Tips for students with ADHD
Having ADHD can present challenges with study. Managing studies and ADHD can also be fatiguing! Here are some tips and ideas that may help you at Deakin. What works for one student, may not work for you, so it is important to explore ideas and identify strategies that suit you.
Your access plan can reduce the impact of ADHD on studies, but you will still need to attend teaching sessions, make notes, organise your time and submit assessments. Whilst not an exhaustive list, we hope the following tips enable you to feel more confident managing your studies.
For specific ADHD advice, speak to your GP, psychiatrist and/or ADHD Coach.
- Know when STAR opens and plan your timetable and other commitments early.
- Readings are often available weeks before trimester start.
- Your Cloud unit site is open in O week - log in and check resources and make a careful note of all your assessment due dates. How will you keep track of due dates – diary, phone, Deakin trimester planner (PDF, 838.6KB)?
- If using an e-calendar to keep track of studies, adding what week of the trimester it is, can be useful to help orientate you to where you are up to in the trimester and how many weeks of study are left.
- Study for many hours does not always mean that study is effective. It is important to consider times of day that work best for your concentration. It is also important to consider how you study best – maybe it is regular smaller chunks of time?
- Review the organising your studies information on the academic skills website for additional tips. You may be interested in specific study skills information. Topics include Group work, reflective learning, using generative AI, and understanding different assignment types.
- Remember – approx. 10 hours / week / unit on average is the expectation at university level. Some weeks may be less, some more – and you may need to build in some contingency hours if you have some days that are not as productive as hoped. The study workload planner might be helpful? It is a visual tool to ‘see’ time. Other hard copy and electronic resources are available if a workload/time planner is helpful for you.
- Consider a study load that works for you. If you are unsure about units / enrolment, speak to a student adviser.
- Think about locations where you study best. Do you work best on campus? From a local library? Consider coming to campus early or staying a little longer to use campus facilities and minimise distractions.
- Think about setting a mindfulness alert – am I still on track / on task? Maybe set it for every 30 minutes to avoid going down 'rabbit holes'.
- Consider using timer apps to aid focus and limit distraction. A range of ideas are listed on ADCET (Australian Disability Clearinghouse on Education and Training) resource. Mac users can also use the studybreak time tracker for free, Chrome also has extensions called Focus To-Do. and RoFocus, which has environmental sounds to help keep you in a study zone. One sec app forces a pause when opening social media apps.
- Setting reminders at the point of action: if you always forget to take your laptop to uni, set a reminder to bring laptop just before you are due to leave, NOT when you first wake up.
- Create a launchpad at home: this is where you can keep your laptop, keys, wallet, phone – everything you need is in one place and ready to go.
- Have you tried 'body doubling' before? This is where you try to mirror what people are doing around you. Body doubling in quiet spaces where other students are studying, such as the library, can be a helpful focus tool for some people. Read the ABC Everyday article on body doubling for more information. Focusmate is an online community where people can be paired with a body double. Explore more if you are interested!
- Getting out of your house to study – at home you are constantly surrounded by other tasks you could be doing instead of studying. Try going to the local library or a café.
- Some people find it helpful to study with background sounds. You may like to try out ADHD music or café/street sounds – there are a lot of playlists on Spotify and YouTube.
- If you are feeling particularly restless or can’t focus. Leave your study for a short period and try some form of exercise, like walking around the block, going for a quick run or putting on a song to dance to. Once you have done that, try studying again.
- The library has a great resource on active reading which has a range of tips on the different elements of effective reading.
- Consider listening to your readings – the libraries converting text to audio page has some ways to do this.
- Inbuilt accessibility tools and apps – check them out! Some resources that students use are
- Natural Reader – free for Deakin students
- Read and Write – free for Deakin students. Watch the text help introductory video (3:27 CC available) to learn more about core functions.
- Speechify
- TextAloud
- Both PC's and Macs also have inbuilt text to speech capabilities. Check the accessibility features.
- Immersive reader is an inbuilt Microsoft tool can work in Word, on your Mac, with your iPad.
- It can also work in OneNote (you can try immersive reader with your own reading material on this page).
- If you would like a more detailed understanding of immersive reader, watch an online seminar (58.28 minutes CC and transcript available. Starting around 9 minutes may be helpful!)
- Explore our Assistive technology resources webpage for some other ideas
- Do you need to reduce visual distraction?? Tools such as Screen Mask or ReaderMode might be helpful. Read and Write has screen masking function and ruler reading functions to help isolate text and limit visual distractions.
- Do you work better with hardcopy? Printing is free on campus for Deakin students. Some key readings in hard copy can be helpful.
- Highlight - do you know how to highlight in a PDF (Portable Document Format)? Highlight on your iPad? Read and Write also has highlighting.
- Be strategic with your reading. Some weeks you may not have time to read everything, but it is unlikely you will be able to achieve your best marks in written assessment tasks without referencing key readings.
- Language and Learning Advisers can help with effective reading techniques.
- It can be challenging being able to follow information for the duration of class – but it is essential that you consider how you might best be able to engage.
- If your classes/seminars are recorded – you can rewatch and stop/start. This does take time, so make sure to add at least an extra 30 mins to each hour you set aside to review online content.
