Throwback Thursday: Self-Esteem

This post was originally published in July 2013

If you are reading this blog, I'm sure you already know that telling kids they are smart does more harm than good. So, what else does the research say about self-esteem?

First you should realize that most of us have the wrong definition of self-esteem. Self-esteem is not about feeling good. Self-esteem is simply a set of opinions about yourself. Self-esteem is built though competence and new achievements. There is a balance of the two. Trying a new experience you can't possibly succeed at will not build self-esteem any more than a high level of competence at something you have been doing for years.

Our society need to shift from our current view of children as helpless and needing to be protected. We need to support them through the difficult times, not rescue them. One of my personal pet peeves is hearing parents talk about how they don't want their child to be behind or have to try "too hard" at something. No one is the best in everything and the earlier you learn that the better off you will be. You should not try to get rid of the bumps in the road for your child. Instead, teach them how to handle the bumps. We should not teach our children to give up when it's difficult or they aren't the best. Imagine what that society will look like when they are adults. The goal here is to raise children to be independent, successful adults. You can't always protect them, so learning to deal with the bumps when they are small is crucial.

"Intelligence is what you use when you don't know what to do." Piaget

Throwback Thursday: Motivating Students

This post was originally published in July of 2013

There are some things children are motivated about on their own and some things we need to help them find motivation for. So, what are the best ways to motivate using brain research?

First you need to know about the nucleus accumbens. For those that want this simplified, it's known as the reward center of the brain. It's a limbic structure that sends dopamine throughout the brain. This is the specific part of the anatomy that generates and sustains motivation. When you think dopamine you probably think Ritalin and ADHD, so let's start our discussion there.

Volkow (2009) found a disruption in two dopamine reward/motivation pathways among adults with ADHD. The severity of this disruption was related to the severity of inattention. Another study done in Barcelona, found that children with ADHD have a smaller ventral striatum (including the nucleus acumbens), especially on the right side. The volume was correlated with hyperactivity. We know that Ritalin produces significant levels of dopamine in the brain. This increases motivation and makes tasks seem more interesting. When you look at brain wave activity in typical kids versus ADHD kids there is a huge difference. The theta/beta ratio for typical kids is 4:1, while the ratio for ADHD kids is 9:1. For some kids necessary tasks require a Herculean effort. 

Typically, our society adds pressure and stress when people are not completing required tasks. It has been proven that when under stress, students work harder, but produce poorer quality work. The more stress you apply, the worse the results. While students are trying and giving it their all, they accomplish less. This also decreases motivation and makes students want to avoid challenges. This becomes even more harmful in the long run.

Sleep also plays a huge part on working memory, attention, and reaction time. Forth and sixth graders were paid to sleep one hour more or less for three consecutive nights. After a loss of 35 minutes each night for 3 nights (most couldn't make it an entire hour less) they lost two years of efficiency in these three areas. We are just starting to understand the impact of sleep and how many areas it impacts. I suspect this area of research to have a huge boom in the near future (3-5 years).

So, how do we motivate our children and students? Students need optimal challenges, feedback from the task (rather than from the teacher), freedom from demeaning evaluations, a sense of autonomy, choices, and self-direction. In other words, they need more meaningful projects and less testing. Good luck getting this in traditional schools. There are certainly teachers out there who are doing exactly this for each of their students, but they are becoming more and more rare.

There is one other thing I feel I should mention here. The brain interprets rewards and punishments as a loss of control, which is demonstrated by the stress hormones being released in the brain. The brain is wired to try to find ways of getting the reward without doing the job/assignment. We should stop fighting this and change the way we are teaching. 80% of education in public schools is competitive. While this is motivating for the top few kids, it's extremely demotivating for the other 95% of students. Why try if you aren't going to win? Stop and think about this - 95% of students are being discouraged 80% of the time in school. In order to address this, our society keeps adding more tests and rankings. We are just making it worse rather than embracing the research and trying to help the students.

Throwback Thursday: Early Education Priorities

This post was originally published in August of 2013.

