Getting ADHD Children Organized for Back To School

How can parents help their child do homework if they don’t know what the assignment is or don’t have the materials necessary to complete it? They can’t! Organizational skills are not innate and they are often a particular struggle for ADHD children. Taking time to create and individualized organizational system can make a huge difference especially for students with ADD and ADHD.

Identify the Assignment and Know the Due Date
Children with ADHD need an easy system to keep track of their assignments. The type of system you will want to use will depend on the age of your child.

Young children with ADHD need a lot of guidance, practice and a very simple structure. Parents can work with teachers to understand the homework system and create a daily or weekly homework chart that your child fills in. It will probably list the date, day of the week and the subjects. It will have a space for the ADHD child to write the assignment and due date and it may include a section to check whether the homework requires a textbook, reading book, worksheet…etc. Listing the subjects in the order they occur makes the process even easier. The chart needs be easily accessible and protected so it will not be crumpled or lost, so choose a place like the first page of a small binder or a notebook

Some older students with ADD and ADHD who have been practicing organization for some time can use a homework notebook. This can be a blank notebook or an agenda with sufficient space to write the necessary information.

Children with ADHD or ADD who are just starting out in the process of organization may benefit from having the teacher sign off that the homework information is correct. This will allow all parties to know that everybody is on the right track.

Strategies to Help ADD and ADHD Children have the Materials Necessary to Complete the Homework

To eliminate the inability to do the homework due to lack of materials, many families with an ADHD child ask for an extra set of textbooks to keep at home.

Some children with ADHD or ADD find that color coding the notebooks and folders with the color of the textbooks helps. The clear visual allows the student to grab the three light blue items instead of having to stop and think about which combination to bring home. Also, many students with ADD and ADHD like to carry around a visual of their schedule. You can color code this with the textbooks, notebooks and folders to make the whole system work together.

For many children with ADHD having so many folders is too much. So some students with messy folders use paper towel tubes. These can be color coded with the subjects too and many children like rolling up the papers and sticking them in the tubes. This helps the homework come home neat and clean.

Other students with ADD and ADHD streamline their organization by having one plastic envelope in their backpack and an accordion file folder at home. The one plastic 8x10 envelope travels to and from school with all homework and notes. It keeps the papers dry and all in one place. Once the ADHD child gets home, s/he can sit down with a parent and properly organize the papers in the accordion file folder.

Good organization can be difficult for even adults! Deciding on a system before school starts can really help your child start the new school year off in the right way.