How long is a child's attention span? (you may be surprised!)

Written by Zsu Lin

Did you know, there are four different types of attention?

Focused attention is the one you probably think of when you think of the word attention: it’s when you focus on one thing at a time. There is also divided attention when you focus on two events at once; sustained attention, when you focus for a long period of time; and executive, when you have to focus on completing steps to achieve a goal (Mazarin, 2021).

The first type is usually the one that parents are concerned about: how long should my child’s attention span be? We’ve talked about this a bit before on the blog, in the post “What contributes to the development of a child’s focused attention?” (Hovington, 2020a).

How long should a child stay focused?

Generally speaking, a reasonable attention span is two to three minutes per year of the child’s age, so 4-6 minutes for a two-year-old, 8- 12 minutes for a four-year-old, 12-18 mins for a six-year, etc (Brain Balance, n.d). Focused attention is an important skill that actually acts as a gatekeeper to acquiring other skills, so whether or not you’re concerned about your child’s attention span, it’s a great skill to work on improving (Wass et al, 2012).

So, what can you do to help children develop their attention skills?

I’m so glad you asked because we have a blog post on that too! Some important tips, for younger kids, are:

reading to your children
minimizing the toys in their environment
including open-ended toys
having them copy images/designs/structures, and playing with them (Hovington, 2020b).

Some more general themes that work into older ages are to bring creativity to tasks your child doesn’t enjoy, to check in with your child and/or build-in breaks for tough tasks, to provide as much structure/organization as you can, and to decrease stressors/distractors as much as possible (Iowa Clinic, 2021; Gobbell, M, 2021; HelpGuide.org, n.d.). Although it’s never too late to start working on attention skills, we know now that the earlier you start, the better (Wass et al, 2012).

Around the age of four or five, most children have learned the basic rules of society, like paying attention when someone speaks, sitting quietly when told to, and not saying out loud everything that comes to mind. By the time kids start school, problems with inattentiveness, hyperactivity, and impulsivity are easier to pick out. If you’re noticing issues in your child or their teacher has said something, it can feel very overwhelming to trying to figure out where to start. We discussed just that in the podcast, episode 5 “ADHD and Students: When to get evaluated,” an interview with Dr. Audrey Benoit, a neuropsychologist, along with the second part to that interview, episode 6 “ADHD and Students: Understanding the symptoms in and out of the classroom.” It’s worth a listen, but the first step is to rule out other issues, like anxiety, OCD, stress/trauma, and learning disorders. The conversation dives deep into signs of ADHD as well as aids and therapy for ADHD.

Hopefully, this serves as a springboard to understanding attention and attention deficits in children, how to help, and when to ask for help.