Kids were tested going into Kindergarten on their knowledge of reading, Math, Science, and Social Studies. What was the best predictor of later reading and Math tests (2nd grade and up)? Science and Social Studies, in that order. Kindergarten reading was not even correlated to 2nd grade reading. Early reading certainly didn't cause higher reading scores. It is much more important to do Science with your kids than any other subject when they are young. This is great because most young kids would rather do Science than reading anyway. Everyone's happy! Also interesting is that early reading doesn't improve later Science and Social Studies scores. Since those subjects are most traditionally taught through reading, I found that interesting. So far the research hasn't figured out why, but still fascinating.

The best way to improve Math scores is going to surprise you. Fine motor skills help with Math. The larger the fine motor deficit, the more impaired later Math becomes. This is most obvious when replicating figures or models, but is true for all areas of Math. They tested many different ways to improve Math scores and the top interventions are: drawing (but not coloring), Legos, fuse beads, pattern blocks, Montessori triangles, puzzles, paper folding, blocks, knob cylinders, and Colorforms. No worksheets, flashcards, or tutoring made the list. Kids tend to shut down when forced to do something they think they aren't good at, but hand them a bucket of Legos or teach them paper folding and they are willing and successful. 

Now for something that makes me feel old. These studies weren't just done with young children. These studies went all the way through college students. At the beginning and the end of the college student study they needed a novel way to test their ability to do mental rotation. Something the kids hadn't done before and were unlikely to practice in between the two tests. They used Tetris. For those of you who are around my age you just freaked out a little that college students have never played Tetris. I was presented with this information at a conference. The group of young guys in the row in front of me spent about 5 minutes debating what Tetris is before using their smart phones to look it up. They decided it must be a game for old people. 

It's well known that the current educational policy is dill and kill. Everyone says they want their kids to have critical thinking skills. You need to know that these are learned before/after and outside school, usually through play. Music, sports, fine motor, problem solving, etc. It's also important to realize that most colleges care more about these activities than you might expect. When looking at two kids with identical grades and test scores the one that will stand out is the one who was involved in things outside of school. This is also one reasons the homeschooling movement is growing in the United States.

Other research notes

I learned a lot at the conference that I want to share, but wouldn't make a good post on it's own. So here's some random notes from various sessions.

• A child's attachment at 18 months is a better predictor of college graduation than I.Q.
• The job of retail/marketing is to make you unhappy with what you already have.
• In order to survive the young of our species need defenses against social manipulation - the earlier the better. 
• No accurate assessment for executive function, however Kindergarten teachers can accurately judge.
• The first two months of life and adolescence are the two biggest periods of brain growth. They are both noted by lack of sleep, moodiness, overwhelming emotions. Nutrition during these times is crucial.
• Some brain training works and some doesn't.
• C8 program for kids and Lumosity for adults are currently the best two on market.
• Use fMRI to confirm training with far transfer and durability for 1 year.

Your Brain as a House

I've previously shared a few different Theories of Mind. (It's a really good post, you should go read it.) Now I'm going to present a slightly different look at the way the brain works.

Everyone has seen the maps of the brain that show which part of the brain does what. However, that's an extreme oversimplification. If you are born blind, the part of the brain that would typically be used for sight is taken over by other functions - typically hearing and memory. Every part of the brain can do multiple functions depending on how it is trained/used.

Think of your brain like a house. You can completely remodel it with only a few limitations. The basic structure can't be easily changed, but you can always rearrange furniture. Turn a bedroom into an office, upgrade the bathroom, etc. Moving the entire kitchen into the half bath isn't feasible though. The brain works essentially the same way. You can upgrade and do some basic remodeling, but you can't completely shift functions too far away from where they should be located. Your brain can always be improved (as can your IQ).

One of the ways researchers study the functions of the brain is by looking at the effects of lesions. If you look at 100 people who all have just one brain lesion in the exact same place, you would expect them to all have the same symptom or behavioral abnormality. However that isn't the case. The reverse would be looking at 100 people who all have the same symptom or behavioral abnormality. You would expect to find they all have the same lesion. Once again this isn't true. One brain lesion can affect many behaviors and the same behavioral abnormality can be caused by damage in multiple places.

