Executive functions are a complex set of cognitive processes that together, control the mechanisms that are required to effectively learn new material, self regulate and engage in prosocial behavior. <a href=”"> Read More…Their importance cannot possibly be overstated in the context of academic and social realms; indeed, the degree to which an individual possesses these is a greater determiner than intelligence when it comes to long term success.  What’s impacted by executive functioning?  Better executive functioning leads to better interpersonal skills and relationships, higher salaries, and greater opportunity overall.
Executive functioning takes place in the prefrontal cortex.  Located right behind your forehead, this part of the brain is responsible for the higher level thinking that we tend to associate with being human.  Each of us has 70, 000 thoughts per day; we receive input from  When information or procedures become meaningful, fluent, and integrated, it’s because the prefrontal cortex was engaged and attending, and is able to process the input appropriately.  The frontal lobe is sent information when a number of conditions are met, and the emotional circuitry is largely responsible for sorting through the piles to determine what content is sent to the higher thinking circuits, and what’s treated as either noise to ignore, or stressful, threatening input that activates the stress circuit.  It doesn’t matter how old you are, or what kind of diagnosis you do or don’t have; if you’re performing under stressful conditions – including boredom, or exposure to bullying, or illness, or expectations which are impossible to meet – you may not be able to access your higher order thinking skills to effectively perform.

The logical next question is:  How can we cultivate these higher order thinking skills?  How do we work with our neural circuitry to enhance our students’ – and our own – capacity to perform and learn?

There are so many ways to address this question, and most of the best practices have a mindful component to them.  The Hawn Foundation does an excellent job bringing mindful practices to young people, and there are other resources as well which I’ll explore in future posts.

Lengthier, learning related posts are coming!  In the meantime, I wanted to take a minute to share my excitement about my wedding, and post an image of the drawing we commissioned as a celebration of our engagement. This design was rendered by the extraordinarily talented Natalya Kolosowsky, who captured our joy and flights of fancy beautifully, while incorporating the menagerie nicely.

Which brings me to ADHD. How so?

This headline, in particular.  And before I say anything else, I feel the need to preface this discussion with a defense of the diagnosis.   ADHD is a real neurological condition, listed (for what it’s worth) in the DSM IV, and has been well documented and deeply researched within respected scientific journals.  There’s no merit to the lunatic fringe who say otherwise.

That said, not all who croon are Elvis, and not all who struggle with executive functioning and short attention span and organization have ADHD.   A reliable ADHD diagnosis looks at a variety of factors, and the symptoms must interfere with success in at least two areas of life over an extended period of time.

All of the symptoms of ADHD may manifest in someone for a variety of reasons.  Consider, for example, just how effectively you can focus when stressed, sleep deprived, anxious, depressed, hungry, angry, or bored.  We don’t learn well when we don’t feel safe, can’t focus when we don’t understand content, and are liable to feel hyperactive when we’re put in situations that make us uncomfortable.

ADHD is a chronic condition, not a catch all for anyone with short attention span, and doesn’t imply anything about capacity for learning and lifelong success, as long as appropriate treatment is pursued and accommodations are made; these being critical.

What kind of preemptive work can be done towards investigating the heart of the matter?  How can you tell the difference?  Where do you start?

Ask questions. Get to the heart of the issue, and find a good advocate. Working with a psychiatrist (and an educational therapist) who knows the issue, and can help tease apart the various strands, can make all the difference in the world.  They should be looking at the whole picture, starting with the goodness of fit, and the child’s personal history. Have there, or are there major stressors which might contribute to anxiety? How does the cognitive profile stack up compared with academic performance?  Is the child the same age as their peers? Does attention span wane only in a specific area, or more broadly, and how?  A good provider takes in a holistic picture before making a diagnosis.

A rebuttal to the most damaging among them can be seen here, and I recommend reading it, and skipping the original incendiary articles.  

