. "I'm bored" can mean many things. It could mean, "This isn't interesting" or "This is too hard" or "This is too easy."

Like adults, children's ability to concentrate also depends on being worry-free. Children who are hungry or preoccupied with worries about family or friends will find it difficult to pay attention to their studies. Concentration relies on children having the energy to take on the challenges that are given to them at school.

Here are several ways parents can foster strong concentration skills in their children:

  • Create a positive place for your children to complete their homework. This working space should be free of distractions but not sterile. 
  • Make study time a routine. Talk about academic learning with the same enthusiasm as you talk about your child's sporting activities and hobbies. 
  • Encourage your children to engage in activities that require concentration such as word searches, memory games, and chess. 
  • Talk with your child about what "I'm bored" means. 
  • Proper nutrition, physical exercise, and an adequate amount of sleep will help your children concentrate on their studies. 

Dr. Laurie McNelles, Ph.D. is Director of the Mothercraft Insitute for Early Develoment at York University in Toronto, Canada. She is an expert in child and adolescent development.