Why Listening Isn’t Always Easy and What’s Involved

We often expect children to “listen” or “pay attention” during structured times like story time or group learning. However, these skills are not simple or automatic. For many children, listening and attending are complex processes that rely on a range of underlying skills working together.

To understand what’s really involved, let’s unpack some of the systems that support a child’s ability to listen and focus in the classroom. 

Postural Control

Before a child can focus and learn, their body needs to feel stable. Postural control is the ability to sit or stand upright without getting tired. When a child is using a lot of effort just to stay balanced, they have less energy left for listening, thinking, and joining in classroom activities.

Executive Functioning

Executive functioning is like the brain’s “air traffic control system.” These skills help your child plan, focus, remember information, and stay on track with tasks. For listening and attention, important executive functions include:

• Working memory – remembering and using information

• Inhibition – resisting distractions or impulses

• Self-monitoring – noticing and adjusting their own behaviour

Sensory Processing

Sensory processing is how the brain takes in and makes sense of information from the world — things like sounds, sights, touch, smells, tastes, and movement. This helps children decide what to pay attention to and what to tune out. For example, sensory processing helps your child focus on the teacher’s voice instead of the hum of the lights or the noise in the background.

Regulation

Regulation is about having the right level of energy and emotional balance to learn and participate. When a child feels overwhelmed or unsafe, their brain can shift into “fight, flight, or freeze” mode — and it becomes much harder to listen, reason, or remember. Helping children feel supported and “ready” makes space for learning to happen.

Language Comprehension

Language comprehension is the ability to understand what is being said. It involves knowing the meaning of words, understanding how sentences are put together, and making sense of longer instructions or stories. When this is hard, a child may appear distracted or “not listening,” when in fact they’re working hard to process the language being used. 

Cognitive Load – How It All Works Together

All of these skills — posture, attention, regulation, sensory processing, language, and thinking — work together like parts of a system. When one area takes extra effort, it increases the brain’s cognitive load, or how much mental energy a child needs to get through a task. For example, if a child is using lots of effort just to stay upright or tune out background noise, they have less brain power left to listen, understand, and remember. Supporting each area helps free up mental resources, making learning feel easier and more enjoyable.

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When a child finds it hard to listen or pay attention, it’s not always about effort or motivation. Listening and attention depend on many systems working smoothly together, and extra load in one area can make the whole process more challenging.

If your child often seems distracted, tired, or overwhelmed in class, it may be a sign that one of these underlying areas needs support. Speech Pathologists and Occupational Therapists can help identify where the challenges lie and build the foundation skills your child needs to feel confident and engaged in their learning.

Joint blog written by Occupational Therapist Kiara Moodley and Speech Pathologist Tess Marson, November 2025.