There is so much more we still need to learn about the brain. 

The Importance of Early Education

 So my post on Tuesday was about how to develop the brain for better reading success. Now I'm going to do a post on why your child doesn't need to know how to read early.

Kids were tested going into Kindergarten on their knowledge of reading, Math, Science, and Social Studies. What was the best predictor of later reading and Math tests (2nd grade and up)? Science and Social Studies, in that order. Kindergarten reading was not even correlated to 2nd grade reading. Early reading certainly didn't cause higher reading scores. It is much more important to do Science with your kids than any other subject when they are young. This is great because most young kids would rather do Science than reading anyway. Everyone's happy! Also interesting is that early reading doesn't improve later Science and Social Studies scores. Since those subjects are most traditionally taught through reading, I found that interesting. So far the research hasn't figured out why, but still fascinating.

The best way to improve Math scores is going to surprise you. Fine motor skills help with Math. The larger the fine motor deficit, the more impaired later Math becomes. This is most obvious when replicating figures or models, but is true for all areas of Math. They tested many different ways to improve Math scores and the top interventions are: drawing (but not coloring), Legos, fuse beads, pattern blocks, Montessori triangles, puzzles, paper folding, blocks, knob cylinders, and Colorforms. No worksheets, flashcards, or tutoring made the list. Kids tend to shut down when forced to do something they think they aren't good at, but hand them a bucket of Legos or teach them paper folding and they are willing and successful.

Now for something that makes me feel old. These studies weren't just done with young children. These studies went all the way through college students. At the beginning and the end of the college student study they needed a novel way to test their ability to do mental rotation. Something the kids hadn't done before and were unlikely to practice in between the two tests. They used Tetris. For those of you who are around my age you just freaked out a little that college students have never played Tetris. I was presented with this information at a conference. The group of young guys in the row in front of me spent about 5 minutes debating what Tetris is before using their smart phones to look it up. They decided it must be a game for old people.

It's well known that the current educational policy is dill and kill. Everyone says they want their kids to have critical thinking skills. You need to know that these are learned before/after and outside school, usually through play. Music, sports, fine motor, problem solving, etc. It's also important to realize that most colleges care more about these activities than you might expect. When looking at two kids with identical grades and test scores the one that will stand out is the one who was involved in things outside of school. This is also one reasons the homeschooling movement is growing in the United States.

Neuroscience of Reading

With most traditional education focused on reading, it's no surprise that there has been a lot of research in this area. First we must realize our brain was not designed to read. When we learn to read, our brain uses parts that would otherwise be used for other skills. In non-readers, the part of the brain that we would expect to use when reading is used for processing faces.

fMRI shows that different languages use different parts of the brain. Symbolic languages use a different part than phonetic languages for example. Even more interesting, dyslexics use a different part of their brain to read phonetic languages than typical readers.

Some people believed that visual motion problems were the cause for dyslexia. It has now been proven that it is a result of dyslexia, not the cause. In fact in a study treating dyslexia in adults (the Lindamood-Bell program), as the reading level improved so did the visual motion ability. This is important to note because these two skills are in unrelated parts of the brain.

So, if you want your child to have an easier time reading, where should you start? First by playing with spoken language. When kids practice rhyming it uses the same part of the brain that will later be used for reading. That's why so many kids books are written in rhyme. Once your child can identify (does cat rhyme with bat), produce (what rhymes with cat), and produce (tell me two words that rhyme) rhymes, you can move onto other skills.

From there I usually introduce two different skills. One is clapping syllables. This is fairly simple, but will take most kids awhile before they are accurate. The other skills is isolating the initial sound (cat, cow, kangaroo, cup, kickoff). Notice we are just using what it sounds like. It doesn't matter what letters it starts with. It's usually around this time most kids notice that when you read there are words on the page. Simply pointing to the words as you are reading helps them understand that words and letters have meaning. This seems like an overly simple concept, but without it you really can't read anything.

