Parents often turn to doctors about the increased physical activity of the child, which is difficult to control and correct. In medicine, such conditions are referred to as hyperactivity or disinhibition. Numerous special studies of both domestic and foreign scientists are devoted to this issue. What is it and why does it occur? Is hyperactivity a normal physiological phenomenon or is it one of the signs of a disease? What regime do such children need, how should parents, educators and teachers treat them?
We will try to answer these and other questions that often concern parents. The word hyperactivity comes from the Greek hyper — a lot of Latin active — active. Therefore, hyperactivity in literal translation means increased activity. In the medical sense, hyperactivity in children is an increased level of physical activity at school and at home. It can be either a natural manifestation of the physiological needs of a child (especially of a younger age) for movement, come under the influence of conflict traumatic situations and defects in education, or be detected from the first years or even months of life. Let’s consider each of these possibilities in turn.
Movement is one of the manifestations of the vital activity of the organism, providing its connection with the external environment. As you know, with age, physical activity of a person undergoes physiological changes. It is especially developed in children of the first 3-4 years of life and slows down significantly in the elderly and senile age. All this has a specific physiological explanation. In young children, the processes of inhibition are weakly expressed. As a result, they cannot focus their attention on one subject or one game for a long time. The desire for knowledge of the environment, in many respects still unknown, encourages children to often change their occupation. They are constantly on the move, they want to see everything, touch it themselves, even break it in order to look inside. Due to the low mobility of the main nervous processes (excitation and inhibition), it is difficult for a child of 2-5 years old to suddenly stop his activity. If, by their intervention, adults suddenly interrupt his lesson, and even shout or punish him, then the child often has a protest reaction in the form of crying, screaming, refusing to fulfill the demands of his parents. This is a physical, normal phenomenon. Therefore, you should not try to limit the natural mobility of the child. If a child’s screams or the noise created during play bothers you, try to keep him busy with something else, more interesting, but do not demand that he stop immediately.
However, parents, especially young ones, in some cases are concerned about the motor activity of the child. They see other children of the same age who may be calmer and less active. It is good if, with these fears, the mother turns to a doctor who should calm her down and give the right advice. Unfortunately, sometimes the first adviser is neighbors, inexperienced educators and other random people. It is not uncommon for a practically healthy child to be given widely available sedative potions and tablets, or the fashionable infusions of various herbs. Do not self-medicate without the advice of a doctor! Only a doctor can dispel your doubts, give a correct conclusion about the health of the child and, if necessary, prescribe treatment.
Now consider the hyperactivity of children, which arose as a result of various external influences. In such cases, parents note that a previously calm child suddenly becomes overly mobile, restless, and whiny. This is especially common during the first physiological crisis between the ages of 2 and 4 years. The cause of hyperactivity can be various diseases, including the nervous system (mainly in older children), but most often — defects in education. The latter can be divided into three groups — the three extremes of education: a very strict (suppressive) style, excessive guardianship, the absence of uniform requirements for all family members.
Unfortunately, there are still so-called socially neglected families in relation to the child, when they are generally little taken care of, often punished for no reason, and make unbearable demands. If at the same time children are witnesses of quarrels between parents, and besides, one of them or both suffer from alcoholism, then there are more than enough reasons for hyperactivity and other neurotic disorders. From such families, they rarely seek medical help or bring a child when he already has pronounced pathological character traits.
One of the common causes of hyperactivity in children is the opposite type of upbringing, when they are allowed to do everything and the children do not know any prohibitions at first. Such a child is an idol in the family, his abilities are constantly hypertrophied. But at a certain stage, parents are convinced that the upbringing was wrong and therefore decide to change their attitude towards the child, present him with certain requirements and restrictions, break old habits that have taken root over the years. The well-known Soviet teacher A. S. Makarenko wrote that raising a child normally and correctly is much easier than re-educating. Re-education requires more patience, strength and knowledge, and not every parent has all this. Often, in the process of re-educating a child, especially if it is not carried out quite correctly, various neurotic reactions may occur in children, including hyperactivity, negativism, and aggressive behavior. In most of these cases, no special treatment is required, it is enough to build your relationship with the child correctly, to be constant to the end in your requirements.
Now let’s consider the type of hyperactivity that occurs from the first years or even months of a child’s life and is mainly not a pedagogical, but a medical problem. Let us first present one of the characteristic observations.
A 3-year-old boy Sasha was brought to me for a consultation. Parents are worried that the child is very mobile, fast, restless, constantly on the move, often changes occupation, does not respond to comments from others. From the detailed story of the mother, it was established that this is the first child from young healthy parents. Her father is an engineer, her mother is a gymnastics coach, at the beginning of her pregnancy she went in for sports intensively, suffered a cold and took antibiotics.
