Solving the Multitask Problem

I am a consummate multitasker. My father often expresses his disbelief; he can't understand how I can read, watch TV, play a game, bike, whatever all at more or less the same time. What does this have to do with learning? The problem is that I'm so used to multitasking I have immense trouble settling my brain down enough to engage in deliberate practice. My body and at least half of my brain scream in protest at being asked to sit quietly while the rest of my brain is engaged in concentration. Further, while I consider myself a visual learner- I remember most of what I read- that only applies to content retention NOT to word for word recitation. Between years of vocal performance, marching band, and drama, I connect memorization to movement. As Dr. Oshita put it, I need to dance when I remember things. Previous encounters with deliberate practice have only reinforced the need for movement: I've used it for martial arts, percussion practice, and plays. Beyond the recitation-movement connection, part of my brain needs to be engaged in some background activity for me to concentrate fully. I study with music or television that I've seen before. Contrary to most study advice about minimizing distractions, if I don't have something going on in the background, my brain distracts itself. As pursuant to this project, I'd find myself halfway through a line and wondering if the word was the same in Javanese or looking up an article on comparative lullaby topics or thinking about something else entirely. Surprisingly, I found an answer. I found myself, without any real decision to so, practicing in my car. I spend a lot of time driving, and for whatever reason, while most of my brain and body were engaged in driving, I found it considerably easier to do my practicing. Also, it was isolated, giving me an environment free of people, unlike my office or home. Of course that led to a different problem. While I can manage to practice while driving, I am not so stupid as to try recording while driving, and my brain usually skipped subjects by the time I got back to somewhere I could open my computer. In the future, when I work on something like this, or have a student experiencing problems with concentration: I can suggest taking the exercise for a walk, or giving a presentation while doing it (pointing out things on the screen, making good use of gesture). After this, I have considerably more sympathy and ideas for kinesthetic learning. After this attempt, I sounded more like a native speaker to my own ears, but not so much like Babs. I sounded more like myself. I need to work on reducing the intensity and audible effort it takes me to produce those sounds at those speeds with the reduced aspiration. I also need to go lighter and a bit higher. Honestly, I feel like I'm back at choir practice with my teacher telling me to stand a foot further back from the microphone.