Once all of these are mastered you can start isolating other parts of words. Typical examples would be end sounds (cat, pit, blanket, put) or vowel sounds (cat, ham, pass, tad). From this point, learning which letters make which sounds is fairly simple. You are just adding symbolic recognition to the mix. I don't even bother teaching letter names at this point. When they see t they say "t", not "tee" or "tuh." Once they know all of the sounds (42 total), then putting them together just seems to click.

I am dyslexic so this didn't work for me at all. I couldn't rhyme. I couldn't clap syllables. I couldn't isolate sounds. I also couldn't read for a long time. It has now been proven with intervention (intensive learning to rhyme, isolate sound, etc) reading can be easier. When I was a kid I just thought I was stupid. When I finally learned to read it was through word recognition rather than sounding out words. Basically I read English the way most people read a symbolic language. This also explains why my spelling is so horrible. I don't see words as chunks of sounds, I seem them as complete words.

I suspect one of my children is also dyslexic. However knowing all of this, I was able to offer the intensive verbal work to help. Now I have one child who is advanced with reading and one child who is right on track. It is important to note that the child who is now right on track has worked much harder to get there. I'm willing to bet that by Kindergarten neither child will qualify as dyslexic. I'm not saying this would work with every child. Just as there is no one solution for anything else when it comes to kids. Every kid is different. This blog is just where I post what I have done and why.

The importance of working memory

As I mentioned in the executive function post, working memory is extremely important. Working memory is the best predictor of school success. It is both academic and social. So, what else do we know about working memory?

High IQ does not equal high working memory. The opposite is also true, high working memory doesn't equal high IQ. While most IQ tests are sensitive to socioeconomic status (SES), working memory is not. For example, one section of most IQ tests for children is on general knowledge. If you ask a child "What is a police officer?" the correct answer would be something along the lines of "someone who helps people." An incorrect answer would be "someone who takes my Daddy away." Clearly this is measuring experience, not intelligence.


There are ways to improve working memory. It all starts with diet and exercise. I've address the importance of exercise on the brain already. So which foods are best to include in your diet? Dairy, berries, herbs, and foods with omega3 and dha have all been proven beneficial specifically for working memory. Foods that will have a negative impact are processed and contain high amounts of sugar, fat, and chemicals. One Organic Mama was kind enough to write a guest post for me on healthy living.

Once you have addressed the diet and exercise components, the other way to improve working memory is through proprioception training. In fact, proprioception training for just one day shows and increase in working memory by 50% and it lasts many months. As with anything, the more you do it the better the results. Proprioception is the ability to sense the position, location, orientation, and movement of the body and its parts. Proprioception training is all about balance and body awareness. It includes things like walking on a balance beam with your eyes closed, jumping to a target with your eyes closed, crawling on a balance beam, and running.

Research on Self-Esteem

If you are reading this blog, I'm sure you already know that telling kids they are smart does more harm than good. So, what else does the research say about self-esteem?

First you should realize that most of us have the wrong definition of self-esteem. Self-esteem is not about feeling good. Self-esteem is simply a set of opinions about yourself. Self-esteem is built though competence and new achievements. There is a balance of the two. Trying a new experience you can't possibly succeed at will not build self-esteem any more than a high level of competence at something you have been doing for years.

Our society need to shift from our current view of children as helpless and needing to be protected. We need to support them through the difficult times, not rescue them. One of my personal pet peeves is hearing parents talk about how they don't want their child to be behind or have to try "too hard" at something. No one is the best in everything and the earlier you learn that the better off you will be. You should not try to get rid of the bumps in the road for your child. Instead, teach them how to handle the bumps. We should not teach our children to give up when it's difficult or they aren't the best. Imagine what that society will look like when they are adults. The goal here is to raise children to be independent, successful adults. You can't always protect them, so learning to deal with the bumps when they are small is crucial.

"Intelligence is what you use when you don't know what to do." Piaget

Exercise and the Brain

I wrote about this topic more than a year ago, but I wanted to post again with the additional research.