From the first days of his life, the boy is very restless and whiny. Repeatedly addressed to doctors, however, no changes were found in the activity of the heart, lungs, gastrointestinal tract and other internal organs. The boy slept very badly for up to a year, and his parents, grandparents took turns with him throughout the night. Sickness, a dummy, picking up helped little. He started to sit and walk on time. After a year, sleep gradually adjusted, however, according to the parents, new troubles began. The boy became very fast, fussy and distracted.
All this was told by the parents without the child, who was waiting in the corridor with his grandmother. When he was brought into the office and he saw doctors in dressing gowns, he began to scream, cry, and escape from his parents. It was decided to see the boy at home in his usual surroundings. He reacted to the arrival of a stranger with some fright, all the time he went away and watched expectantly. Soon he became convinced that no one was paying attention to him and began to deal with toys, but he could not concentrate on any of them. All his movements are fast and swift. Slowly and gradually joined the conversation with the doctor. It turned out that the boy reads in syllables, he knows letters from the age of two, although his parents try to keep books less in his field of vision. Performs simple arithmetic operations up to five. Through various distracting methods, it was possible to examine the child. Examination of clear organic signs of damage to the nervous system was not established.
In a conversation with parents, it was found out that education is carried out correctly. Despite hyperactivity and unbridledness, he clearly knows what not to do. So, he does not touch the dishes in the room, the TV, the radio, they seem to not exist for him. But the toys in the room were scattered at random. It should be noted that with regard to toys, parents also do the right thing: they don’t give a lot at once, they hide the old ones for a while, they don’t buy new ones often. It was clear that the child’s condition was not due to defects in upbringing. Parents do not consider the child a «wunderkind», although he is already beginning to read and shows ability in counting. They are more afraid of this somewhat premature mental development, and especially his behavior.
Advice is given not to be afraid of the early development of the child’s abilities, periodically offer him the simplest children’s books, and, if the boy wishes, read with him in the form of a game. It is also recommended to go for long walks more often (up to a little fatigue). In order to streamline the behavior, it was decided to prescribe some medications. Suddenly, music began to play in the next room. The boy suddenly changed, the fussiness that had taken place passed, he stood for several seconds, listening, and quickly ran to the sounds of music. Now the parents remembered another «strangeness» of the child: he just listens to calm slow music, stands quietly near the receiver for a long time and is always unhappy when it is turned off. And indeed, the boy stood calmly near the radio, waved his arms slightly (as if conducting), his body swayed slightly to the sides. This went on for about ten minutes, then the parents turned off the receiver. There was a short-term negative reaction, but without protest. Parents note that the child often brings a number of his favorite records to be played, which he remembers in appearance: he is ready to listen to them endlessly, which, of course, he is denied, since this also frightens parents to some extent.
The child’s reaction to music changed our recommendations somewhat. Parents are advised to allow the child to listen to his favorite records 2-3 times a day, gradually expanding their number. It is also recommended to take the child to someone who plays the piano and allow him to “touch” the instrument himself. It was decided to refrain from medical treatment for the time being. The results of the re-examination showed that our recommendations were correct. Some ordering of the child’s behavior is noted, although he continues to be quick and somewhat fussy.
We have described a fairly typical case of early hyperactivity occurring from the first months of life. It is characterized by a special type of increased motor activity, combined with restlessness, increased distractibility, absent-mindedness, impaired concentration, and increased excitability. At the same time, aggressiveness, negativism, some awkwardness and clumsiness can be observed. A hyperactive child rushes around the apartment like a whirlwind, causing real mayhem and chaos in it, constantly breaking something, hitting, crumbling. He is the instigator of quarrels and fights. His clothes are often torn and soiled, personal items are lost, scattered or piled up. It is very difficult to calm him down, and sometimes almost impossible. Parents are at a loss — where does this inexhaustible energy, which haunts and rests the whole family, come from? A figurative description of a hyperactive child is given by the mother of a 5-year-old boy, which is given in the book by A.I. Barkan “His Majesty the Child, as he is. Secrets and mysteries” (1996): “Really no one has created a perpetual motion machine yet? If you want his secrets, study my child.» Such children bring a lot of trouble to parents, educators and teachers. Parents have a number of questions: why did everything happen and is it their fault, what awaits the child in the future, will this affect his mental abilities?
These and other questions have long been closely studied by child neurologists and psychiatrists. Much remains unclear and controversial, but some issues have already been resolved. In particular, it was found that in case of early onset hyperactivity of the child, pregnancy in the mother often proceeded with complications: pronounced gestosis of pregnancy, somatic diseases, non-compliance with the regime of work and rest, etc. It is known that taking care of the health of the child should be even before his birth. After all, a person’s life begins not from birth, but from the first days of pregnancy. Therefore, even now, in some countries of the East, age is calculated from the moment of conception. Science has established that some diseases of children can occur even in the prenatal period, during development in the womb. An unhealthy lifestyle, malnutrition of the mother, lack of vitamins and amino acids also disrupt the development of the unborn child. A pregnant woman, as never before, should be careful in the use of various medicinal substances, especially such as psychotropic drugs, sleeping pills, hormones.
