Five Tips for Helping Young Kids Focus on Academic Tasks (Plus Free Token Board Download!)

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We all know that moms wear dozens of hats in a given day. Even when you aren’t a homeschooling family or distance learning because…2020 and pandemic…motherhood still encompasses the role of teacher. While you may not be teaching your kids the times tables or how to write in cursive, as a mom you teach your kids new skills all the time. Chances are you do it without you or your children really even noticing that it’s happening. So if you ARE distance learning or making the switch to homeschooling, you’ve probably realized that trying to get your kids to acknowledge this new, formal role of “teacher” is really tricky. You are mom, and teachers are teachers in most kids’ minds. They aren’t used to getting academic instruction from you, and it takes some getting used to for both mom and kids.  

My daughter managed to make the switch to homeschooling with relative ease, but she still will ask me periodically when she’s going back to school. Psalm is a classic learner. She does well with instructions and sitting still, and she enjoys structured learning. But even though these are relative strong points for her, she’s still not even 5 years old and her body wants to wiggle and her mind wants to wander. Don’t even get me started on my son. Oliver is only 2, which I know accounts for much of his inability to sit still and focus, but even putting age aside, he’s much rowdier and more kinesthetic than Psalm ever was. All of these factors can make formal learning time a bit of a battle some days.

So, what is the trick to keeping young kids focused on academics when they aren’t in the kind of learning setting they are used to? To be honest, we’re still trying to figure that out over here. But I’ll let you in on a few tricks that have worked for us so far.

1. Sing—My children love music. Like, there’s almost never a time when there isn’t music playing in our house. So using songs to teach concepts to my kids is extremely effective. And in general, putting things to music makes them easier to remember. Singing songs with your kids helps keep them engaged, and there are tons of great options out there for teaching everything from the alphabet to the days of the week to dinosaur facts. Our current favorites come from ABC Mouse. You can watch the music videos through the app or online if you have an ABC Mouse account, or you can listen to the music for free by looking them up on Spotify!
2. Incorporate movement—I mentioned before that Oliver is a kinesthetic learner, but even Psalm, who is much better at sitting for instruction, is still a wiggly 4-year-old who needs to move around frequently. Kids aren’t meant to sit still for long periods of time. They need movement. And mixing up the different types of learning experiences your children get not only makes learning more enjoyable, it helps play to their different strengths. Incorporating movement can be as simple as having your child listen for a special word or phrase and then clapping, stomping, or jumping when they hear it. If you want to get fancier, you can use things like egg shakers or play silks to shake or wave while learning. This works really well when paired with tip #1, but you can also shake an egg shaker or wave a play silk while counting or reciting. The very act of performing a specified movement while recalling a learned fact helps that fact stick in your brain.
3. Act it out—Teaching young kids history, Bible stories, or safety skills can be really tricky. The concepts are a little too abstract for children to grasp on their own. Acting these things out can help kids stay focused on what they’re learning and remember it later. Are you teaching your kids about the first Thanksgiving? Act it out! Teaching your little ones the story of Daniel and the lions den? Act it out! Reminding your kids that they have to look both ways before crossing the road? Act it out! This feels like play to kids, which keeps it fun and interesting, but it also helps familiarize them with something out of context.
4. Give each child a responsibility—Oliver is staunchly in the middle of the “I can do it myself” phase (even though he can’t do many things himself), and Psalm likes being in charge of anything and everything (and everyone…). So giving each child a responsibility or assignment, such as “Oliver, can you hold this poster for me?” or “Psalm, can you turn the pages of the book when I point to you?” helps keep them engaged. Establishing jobs up front also helps prevent fights along the way, because everyone knows in advance that they will get a turn to do their job.
5. Use a token board—not every academic task lends itself to movement or song. Sometimes, like it or not, you have to sit still to be learning. Being able to sit, listen, and perform tasks is also a valuable skill for kids to learn, since as they get older they will be required to do those things in testing, church, and work environments. For the times when my kiddos need to hold still, I use a reward system. When I was teaching special education, we used token boards to help motivate the kids to stay focused on longer tasks. They were extremely effective, so when we decided to start homeschooling, I knew I wanted to have some. Each token board has five token slots, and a spot for identifying the reward the child is working for. For each major learning task the kids complete, they get a token in one of the slots. You can use anything as a token—beads, pompoms, coins, etc. To keep things simple, I just use a dry erase crayon to draw a star in each token slot. Once they’ve earned all five stars by completing five different academic tasks, they earn their reward. Note: Another variation of this is using a snack for the token. Psalm and I like to use chocolate chips (because we’re chocolate addicts and chocolate is highly motivational). I’ll put two chocolate chips in each token slot, and when Psalm completes a task, she gets to eat the chocolate chips. Once she’s finished all five tasks, she gets 10 chocolate chips that have been sitting in the reward slot, reminding her that staying focused is worth the effort. If you’re not into using sugar as bribery for learning (which probably makes you a responsible parent) you can use raisins, animal crackers, or any other small snack.

You can buy token boards on Amazon and at teaching resource websites, but they’re such a simple concept that I decided to create my own. You can download a copy for free here! The download includes three different color variations, and all you have to do is download, print, cut, and laminate them to start using token boards at home.

What methods do you like to use to help keep your children motivated and focused during academic instruction? I’m always on the hunt for new strategies!