How do Children with ADHD Receive Criticism?

Receiving criticism well maybe very difficult for children with ADHD. In my opinion, they are often less confident than their typical peers. Why is this? How would you like to hear the following, day in and day out?

✱ “Stop talking!”
✱ “Stop hitting!”
✱ “Biting is not permitted.”
✱ “Go back to your room if you are going to stand there and
interrupt us.”
✱ “I told you to do your homework assignment three times:
Why don’t you listen?”
✱ “You were supposed to bring a raincoat for the trip? Why
did you forget?”

You get the idea. In so many situations, the child with ADHD is yelled at and criticized constantly, as well as being the receiver of negative comments from adults and children. It is seemingly difficult to teach a child to receive criticism well when criticism is the only type of verbiage he receives!

The only way to help the child with ADHD to become better at receiving criticism well is to teach him to separate himself from the criticism that is being directed at him. In other words, the teacher has to help the child with ADHD to interpret the criticisms that are being made to him as meaningless. The teacher must instruct the child not to permit those criticisms to affect how the child really feels about himself. When someone tells the child to stop talking, the teacher should help the child to understand that people are not disinterested in what he is saying, but they just want him to listen more of the time than he talks. The teacher can help the child to listen more effectively.

A good way to teach a child with ADHD to listen more of the time and more accurately is to have the child listen to a story on a CD, either recorded by the teacher or professionally recorded. The teacher should have the actual book next to her at the same time that she listens to the story on the CD. along with the child with ADHD. In this way, she will know the amount of text that she wants the child with ADHD to remember.

She should then ask the child questions after each part to see how much he remembers. If he remembers most of the story, then, by definition, he listened to it well. If he interrupts the reading of the story on the CD, say to him, “Let’s listen now and stop talking, so we can remember the story.” Begin by stopping at short sections that are being read on the CD, even after one paragraph or one page, to ensure that he is listening. Little by little, extend the number of pages that you have read one at a time to see if he remembered the story.

At this point, you can begin to explain to the child with ADHD how much of the time he listened to the story without talking. You can then analogize the way he listened to how he should listen to another child when they are involved in a conversation. You can then explain to the child that when he listens more of the time rather than talking more of the time, people are more interested in what he is talking about. But if the child still receives criticism, how can you teach him to begin receiving criticism well?

Receiving criticism well depends on the confidence level of the child with ADHD. It is more difficult to respond to criticism when a child feels devalued because of that criticism. It
is very important for teachers to work with children with ADHD, as we are trying to do here, to diminish their socially inappropriate behaviors. If those behaviors are reduced, other people will respond less negatively to them. Do you see the cycle here? When the child behaves in a more appropriate way, people respond more positively to him, and he receives criticism well. When the child behaves in a more socially inappropriate way, people respond more negatively to him, and he receives criticism poorly.