At the same time, it should not be concluded from what has been said that treatment cannot be taken during pregnancy. After all, a pregnant woman can get flu, bronchitis, pneumonia, etc. In such cases, the appointment of medications is mandatory, but any treatment is carried out as prescribed and under the supervision of a doctor.
There are strong indications that hereditary factors play a role in the development of childhood hyperactivity. Upon detailed questioning of grandparents, it is often possible to find out that the parents of their grandchildren were also hyperactive in childhood or had similar neurological disorders. Similar disorders are often detected in relatives on the line of both fathers and mothers. Consequently, early childhood hyperactivity is often the result of abnormal intrauterine development or is hereditary.
Regarding the further development of such children, the following can be said. Based on large statistical studies, it has been proven that hyperactive children, as a rule, do not experience mental retardation. At the same time, they quite often have certain difficulties in their studies, even unsatisfactory or only mediocre performance in 1-2 subjects (more often in writing and reading), but this is mainly a consequence of educational defects or incorrect pedagogical influence.
Another interesting feature of hyperactive children should be noted. Quite often, in their first year of life, physical and mental development proceeds at a faster pace. Such children begin to walk and pronounce individual words earlier than their peers. One might get the impression that this is a very gifted, brilliant child, from whom much can be expected in the future. However, at preschool age, and especially in the first years of schooling, one has to make sure that the mental development of such children is at an average level. At the same time, they may have increased abilities for a certain type of activity (music, mathematics, technology, playing chess, etc.). These data should be used in educational and pedagogical work.
As you know, almost any child in the presence of conflict situations, especially frequently recurring ones, may develop a number of neurotic disorders. This is especially true for hyperactive children. If insufficient attention is paid to their upbringing or it is carried out incorrectly, then various functional disorders of the nervous system gradually arise and are recorded in them.
In relationships with such a child, it is necessary, first of all, to proceed from the unity of requirements from all family members. Such children should not see in one of the family members their permanent protector, who forgives them everything and allows what others forbid. The attitude towards such a child should be calm and even. No concessions (reductions) should be made to the peculiarities of his nervous system. Already at an early age, the child should be taught what not to do and what to do. Everything else he perceives as «possible.»
In educational work, it is necessary to take into account the increased motor activity of such children. Therefore, games should be primarily mobile. Given the increased distractibility of such children, it is necessary to change the nature of their activities more often. It is necessary to give the practically most expedient way out of such a child’s hyperactivity. If at the same time he does not sleep well, especially at night, you can take long walks the day before, up to moderate fatigue. In our example with Sasha, his increased interest in music is noted. If similar tendencies can be found in hyperactive children, then this should be used as much as possible in education.
It is noted that hyperactive children do not adapt well to a new unfamiliar environment, a new team. When such a child is placed in a kindergarten, a number of complications often arise at the beginning: after a few days, the children refuse to attend the kindergarten, cry, and act up. In this regard, it is very important to first instill love for peers, being in a team; it is also necessary to talk with the teacher in advance about the characteristics of the child. If the visit to the kindergarten begins suddenly, then the negative traits of the child’s behavior may increase, in many cases he violates the general order in the group with his negativism and stubbornness.
Approximately the same can happen during school visits, especially in cases where there is no proper contact with the teacher. Insufficient concentration of attention, restlessness, and frequent distractibility create a reputation for such children as behavior breakers. Constant reproaches and comments from teachers contribute to the formation of an inferiority complex in a child. He seems to protect himself with unmotivated impulsive behavior. This can be expressed in damage to surrounding objects, foolishness, some aggressiveness. A hyperactive child needs a special approach at school, it is better to put him on one of the first desks, call him more often for an answer, and generally give the opportunity to “discharge” the existing hyperactivity. For example, you can ask him to bring something or give it to the teacher, help him collect diaries, notebooks, wipe the blackboard, etc. This will be invisible to classmates and will help the child to sit through the lesson without violating discipline. Naturally, every teacher will find many such distractions.
If hyperactive children show a desire, in addition to attending school, to play music, attend a sports section, they should not be prevented from doing so. Moreover, there is no reason to exempt them from physical education, participation in competitions and other events. Of course, such a child should be periodically shown to a neurologist, who will decide on the appropriateness and nature of therapeutic measures.
We examined the various manifestations of hyperactivity in children and the causes of their occurrence. It is difficult to give advice to parents on a case-by-case basis. At the same time, it should be remembered that one of the main measures for normalizing and controlling the behavior of such a child is properly conducted education and training.
Tips for parents of a hyperactive child
What should be done specifically? First of all, remember that children with ADHD have a very high threshold of sensitivity to negative stimuli, and therefore the words “no”, “don’t”, “don’t touch”, “prohibit” are, in fact, an empty phrase for them. They are not susceptible to reprimands and punishment, but they respond very well to praise and approval. Physical punishment should be avoided altogether. See →