• Concentrating on a task can be tough for some children, but it is a skill that they can learn, in most cases. With an environment that is free of distraction and focusing their attention on concentration-building activities, children can become more attentive and improve their performance in school by increasing their ability to concentrate. There are several activities that will help the young build concentration.
  
  

Board Games

• Board games that require concentrated thought might be one of the better ways of working on a young person's ability to concentrate. Instead of forcing them to work on a problem, you are simply encouraging them to have fun. Kids love to play games, and they must focus their concentration on the rules and how to proceed through a game. Games such as chess and checkers are good options for building concentration if the child is interested, but any game that he is able to understand and enjoy by following a set of rules should help develop his ability to concentrate.
  
  

Missing Numbers

• Asking a child to call out missing numbers is a fun activity that reinforces his ability to count and will help him concentrate. For young children just learning to count, a person begins counting and skips a number now and then. The object of the activity is for the children to pay close enough attention to hear the missed number and call it out. If an adult begins counting, "One, two, three, five," the children would yell, "Four!" For older children familiar with multiplication, the same activity will work. The adult will count in twos or threes and skip a number.
  
  

The Concentration Game

• A good activity to use to work on concentration is the card game of the same name. Concentration is a game usually played with picture cards. The cards are shuffled and placed face-down in four rows of 13 if using a standard deck, but the game can be laid out in any way the players wish, depending on the number of cards. Each card should have another identical card within the deck. The object is to match the cards to their identical counterparts and remove them from play. Remembering where you last saw an identical card is the key. Two cards are turned over. If they match, they are removed from play. If they do not match, they are turned back over in the same position they were in. Eventually the players will match all the cards. This game can be found in many forms and is available in free online versions.