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[quote=Anonymous]I was a piano teacher and have a very strong piano background.  I sincerely feel that all music lessons helps everyone - learning disability or not.  That being said, sharing my experience with my ADHD kid who is also dyslexic - piano is very very hard for him.  Drums I understand are the easiest for ADHD kids.  He wasn't as into it but def not an issue.  Guitar was really hard.  Piano really hard too but strings is very technical, engaging fine motor skills.

With piano, because my kid is so talented visually and has an exceptional memory, they can mimic other people playing.  So finding someone playing on Youtube and watching them play phrase by phrase and mimicking their dynamics, rhythm, etc.  - it's easier than actually needing to do this organically and it works.  You can reach a certain level of piano playing but after that, it becomes really too hard unless my kid mimics to learn harder music.

So I wanted to illustrate that even if you hope music will help ADHD kids - it definitely can - but to a certain point I don't think it's about helping them be better functioning.

My other kid plays cello, violin and piano while I only play piano so I am somewhat familiar with what it takes to play different instruments. She has stellar working memory.  Working memory is the biggest issue for those with ADHD.  It's the red flag for people who wonder if they have it.  If you have ADHD, you have poor working memory - that is how I know if someone really has ADHD.  It's not just daydreaming and not focusing - it is about managing complexity and fluid memory and sequencing.  My ADHD kid simply has limited amounts of this ability and you can't actually get it if you don't have it.

A much more effective approach to helping someone with ADHD is not through music lessons in hopes that will help them develop their working memory, rather I believe, it's to just teach them tricks to use to compensate them for having low working memory.  A lot of people want to take someone with ADHD and normalize them but you cannot do that. 
What you can do is to figure out the best way to get through life as easily and successfully as possible and often that means overcoming your deficits using other strategies - you don't have what you don't have.  Find other tools and ways to get from point A to B.

The study of music is quite technical in nature at a certain level, and not everyone can play every instrument even at an intermediate level well.  It's a certain talent you need to be able to play and it's not easy.  [/quote]

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