Is your child hyperactive? Almost every other parent would respond in affirmative.
But before you think you can boast of this quality of your child, let’s try to understand it better.
Instability and inattentiveness make it difficult to handle hyperactive kids and more often you see them bouncing from activity to activity with seemingly limitless energy and ease.
You see, a hyperactive kid may have problems paying attention and sitting still in their seats. Also, they can be impulsive, which means doing things without thinking about the results.
Not a desirable trait, agree? But think about it! A hyperactive child is not ‘bad,’. It’s just that they may just need little more attention and patience to channelise their energy and thought-process.
Here’s how you spot hyperactivity in kids:
- Hyperactive kids have difficulty in listening to or following directions.
- They can’t sit back in their seats and move around a lot.
- They talk too much or interrupt other people’s conversations.
- Hyperactive kids fail to follow instructions or do a step-by-step routine.
- They are impulsive, overenthusiastic and bouncing with energy.
- They can easily become worried, frustrated, angry, and sad.
Hyperactivity is related to the brain. Hence, the best way to handle hyperactive kids is to make them relax and take things one at a time.
So, help your child to pay attention, focus better, and be less hyper. Wondering how? We have a few tips that will help you deal with hyperactive kids better.
RELATED: 13 Mind-Blowing Tips To Increase Concentration Power In Kids
5 Easy Ways To Handle Hyperactive Kids
1. Channelise Their Energy
Find means to vent their energy and calm their minds. Children need to run around and play a lot.
Invest in classes that help them use up their energy, physical activity, and soothe the mind.
You can also get your child activity boxes to help them engage meaningfully and focus on play-based activities.
This will help boost their memory skills and concentration- not to forget skill development as well!
There are several companies that produce discovery boxes – one such company is Flintobox. They make theme-based activity boxes for children between 2 to 12 years of age.
Each month’s theme is unique and they produce a limited number of boxes every month, you can check the boxes here.
2. Talk To Your Child In A Simple Manner
Give them your complete attention and lend an ear to their concerns, interests, and apprehensions. Also get them to make to-do lists and break down the instructions given to them.
3. Help Them Deal With Their Feelings
Children with hyperactivity find it difficult to handle anger, sadness, and worry. Help them to deal with their feelings and tell them what is good and what is bad.
4. Make Them Relax
Minimize distractions and screen time. Take them out to green surroundings. Just be patient, take a deep breath, be determined to calm them, and put their high energy levels to good use.
5. Behaviour Therapy
Reward them for good manners, listening to you, sticking to a routine, encourage them to establish order, and let them know what is expected of them. The best way to deal with a hyperactive kid is to engage his mind and body and channelise their energy.
Also, TV and video games do little to channel energy and are a major distraction.
7 Games & Activities To Keep Hyperactive Kids Busy And Motivated:
Karate/Martial Arts To Channelise Energy
‘Karate’ means empty-handed.
When kids learn karate, they do different postures that help in channelising their energy.
It also helps them to concentrate and calm their minds.
Building confidence, learning to focus, and developing enhanced coordination are just a few of the benefits of martial arts for hyperactive kids.
Outdoor Sports For Constant Activity
Outdoor sports like football, basketball, volleyball, baseball, and badminton are great games for hyperactive kids as there is no standing around time in these games.
Your children will be constantly moving and using large muscle groups, keeping them focused and energy-drained. They also get to learn about team spirit, sportsmanship, and competition.
However, if you can’t put them for any outdoor sports, make them take up running, which offers constant movement, health benefits, and a sense of accomplishment.
Music To Calm The Mind
Music is a great way to unwind after school. Music exercises both sides of the brain at the same time, thus calming the brain, which in turn makes your kids multi-task and store information better.
When they are part of a band, or sing/play chorus, they learn also to be a team player.
Swimming For Self-Discipline
Another effective activity is swimming. Olympic gold-medalist Michael Phelps was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 9.
He took up swimming to master a sport and vent his energy.
Swimming is a great exercise for hyperactive kids as it offers constant movement, self-discipline, and calorie-burn.