The importance of physical exercise on your neurological health is fascinating to me, so when I'm attending a conference I tend to chose sessions that include this topic when possible. One of my favorite speakers is Dr. Kenneth Kosik. (You may notice I referred to his research in the post linked above also.) He does a lot of research on Alzheimer's and brain health. Here are some of the notes I wrote down from his session.

If you have more education and a more demanding job, it protects you against Alzheimer's.
Alzheimer's, heart attack, and stroke have many of the same risk factors.
Vascular blood vessels in the brain would be 500 miles long if stretched out.
Childhood cardiovascular health impacts the blood vessels in the brain.
70% of 40 year olds have affected blood vessels in the USA.
Children should not ever have more than 50g/day of sugar. (A juice box is 25g.)
Travel reduces risk of dementia, as does socializing, knitting, and gardening.
Biking, swimming, and golf don't reduce risk of dementia.
Dancing and playing instruments lowers dementia risk.
Cognitively, it's better to follow than to lead when dancing.

If you notice, taking care of your heart and physical health is obviously one of the most important factors in keeping your brain healthy. Nutrition and exercise reduce your risk of cardiovascular problems and mental problems. Trying things that are new and challenging, especially facing the unexpected (traveling, socializing), should be encouraged at all stages of life. I was disappointed that biking and swimming aren't more helpful since I enjoy those. I will continue to play instruments and encourage my kids to do so. I dance like a white girl with two left feet, so I will avoid that one for now. haha

I also attended a lecture by Dr. John Ratey (Harvard Medical School). He shared how humans are de-evolving. We sit in front of screens hunched over and it's making us much worse off. He is a big proponent of the FitDesk if you have to do computer work. Here are some of my notes from his speech.

It's better to wear out your body and mind than to rust.
Running will get you results in half the time of walking.
To add 3 years to your life run 100 min/week or walk 200 min/week.
Running is the best exercise for neurological health.
The computer offers hypernormal stimuli.
Fitness increases neurons and connectivity in the brain.
Exercise is as good as Zoloft to treat depression.
Exercise is the equivalent of a little Prozac and a little Adderall.
Running increases your endocannabinoids. (like marijuana)
A PE teacher gave grades based on how long students' heart rates were in the target zone and there was an 83% drop in disciplan referrals.
Teachers should offer a time in instead of a time out (run, bike, etc) in order to turn the brain back on.
Improving cardio fitness improves IQ.
Strength training improves physical health, but not mental.

I should note here that I hate running, so hearing that was the best thing I could do for myself mentally was a major disappointment. However, it was also the push I needed. As I write this I'm in week 4 of a couch to 5k program. By the time this is published I hope to have completed it. I still hate running, but after seeing the evidence, I feel the need to run. I would love a FitDesk , but don't have the money or a place to put it. I like the idea of PE grades being based on something that everyone can achieve with effort.

So, has any of this information made you want to start exercising?

The impact of Technology on Attention

Before we get too far, you should probably start by reading my disclaimer. One of my most loved and most hated posts is TV and Computer Time for Babies. Now children not only have screen time from tv and computer, but also from phones and tablets. So, what does the newest research say about all of this screen time?

There seems to be a common belief that kids these days are wired for using technology. It's not a belief based in anything other than convenience. It is easier to set the kids in front of a screen and know they are learning, playing, and happy. This does take a toll that everyone should be aware of.

You may not realize that technology creates more work. Before light handheld irons were common, people would only iron their clothes once a month and the level of acceptable wrinkles was much different. Better technology means we are now ironing more and our standards for wrinkles is much lower. Another example, when I was in elementary through high school and needed to do a research project, I headed to the library. I started at the card catalog - a large box with actual cards representing each book. Teachers would expect 3-5 references. Now everything is digitized and easy to access. Teachers expect more references, higher quality references (not just wikipedia), and more analysis of conflicting research. There are many other examples, but when you really think about it historically, technology has created more work than it has saved.

