Psychological problems

...Recently teachers and psychologists have noticed that children are unable to be self-absorbed, concentrating on something, they show no interest in what they are doing. Such symptoms were united into the signs of a new disease - "concentration deficit". This type of disease is clearly seen in the process of learning and is characterized by hyper activity, "situational" character of behavior, increased distraction.

Such children are not occupied with any lessons, they quickly shift their attention from one task to another, long for quick impression change, but varied impressions are perceived skin-deep, they are not analyzed and joined together. They need constant external stimulation, which they used to receive from the TV screen.

Many children cannot perceive oral information - they do not remember the previous phrase and unite separate sentences. The speech heard does not create any images and strong impressions. That is the reason why children with attention deficit find it hard to read: they understand separate words and short sentences, they cannot retain and join them, and as a result they do not understand the whole text, they are not interested in reading even the most exciting books. Psychologists notice one more fact - nowadays children have almost no fantasy and creativity. Children loose ability and desire to occupy themselves with something. They do not apply forces to create new games, to compose tales, to create their own imaginary world. They are bored and do not want to draw, to construct. They are not interested in anything.

Lack of personal content influences relations between children. They do not find it exciting to communicate with each other. It was noticed, that communication with children of the same age is superficial and formal: they have nothing to discuss, nothing to argue about. They prefer to press the button of a TV set and wait for new entertainment. So, in case a two-year-old child knows only 10 "babble" words, cannot construct phrases, and cannot show objects on pictures (a bear, a forest, a house, a doll, etc.). In case at the age of 3 years a child does not answer simple questions, such as "who?" "where?", does not build phrases consisting of 3-4 words, confuses notions "up" and "down", cannot follow two instructions in succession : "Take the bear and give it to me!".

These are disturbing signs, which must attract parents' attention. In such cases specialist's help is required. The lesson should start as early as possible. Unfortunately, many parents wait till their child is 3 years of age, and he will start speaking by himself. Very seldom these hopes are justified. Omitted opportunities complicate the matter. Lack of help in early childhood leads to appearance of a number of complications. It is much easier to control the process of speaking in early childhood, when the child starts to "babble". Correctional help is effective in the so-called "sensitive" period: 2,5 - 5 years, that is the period of speech function formation.

To be continued ...

Istomina Natalia, Psychologist-Consultant, American Medical Center