Theatre For Creative Engagement
Drama or theatre is a creative activity to engage the hyperactive kids. It needs practice, co-ordination, sharp memory, stage confidence, and people skills. It also helps the kids to take personal challenges ,and hone their public-speaking skills.
Nature Trails To Soothe The Body
Nature has its own ways to soothe a hyperactive child.
And trust us, kids will love to be in natural surroundings.
Trekking, hiking, rock-climbing, rowing, etc. are great options for your bundle of high-energy.
Thinking Games
Games like scrabble, chess, matching pairs, etc. are great exercises for the brain.
These are engaging options for hyperactive kids as they make them sit in one place and concentrate.
These types of games are ideal for kids with short-attention-span and high energy as it helps them build their confidence and interest.
Please note: Let’s understand so much, not all active kids are hyperactive. Hyperactivity is different.
Share your ideas to handle hyperactive kids in the comments section below. What do you think are other ways to reduce hyperactivity in kids?
issues dogs
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steel blade
I enjoy the efforts you have put in this, appreciate it for all the great articles.
Suba
My son 6 yrs old. His really hyper till I do know how to control him. This message will help me to plan something.
Thank you very mch.
Regards, Suba
Oakridge International School
Children need love, Most of the Hyperactive children are suffering due to lack of attention by the parents, peer group or teachers. They lack in keeping their minds calm. We as adults need to work with them in simple manner. Relax their minds and find other means to vent out their energy.
Dakshit Mathur
Excellently covered topic. Will be beneficial to calm your child definitely.
Meher khan
Hi my son is 5 year old n he is too much hyper kid.I read ur article n got many things In it which can help bt main problem is dis when my kid get hyper he does nt listen any thing n just shout alot.he misbehaves each n every one .plz help me hw cn I handle wen he get angry n hyper.waiting for ur reply
Rakesh
Hi Meher,
Don’t worry. It’s natural for 5 year olds to display such actions and is nothing to be concerned of.
However, you can check out this article on how to handle temper tantrum – https://flintobox.com/blog/parenting/terrible-twos-toddler-temper-tantrums
vaishnavi
You can give him calming techniques lik hammock swing, bouncing both supine nd prone on therapy ball, joint compression, massage. U do all dis for three times a day. Sure u will see the difference
aj
hi my 2y.o baby girl has lots of enery in regards to daily activities… she’s so impulsive but she really does has focus in watching tv and sometimes when we write stuffs like drawinh.. the only problem i got is that she wants to run around, explore and doesn’t want to be hold onto.. she got tantrums sometimes… she’s a lot of a destroyer.. she climbs furnitures always and so fast! what shall i do?
Rakesh
Hey AJ,
Don’t worry, it’s perfectly natural for toddlers to behave that way.
As they’ve just started walking, they are exploring the limits of this new freedom.
But since they haven’t started talking completely, they try to express words through actions and the tantrums happen from time to time.
For more on temper tantrums in toddlers and how to handle them you can check this article – https://flintobox.com/blog/parenting/terrible-twos-toddler-temper-tantrums
premila
how to improve their concentration?
Ashwin
Hi Premila,
You can check out this blog article to improve your child’s concentration –
https://flintobox.com/blog/child-development/13-tips-increase-concentration-kids
Varma
The To-do list works. My 4 year old daughter liked it. She throws tantrums daily to finish important tasks like brushing, bathing, eating breakfast, etc. I made her a tick-able to-do list and told her to do tasks in that order. She liked it very much and then had fun brushing her teeth, taking a bath, getting dressed up and finally finish breakfast. She would do the task and happily come tick it on the list, which sounded like a game to her. In fact she did all of the them tasks much faster. She asked me a to-do list the next day
Sumitra
Hi Varma, thank you for your feedback and for sharing!
Para Neelima
Thanks for giving nice Information.
Its helps my kid… Because my kid was ADHA..
Sumitra
Hi Para Neelima, thanks for sharing your feedback.
Melisha
A diagnoised ADHD child will sometimes also need medication from a child psychiatrist. Only behaviour modification doesn’t help.
Sumitra
Hi Melisha, thanks for your value input!