Let's study at home with special and not special needs :)

Speaking personally, I think every child has special needs. Every child has their own individuality, needs special attention, and has a special attitude, because we are humans, not machines. I'm a teacher and therapist for Special Needs, and we are homeschoolers. When we started homeschooling, my middle child (he is not Special Needs, but is just like every child – busy and creative) simply refused to sit down to study. For about half a year, I struggled with this – we would sit down and read, but didn't study. When learning time came, he would start to cry. So starting was really hard. Initially, I started to do a lot of research on methodology, doing online courses. I thought it might be a good idea to share with other parents what we finally did to make my difficult son sit down and start to study. I realised that it was not him, but me who had to change. These changes were as follows:

1. Rules were introduced. Some 10 rules, no more – the most important rules to set the frame of the day.

2. A daily routine was put in place. (I’ve written a post about it recently: https://irorszagbandownszindromaval.blogspot.com/2020/03/learning-at-home-during-corona-virus.html.)

3. If I ask for something, I stop everything else until he answers and I get feedback. I do nothing but listen.

4. It I address him (sometimes I have to touch), I wait for eye contact. I wait until he listens to me.

5. During my request, I try to be at the same head level (bending down, crouching, or sitting down) and looking into his eyes. Occasionally, I can only make eye contact with him when I point my fingers at my eyes because he follows my hand.

6. I try to break down my request into smaller instructions. If possible, I use small steps. I do this because it makes sense to pay attention to the next instructions as well. This is important because when a child has an exercise, and the instruction is to circle the right answer but they underline it, if the teacher is not to flexible and won’t accept that part of the answer, especially for more complex mathematical tasks, you will get lost.

7. When I say what I want, I always wait for feedback: has he understood what I meant? Not because I think he's slow, but because he may have been distracted, or I haven't told him clearly enough. It's better to be sure. If he says he's understood, I ask him to repeat the instruction. If he can repeat it, he will do what I ask. 

8. We sit down for a maximum of 45 minutes to study. Sometimes we finish a topic early, in only 20-30 minutes. If he wants to continue, he can work for the whole of the two hours, but we try to introduce a little break after 45 minutes.

9. It is very important to study between 10 and 12 o'clock (or earlier) because before 12 his brain works better, so my son started studying after breakfast. If he wasn't on time and was tired, I would point this out: you see, you're tired now. Now he hurries to his desk after breakfast to be ready.

10. If I couldn't really achieve something with him, I used to have him write 10 times that next time he wouldn't do this or that. This happened only rarely. This won't motivate a child to learn, so we did not apply it to learning, it only happened when he did a serious (hitting his little brother). If he didn't write it, he couldn't watch movie at evening, which proved a very effective. The point is, as long as the child writes, you focus on not doing this.

11. I just tried to motivate him with rewards. 

Best of luck!