Here is a Washington Post interview with Damon Korb about his advice on teaching kids to be organized.
Despite well-planned family trips, weeks of camp, play dates and child-care arrangements, summer is built upon the comforts of gentle chaos.
But now it is time to refocus, invest in routine and better develop the organizational thinking we need to face the school year with a plan, geared for whatever we may define as success.
Damon Korb, a developmental-behavioral pediatrician and author of “Raising an Organized Child: 5 Steps to Boost Independence, Ease Frustration, and Promote Confidence,” wants to help parents and children take a more organized approach to the new school year.
Q: How did you discover the need for organized thinking in family life?
A: I’ve been a developmental-behavioral pediatrician for 20 years, and I see a wide range of kids — kids with autism, kids with ADHD, Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), learning difficulties, behavior problems — and the complaints that the parents came forward with were always related to executive dysfunctions. “Why can’t my child get ready in the morning? How come my child will do their homework but forget to turn it in? Why does my child struggle making friends? How come my child always argues with me?” My intent was to help make raising an organized child clear and accessible for families so that we could help teach these executive functions from a young age.
Q: How do you narrow all of that down into a five-step process?
A: There are themes that apply across ages, and you just apply them differently:
1. Be consistent. Parents need to be consistent, they need to teach consistency. They need to have the same routines consistently.
2. Introduce order. Kids need to have a sense that there’s a beginning, a middle and an end to everything. A project isn’t done until it’s finished.
3. (Read more…)