It’s critical to keep in mind that while not everyone who exhibits the symptoms of ADHD has a diagnosis, but when one is present, we know, based on peer reviewed scientific literature, that medication is the single most effective treatment.  

One of my volunteer gigs entails co-faciliatating a support group for parents who are raising children with AD/HD.  The topic of medication is invariably one of strong opinions – I’ve never met anyone who takes lightly the notion of giving their child prescription drugs.  That said, when they help, the difference is meaningful, palpable, and often, life changing.  

For additional information on ADHD, see the CHADD Resource Center online. 

One point about learning differences – and I include ADHD and Aspergers under that umbrella – is that they are, in a sense, social constructs.  Given an environment that is truly unrestrictive, the symptoms may well cease to interfere with one’s livelihood, and will no longer be a disorder.

This Op- Ed struck me as interesting - is it true that the author never had Asperger?  Was it just that he was in the wrong place?  Social isolation can have its roots in a number of different places – certainly not all kids with social skills deficits have Aspergers, and to imply such is rooted in ignorance.   It’s important to look at the whole child, and take into account all variables that may contribute to social isolation – at times, it’s as simple as an individual being incompatible with their environment.   On the other hand, finding social success among peers with similar interest doesn’t render a diagnosis obsolete, either.  Many people with Aspergers are able to see meaning beneath the surface, but have trouble with social cues.  On the whole, his point is good, but I’m not sure his argument makes sense. 

Successful learning and engagement requires a sense of safety, which is cultivated over time based on positive experiences in a number of areas.  It’s very difficult to learn and focus when someone feels like success or safety isn’t attainable, and this is very common for many children (and adults), not only those with AD/HD.  Anxiety and AD/HD bear a striking resemblance to one another; indeed, anxiety is a very common secondary diagnosis for those who have AD/HD. 

Not everyone who struggles with sustained attention has an AD/HD diagnosis, though, and it can be confusing to get to the root of someone’s challenges.  This is the first in a series; AD/HD has become enough of a catchword that misinformation is as easy to come by as the facts in the story. 

The ability to focus for sustained periods of time is one of the first cognitive skills to be compromised, given an illness, stress, hunger, sleep deprivation, or other challenging condition.  In this modern world, a sense of security can be difficult to come by.  

Note below the similarities between ADHD and anxiety.  Not, in addition, the critical differences.  

AD/HD

Symptoms interfere with success in at least two domains of life (ie, work, relationships, finances, or health) over time.  Often includes anxiety as secondary diagnosis. 

Both

• Restlessness
• Impulsivity
• Difficulty sustaining attention
• Reactive
• Trouble sleeping
• Excessive worries / fears

Anxiety

Characterized by excessive worries and fears, which can interfere with many domains of life.  Often anxiety symptoms are context-dependent, and some symptoms may be physical, such as stomachaches. 

… I did try to make this into a venn diagram, and failed. 

I thought this article was relevant enough to give it’s own brief entry.. Using best practices while studying is particularly important to those who struggle with long term memory retrieval, executive functioning, working memory, or sustained attention.  Students who struggle with these challenges would do well to practice recommended study skills with an specialist.

It’s in Psychology Today, and covers, broadly, some of the current research on the best practices for learning. Robert Bjork is the director of UCLA’s Learning and Forgetting Lab, and some of what he says is counterintuitive, and refutes popular convention.

Take home messages include:

1.  Interweaving your focus while learning is a more effective way to advance your skills.   If you make small, seemingly meaningless steps with many skills, the incremental progress you make over time in each area will be greater than the leaps you make in the single area if you narrow your focus, but only if the skills are cognitively related.

2. State dependent learning is even more important than many people believe it to be – varying your location while studying will help make the content more accessible.

3. Time study sessions such that when you come back to material you’ve already studied, you’ve almost forgotten much of it.

4.  Taking notes after class, rather than during class, may actually be more beneficial since you are forced to replay the lecture.  This of course, assumes the participant was able to attend in the first place.

