Keep Your Child Focused for Success

Changing habits or behaviors is difficult for adults, and even more difficult for children. Although children may truly want to change behavior that gets them in trouble with their parents or their teachers, or which makes them a subject of ridicule among their peers, wanting to change and being able to change are two different things.

Parents and teachers alike know that nagging doesn't work and quickly becomes frustrating for both the child and the adults involved. "To change, a child needs to keep his focus on what to do and why to do it - not an easy task for kids in a world filled with distractions," says psychologist Dr. Steve Levinson.

Levinson has spent two decades researching why change is so hard. He discovered that people need some mechanism to keep their attention sharply focused on their good intentions in order to achieve their goals. His research led him to create the MotivAider, a small electronic device that can be set to vibrate at varying intervals to remind people to manage their behavior.

The device is ideal for keeping children focused and on task. Parents and teachers have used the device to help children develop good behaviors and modify unwanted behaviors. The compact, battery-powered device weighs less than 3 ounces and will easily fit in a pocket, or can be worn like a pager. No one but the child using it need ever know it's there.

The key to using the device is to attach a personal message to the vibration. For example, to control nail biting, the child, in conjunction with her parents, would devise a personal message such as "stop biting my nails." Next, link the message to the vibration so that the child will automatically think of the message whenever she feels the vibration. Then, set the device to deliver the vibration as often as desired. As behavior improves, the device can be adjusted to vibrate less often.

In a classroom setting, the personal message could be "look at the teacher" or "pay attention." Then, whenever the device vibrates, the student will be reminded to focus on the teacher or on the task at hand.

Parents and teachers can use the device themselves to motivate change in children. In a situation where the adult strives to give positive attention for good behavior, teachers and parents can use the MotivAider to remind them to periodically praise the child for constructive behavior.

The MotivAider has also been used successfully with autistic children as well as children with ADD and ADHD. Jason Garner, senior managing supervisor at the Center for Autism & Related Disorders, reports that he recommends the MotivAider to help facilitate attention skills in an academic setting. "We use it to facilitate on-task behavior, social interaction skills and overall independence skills," he says. "The device has helped kids that I directly supervise from Hawaii to the Middle East."

To learn more about how and why the MotivAider works, go to www.helpkidschange.com.

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