What about attention span? My child gets frustrated easily and gives up after minutes. It’s a challenge just trying to teach him his colors. He’s 3 and he’s still struggling with knowing his colors.

As a preschool teacher, one of the first lessons you learn is that most children have about as long of an attention span a they are old. You learn it because whatever you had planned doesn’t work because your class has lost interest and wandered off after about 3-4 min. So having your 3-year-old (and a boy at that–boys generally mature a bit slower than girls do) lose interest in anything after a few minutes is completely normal.

I vary my activities about every 5 minutes in my classroom. So when you’re working with him, keep to about that long. He can learn to sit for 1 minute longer than he might normally, but he can’t learn to sit for 15 minutes longer than he can. With a 3-year-old, you’ve got about 3-5 minutes on any given subject.

Here’s how a session with your son might go. “Today we’re going to talk about blue.” Show him something that is obviously blue. “What else can you see that is blue?” You might be wearing a blue shirt or blue jeans, or he might be. Maybe have 3 or 4 pictures in front of him with something that is blue in them. Show him and see if he can say blue after you. “Now lets go on a blue hunt and find 4 things in our house that is blue”–and off you would go and that’s the end of the blue lesson. You might need to repeat blue several times before he connects the color with the word blue, but that’s OK. (Keep in mind color blindness. If he still hasn’t got his colors down after several color type lessons, a visit to a pediatric optometrist might be in order. I have a few children each year who are color blind, and there are great ways to work around that. Teaching them to read the color on the side of the crayons is an easy way.)

So, not to worry–you’ve only got a few minutes to work with before he needs to change subjects and ideas. That’s all very normal. Keeping it short and fun will make him want to come and play/learn with mommy again. Good luck to you.