The full article is posted here.

“I really appreciated the way that you put your coat and shoes away when you came inside just now.”

“Justine, you behaved so kindly and generously with your little brother.  I know that he can be difficult sometimes, and I really appreciate how well you played with him this afternoon.”

If the goal of praise is to reward a behavior and encourage it’s recurrence, we have to be specific, and recognize improvements, however incremental.

This is relevant to raising all children, and important to keep in mind for parents.  When it comes to mathematics, it’s especially relevant.  I’ve lost count of the number of children I see in my office who have a tremendous amount of anxiety around mathematics, and are convinced that they’re destined to fail in this area.  Too often, the model for mathematics instruction is oriented towards results, rather than process; children who don’t grasp the concepts quickly aren’t rewarded for their efforts, but often receive well intentioned negative feedback.

Many of the children I see come to me specifically to work on their mathematical skills; in general they see me after a tutor hasn’t proven effective.  For these kids, a great part of their barrier to success is rooted in fear – the other day, a student of mine actually drew a picture of herself as a zebra, being chased by her math homework as a hungry lion, illustrating the analogy I commonly use to explain the stress response.  When your first instinct is to run, it’s impossible to think clearly and systematically.

So the question is: how do you teach a child who fears mathematics to play, and discover, and be curious?  How do you help them to move forward while learning to try?

Briefly, with broad strokes, I’ve found the following to be most effective:

1.  Set them up for success:  Task approach is often a big part of the challenge for a lot of kids; they don’t know how to get started and feel overwhelmed by the number of problems.  Bounding the task, and letting them dictate the terms makes a huge difference.  Eliminating the expectation of accuracy is critical here.  Do you think you can work on this for five minutes?  Which problems do you think you can try? See if you can get started on a few of them.

2. Reward and recognize effort.  See my first paragraph above.

3. Remediate for missing background knowledge:  Most – not all –  students who come to me for support in mathematics are creative kids who have trouble seeing the way the numbers work together to create a picture, and a difficult time following multi-step directions and maintaining consistent detail analysis.  Identifying the weak strands, and giving instruction for these areas is critical, as advanced mathematical concepts are built on more fundmental understandings.

3.  Support cultivation of a sense of curiosity and play:  Mathematics is a wonderful language for cultivating analytical skills and an understanding of the world .  The notion that math is answer driven, rather than process driven is hurtful, and kills curiosity.  Again, praising effort, as well as asking questions, and allowing opportunity for exploration is a fundamental component to raising mathematical thinkers.

There’s no shortage of resources along these lines; here are a few that stand out:

1.  The Scientific Americanarticle on effective praise.

2.  Games and activities which cultivate logical and mathematical thinking – this list spans across levels of sophistication:  Educational programming languages, Chess, Set, Ticket to Ride, Battleship, Settlers of Catan, Monopoly, Risk, Backgammon, Mancala, Civilization (the board game), Risk, Power Grid, Nine Men’s Morris, Dominion, Stone Age  and really, the list goes on, and on.

3. Danica McKeller, famous for her role on the show Wonder Years, is a math whiz in addition to being a successful actress and role model for young women.  She’s written several books for the tween set.  Information can be found on her website. 

4. Courtesy of Wikipedia, a basic description of number sense, the fundamental understanding of patterns required for mathematical success.  Here’s an interactive quiz for adults assessing number sense.

5. A longer, more academic article at Reading Rockets comparing number sense in mathematics to phonological awareness in reading.

I was lucky enough at fifteen to know some musicians who made sure that I got a hold of Etta James’s classic CD, At Last, thereby opening an entire musical world to me. She could convey the gamut of love and anguish like no other – RIP Etta James, and thanks.

Cheers,

Rebecca

Big props to these parents, too, and their determination and willingness to keep trying different approaches for their daughter. I think it’s paid off; don’t you?