Optimizing Executive Functioning
Have you ever heard a teacher say something along the lines of, “Your student is really smart, but …”? Or perhaps you’ve seen it first-hand with your own child or teen—an otherwise bright student who just can’t seem to stay organized or motivated to complete their homework. Or maybe they struggle to pay attention or keep up with the pace of the rest of the class when following directions. These are all critical pieces of executive functioning: those brain skills that allow us to play ahead, follow multi-step direction, stay focused, and display self-control.
More specifically, it’s individual cognitive skills that just aren’t as strong as they need to be to perform well in school, sports, work, or life. To help you determine if optimizing your student’s executive functioning might help them live up to their full potential, here’s a rundown on what it is, why it’s vital to success in life, and how you can boost executive function’s underlying cognitive skills.
What is executive function?
Executive function is actually a set of evolving skills, abilities, and cognitive processes that we use every day, regardless of age and activity. They can be broken down into two main categories: controlling our thoughts, impulses and emotions; and prioritizing, organizing and initiating tasks and memories.
In school, for example, executive functioning might help us plan and complete a big end-of-semester project. At work, executive functioning might help us follow multi-step directions to complete a task for our boss or team on deadline. On the soccer field, it might mean visualizing the coach’s play and then executing it to get a goal and win the game under pressure.
Generally speaking, executive function is what helps us stay cool-headed under pressure, to plan projects and break them into smaller tasks, and to remember important details as we need them along the way.
How do weak executive function skills impact us?
When you understand that executive function is a set of processes, it’s easier to identify the challenges that can develop if even one of the high-order cognitive skills needed for optimal executive function is weak. Just imagine if logic & reasoning skills (which are needed for problem-solving) weren’t up to par in a student who was about to take the SATs. Or if weak working memory (the ability to hang on to information while in the process of using it) impeded an adult’s ability to remember what was just said in a conversion—including multi-step directions for completing the team’s assignments on time. Or if visual processing skills (which enable us to think in visual images like a movie in our mind) weren’t strong enough for us to link together and comprehend what we’ve just read, requiring us to go back to the beginning in an effort to help it “sink in.”
If just one of the many cognitive skills that make up executive function are holding us back from reaching our full potential, learning, reading, and completing complex tasks can be far more challenging than they need to be. Picture a child who struggles academically in middle school due to underperforming executive function. His/her struggles might manifest as:
- Being overwhelmed by too many tasks or a plethora of information
- An inability to understand what they’ve read the first time
- Trouble following routines or multi-step directions
- Difficulty completing tasks on time
- Delayed decision-making or response times
- An inability to “keep up” with conversations
What parents and teachers may incorrectly assume is simply a lack of motivation, interest, or even respect may actually be brain skills in need of a boost! Addressing the cognitive deficits associated with executive function struggles in middle school can significantly help prepare your student for high school, when they’ll be required to not only complete more complex assignments independently, but also switch rooms between classes, take notes, plan multi-step projects, and stay on top of a heavier homework load. The earlier these skills can be targeted and trained, the better the outcome for the individual.
How can executive function be optimized?
The short answer is that because executive functioning is a set of cognitive skills, it can be optimized by strengthening those underlying cognitive skills. Personal brain training, also known as one-on-one cognitive skills training, works by targeting and training brain skills just like a muscle.
The process begins with a Brain Skills Assessment to determine which skills are weak and which could use a boost. The assessment only takes about an hour and the results often help parents connect the dots behind why their student thrives in some areas yet struggles in others.
Using the results of the Brain Skills Assessment, cognitive specialists can create a personalized brain training program to address the root cause of the issue by training the core learning and thinking skills with the most room for growth.
Upon completion of the one-on-one brain training program, clients are given a final Brain Skills Assessment to measure the results of their hard (but fun!) work!
How successful is cognitive skills training?
Although every program is different, we can share the results of LearningRx one-on-one brain training. Over a 9-year period, we collected brain training results from more than 21,500 clients. The results from the final Brain Skills Assessments showed that:
- The typical graduate saw across-the-board cognitive improvements, including gains in attention, working memory, long-term memory, and processing speed.
- Children and teens improved learning and thinking skills by +3.7 years on average compared to peers
- Adult LearningRx clients improved IQ scores by +14 points on average after completing their brain training program.
Curious to learn more about how personal brain training might help you or someone you love with executive functioning struggles? Click here to contact us and schedule a Brain Skills Assessment today!
The results may create an “Aha!” moment for your family and provide hope for stronger learning, thinking, or reading skills at any age!