- Some students find it easier to follow information when they can read and listen at the same time. Deakin has ‘locked’ the Auto captioning and transcripts option in zoom meetings. Attendees and viewers will have the option to choose to use these or not. It is also possible to download the captions from your Panopto videos. For more information visit our Assistive technology resources webpage.
- If you are a Chrome user, you can access captions for most videos. Turn on live caption in Chrome
- Please note that auto captioning that relies on automatic voice recognition has varying levels of accuracy. It is important to carefully check information.
- Glean is an easy-to-use notetaking software program that an increasing number of students with ADHD are using to effectively take notes in seminars and classes. Glean enables students to have a visual and audio record of information presented in class and to be able to quickly ‘tag’ key information. Students can import slides, record sessions, and then generate an auto transcript of the recording (this is not 100% accurate but can be helpful).
Glean has also introduced a ‘live captions’ function to give you real time text on-screen as your presenter speaks. Simply press the CC button and start recording. Captions are only shown when recording (not during playback). And as soon as you stop recording the captions disappear but this may be useful while watching and listening in a range of teaching and learning settings.
The Glean 3 -minute explainer video (AUS) shows how Glean can work in a learning environment. For more detail watch the Glean Product Demonstration video (10 minutes). Try the free trial and speak to your DLO if you think Glean would be helpful for you. The DRC has a limited number of Glean licences available for loan. - Read and Write has a referencing/bibliography tool that may be helpful for you
- Other notetaking tips
- Sometimes it can be simple things that help – like adding, changing, or deleting the background colour in Word
- Planning is necessary in meeting deadlines, organising your time, and figuring out how to study.
- Plans need to be specific. For example, instead of planning to do general readings for your unit, highlight some specific reads and put this on your plan (e.g., I will complete reading 1, 2 & 3 by (date).
- Allocate a time limit for your plan and set a reminder.
- At end of your time, if you have not finished all that you set out to complete, set a new plan for the next time you will be able to study so you already have a starting point.
- Example of a study plan may look like:
- Find 3 journal articles for assessment 1 (30 minutes).
- Save and file articles.
- Watch class recording (30 minutes)
- File notes from recording.
- Make list of what I need to do tomorrow when I return to study.
- The Deakin assignment schedule planner may be helpful in breaking tasks down for an assessment.
- There are also drafting your assignment tips on the study skills site
- Mind mapping tools can provide a visual tool to help sort all your thoughts into an essay plan. Tools to support mind mapping include EdrawMind.
- Have you ever considered speech to text programs? Macs have a very useful inbuilt speech to text program. For PC users, speak to your DLO – maybe a speech to text program might help you get started with assignments by verbalising and/or ‘brain dumping’ ideas.
- Read and Write can also provide speech to text and is free for Deakin students. Learn more at the Text Help academy.
- Another good way to get ideas out of your head and into text is to have a meeting with yourself using Microsoft Teams. Record the meeting and enable the transcript, then you can simply speak your ideas into short defined space. At the end of the meeting, you will have a transcript you can use and refine later into full sentences. For example 'opening paragraph to say…..', 'next introduce the key evidence for…..' and 'now summarise my reasoning and conclude with…..' etc.
- Would organising a study group help? Or joining something like Focusmate
- Don't forget the importance of proofreading your assessments before submitting – keep an eye out for the mistakes that can occur when rushing.
- Often listening to your assignment can help identify errors or sentences that have too many ideas or are too long. Read aloud to yourself, read to someone else, use a text to speech app (e.g. Natural Reader & Read and Write).
- Use editing and proofreading tools. Have you tried apps such as Grammarly?
- If Grammarly is helpful for you, let your DLO know.
- Have you ever considered having a session or two with a Language and Learning Adviser or dropping in to see a writing mentor? They cannot comment on content or proofread an entire assessment – but they may have useful tips!
- Our free online study help service, Studiosity can help with online writing feedback within 24 hours.
- Turn on Auto-save for all working documents.
- Think about whether an extension is going to help or hinder you. A firm date can provide a motivating push for some but having several assignments due at once can be a lot to juggle.
- Ask for extensions if you need them before the due date. If you are relying on extensions for every task, you might need to revisit your planning and time allocation for tasks.
- Be aware that extensions longer than 2 weeks may require a Special Consideration (SC) application and students need to provide evidence of why additional time is required. An Access Plan is not sufficient evidence of grounds for SC.
- If you have additional time for in-class quizzes (timed assessments that do not appear in StudentConnect) then please be aware that you need to contact your unit chair to discuss the additional time. Refer to your Access Plan or DLO for more information.
Remember – you don't have to try everything and please don't try everything at once. Focus on the area most impacting your studies now and choose one or two ideas that might work for you.
Interested in peer support?
Did you know Deakin runs an ADHD support group during Trimester 1 and 2? Contact adhdgroup@deakin.edu.au for more information.
DUSA also have the DDNA club for neurodivergent students (and others). The club provides a safe space to share experiences.
Got some tips?
If you have found a particularly helpful tip, please share it. The DRC recognise and value the knowledge that comes from lived experience. Please email the Disability Resource Centre any tips you have, and we can add them to this resource.