The Strengths of ADD

"Super Parenting for ADD" is a recent publication (2008) by Edward Hallowell (of Harvard Medical School and director for the Hallowell Centers for Cognitive and Emotional Health) and Peter Jensen (child psychologist and the founding director for the Center for the Advancement of Children's Mental Health at Columbia University). The book is an upbeat approach to working with ADD children. It emphasizes that ADD is not a disorder, but a particular set of strengths and weaknesses and advises parents of ADD children to focus on the gifts of their children.

The authors were adament on the point that it is incredibly counter-productive to focus on the negative aspects of ADD and that these children should not regard themselves as having a disorder. Constantly emphasizing the negative aspects of ADD is a really good way to mess your kid up in the long run.
The traits associated with ADD, which are typically given a negative name, have positive "mirror traits." Here are some examples:
impulsiveness=creativity, stubbornness=persistance, intrusiveness=eagerness.

Parents of ADD children should nurture an environment where it is safe to take risks (sounds like our class!), encourage the mastery of a skill and pinpoint the child's inner conative tendancy- the way in which one likes to accomplish tasks. There are four basic conative types: hands-on, fact-finder, follow-through (attention to scheduling), or quick start (jumping right in without much forthought).

Kathy Kolbe has conducted extensive research about conative types. One can find out more about conative types at kolbe.com. There are some cool tests to determine your own conative tendancy, but it is a bit pricy to get the results.

-Beatrice