Supporting Executive Functioning in our Children
What is Executive Functioning?
Executive functioning is the way our brains manage the tasks and demands in our everyday lives. Executive functioning skills include attention, working memory, planning, organising, impulse control, task initiation, emotion regulation, flexible thinking and the ability for self-monitoring.
What does executive functioning help with?
Executive functioning skills help us to:
Stop and think before acting
Wait
Plan and organise what we need to do
Notice when we need help
Control impulses such as yelling, hitting and talking over people
Manage emotions when things are hard
Remember instructions and follow them
Shift attention between tasks
Be flexible and adapt to changes
Development & Background
Executive functioning skills are not behaviours a child chooses. They are brain-based skills that develop slowly over childhood and adolescence and often develop differently across different people. It is common for children to be strong in certain executive functioning areas and struggle in others. Success with executive functioning is bolstered by adult support, guidance and opportunity to practice these skills and is easily disrupted by stress, fatigue or overwhelm.
Supporting Executive Functioning Skills to Grow
It is important to remember that different brains process information differently. A child’s difficulty with executive functioning skills is usually not a lack of effort or motivation. Children do well when the task matches how their brain works! Instead of asking: “Why can’t they just do it?” We ask: “How can we change the way this is presented so their brain can access it?”
Evidence shows that when supporting our children to better manage executive functioning, it is most helpful to start with adaptive strategies. That is, introducing environmental changes that support our children with areas they struggle with, such as visual checklists and routines, alarms and reminders. Aligned with this, adults play an integral role in supporting development of these skills by modelling to our children and verbalising out loud how we use our executive functioning skills to manage our lives. Verbal check ins and prompts from adults in a supportive and calm manner are helpful for many children to monitor how they are progressing with a task.
Following this, skill-based strategies to help a child’s brain extend its capacity overtime can be helpful in some situations. Puzzles, games (UNO, Connect 4) and explicitly practicing executive functioning in everyday routines encourages the development of these skills.
Executive functioning skills do not develop through repeated reminders without ensuring your child has the skills required to complete task, consequences or punishment, and expecting independence in tasks before your child is developmentally ready.
Practical Tips to Support the Development of Executive Functioning Skills
1. Clear routine and structure supported by visual aids
Reduces cognitive demand on children and externalises the planning, organisation, memory and sequencing aspects of a task. Increases predictability which supports regulation and self-monitoring.
2. Do Tasks Together
Collaborate on tasks that you know your child finds difficult and step through the process together. ‘Wonder questions' help add structure and organisation e.g. "I wonder what we need to prepare for this task?”. As a child becomes more confident and competent with a task, step back and allow your child to take the lead.
3. Copy Cat
Do task in parallel but not together, so that your child can utilise/copy your executive functioning skills. Verbalise what you are doing and how you are thinking about the task demands. This can be used for all kinds of things such as dressing, preparing for a conversation with a friend, doing homework etc.
4. Make it visual!
Provide low demand visual sequences for tasks of difficulty to support your child’s development of autonomy in these tasks.
5. Practice skills explicitly!
Think about what areas of executive functioning your child is struggling with and practice them! E.g. if your child is having difficulty waiting, consider everyday opportunities to support your child to practice waiting. Explain to your child WHY you are practicing these skills. If it makes sense to them, your child is more likely to engage.
6. Make it Fun!
Children are more likely to engage in something they find fun and meaningful. If your child is having difficulty controlling their impulses, consider games you can play together that require them to practice this specific skill. If your child is having difficulty adapting to changes, consider how you may make small changes to familiar games and practice working through this. Other helpful ways of practicing these skills include role playing, modelling and narrating what we do!
7. Practice practice practice!
In order to support children to stretch their executive functioning skills over time, it is important they have frequent opportunities to practice them at times they are feeling regulated and engaged. Just like riding a bike – the more we practice the better we get!
8. Reduce unnecessary demands
Consider what your child’s main goals are and focus on one or two priority areas. By reducing unnecessary demands, your child will have greater capacity to focus on developing areas of need.
Important to remember…
It is common for a child to:
Use a skill one day and not the next
Need more support when tired or stressed
Appear capable in one environment but not another
This does not mean the skill is lost. It means the brain needs continued support. Your child’s brain is developing in its own way, and with the right supports, they can build meaningful executive functioning skills.
If needing additional support, reach out to your therapist, GP or health care team.