How to develop executive function skills in young kids.

Executive Function Skills are developmental and will vary from child to child.  We can teach strategies to our students that will enable them to access and develop these skills.  We can also continue to expect those same strategies to be used from grade level to grade level.  Getting on the same page with your school building or even entire district is a great starting point.

In Kindergarten we are planting the seeds.  This is when new strategies are taught through modeling and monitoring.  After we plant the seeds, we water our garden and watch it grow and develop.  This happens in grades K-3.  We water our garden when we practice using these strategies until they become habitual routines.  These executive function skills should start to become habitual routines by 3rd or 4th grade.  You see, when we learn something and then move on, expecting that students will naturally mature the skill, we are sadly mistaken.  Let me explain…

I taught 3rd grade for 8 years.   Everyday the students would take a multiplication timed test.  Practicing their multiplication facts until they are memorized.  Each student was on their own “just right” level and progressed as they mastered each set.  I would grade them everyday (all different leveled tests, so the answers were not the same).  I became really REALLY fast at grading those tests.  

Then I moved to kindergarten for several years.  I had not even thought about multiplication facts for several years.   One day, I was filling in for a fellow teacher because there were no substitutes available and I had a student teacher covering my class.  This friend of mine taught 3rd grade.  Her students were doing their timed tests and I thought it would be nice to have them graded for her when she returned.  What I found was that it took me much longer than I had remembered.  You see, I was out of practice.  My brain muscle had not worked out in that way for quite some time.  It had weakened.

Our Brain is a Muscle

Our brain is a muscle that needs to be formed and strengthened through repetition.  This is how good habits are formed. We establish a routine that is successful and practice that same routine until it becomes a habit.  Eventually we can do it without even thinking about it.  Until a habit is formed, we must be intentional about developing executive function skills in this same way.  That is what we want…to train our students to have good habits that will make navigating their life (school, work, play, achievements, etc.) easier!

We can do just that by using my 3 M’s:  Model, Monitor, and Measure Success. 

This process is successful across the curriculum for teaching students.  It works because consistency creates good habits.  

• Model-We teach our students (no matter the grade) the specific strategies and show them exactly how to use the strategy through modeling.  Show them!  Role play showing them exactly how to do whatever it is you are teaching.  You can even model it the wrong way to see if they catch the mistake.  Students love that!
• Monitor-After we physically show them how, we need to observe them using the strategy.  This means offering constructive criticism, correcting and encouraging them, and continuing to monitor.   This can take some patience and oftentimes will send us back to modeling again.  We can also make observations and use our findings to plan strategically in our classrooms.  A good example of this is setting up our classroom seating, based on our observations of student ability.  Students with weaker Executive Function Skills will benefit from sitting next to a student that would act as a good model for them.  When we see somebody else doing something the right way, it makes us reflect and reconsider how we are doing it.  Models or mentors play an important role in learning and succeeding.
• Measure Success-  When you see your student using their executive function skills point it out to them.   These skills are often taken for granted or not noticed at all.  Say things like, “Wow, I love how you decided to make a to-do list of your own, so that you could get everything done!”  This will remind them that using these strategies really does help them get the jobs done well!  You can even celebrate a student with the whole class!  

Now that we know that we need to teach executive function skills using the 3 M’s method (modeling, monitoring, and measuring success), we need to know what strategies will actually mature and develop executive function skills.   

Teach Your Students about their Brain!!!

You can start by teaching your students about their brain.  You simply explain that their brain is a muscle and these strategies give your brain a work out and make it stronger. 

When you introduce these strategies you can explain to the students how or why it will help them.  For example having a morning routine helps your brain to plan and organize your day.  Doing the same routine over and over will create good habits that your brain will remember to do in order to plan for a successful day. 

Understanding the “why” often helps students understand the importance of taking the time to use the strategies that you are introducing to them. 

Using the method of the 3M’s will allow your students’ brain to develop in a way that fosters step by step processes, planning, executing, and repeating the process until mastery.  Primary aged students need time for these processes to simmer.  We cannot just rush through the academic standards by memorizing and moving on.  If we want to develop their brain in a way that will support their life long success, then we need to model how, monitor our students’ strides, and assist them in measuring their success.  We need to teach them that failing is not the end…but the beginning of learning something new.  Then we start all over with the 3M’s: MODEL, MONITOR, MEASURE SUCCESS.