Kids are being raised on multiple media streams and multi-tasking. 40% of 3 month olds watch 90 minutes of television a day. That goes up to 50% of 8 month olds and 90 percent of 2 year olds. 50% of 8 year olds have their own cell phone. The most commonly requested add on in family cars is a dual screen video player. With all of this early exposure and practice multitasking, how can I say that kids aren't wired for using technology?

It is true that a 22 year old is better at multitasking than a 40 year old. I observe this on an almost daily basis. However, it's not because 22 year olds have more practice, it's because they are 22. Their brains are younger and work faster. Once they are 40, they will be frustrated that they can't multitask as well as most 22 year olds. The more you multitask, the more your long term attention decreases. Distractions start bothering multitaskers much earlier than those who have learned to focus on one thing at a time. Yes, learning to focus on one thing at a time is now something that we should try learning.

Kids spend the first few years of their life playing digital games. Every time they get an answer right there are lights, music, and characters literally dancing in celebration. Then they are placed in school. The human teacher stands at the front. When a student gets the answer correct they may smile and say "that's right" as they continue the lesson. Of course kids see this as being boring. Where's the instant party? Humans are not viewed by the brain as being interesting comparatively. Students get antsy, impulsive, and certainly don't want to do a worksheet.

Stop and think about the goal of education for YOUR child. Is the goal for your child to be entertained? Is the goal for your child to be challenged? Is the goal for your child to learn enough to be successful outside of school? Learning to sit and listen to a human speak and being able to apply what you have just heard is a skill that will be used throughout life. We need to make sure our children are prepared for life, not just playing games on the computer.

Screens do cause attention problems. This has been proven. However the ability to sustain attention is not correlated across tasks, i.e. sustained attention with toys versus videos versus interactive experiments. Video game players do perform better on quick perception tests. The brain is changeable within reason. If you think the computer is saving your work, you don't remember what you just wrote. If you know it's not saving, you will remember what you are typing almost word for word. Multitasking always carries a cost. Having a tv on in the background when you are working is always bad, no matter what task you are completing. (I do feel like a bit of a hypocrite since the tv is on in the background as I write this...) Multitasking causes people to make more mistakes and takes longer for the same task, no matter how much practice you have had or if you are 22. As far as having music in the background, the studies contradict themselves. It's good for some and bad for others.

The most disturbing part of the new research is on the brain multitasking during driving. If you are driving your car and your phone rings, even if you don't answer it (which I'm sure you know better than to even try), your attention is split to a point of making driving mistakes. Just hearing or feeling the phone pulls attention away from the road and any other distractions that might suddenly happen - a child running into the street, a car swerving into your lane, etc.

Limits on screen time are becoming even more crucial as this research comes out. While we didn't do any screen time before 30 months, when we did start they weren't interested. However we did let them watch up to 20 minutes a day for 5 days a week over the Summer. It's too hot to play outside most afternoons, so this seemed like a great solution. Since I keep this blog a year behind, I can tell you that was too much for my kids. Now at almost 4, they are finally up to that amount and able to handle it without behavioral problems.

Motivating Children and Students

There are some things children are motivated about on their own and some things we need to help them find motivation for. So, what are the best ways to motivate using brain research?

First you need to know about the nucleus accumbens. For those that want this simplified, it's known as the reward center of the brain. It's a limbic structure that sends dopamine throughout the brain. This is the specific part of the anatomy that generates and sustains motivation. When you think dopamine you probably think Ritalin and ADHD, so let's start our discussion there.

Volkow (2009) found a disruption in two dopamine reward/motivation pathways among adults with ADHD. The severity of this disruption was related to the severity of inattention. Another study done in Barcelona, found that children with ADHD have a smaller ventral striatum (including the nucleus acumbens), especially on the right side. The volume was correlated with hyperactivity. We know that Ritalin produces significant levels of dopamine in the brain. This increases motivation and makes tasks seem more interesting. When you look at brain wave activity in typical kids versus ADHD kids there is a huge difference. The theta/beta ratio for typical kids is 4:1, while the ratio for ADHD kids is 9:1. For some kids necessary tasks require a Herculean effort.

Typically, our society adds pressure and stress when people are not completing required tasks. It has been proven that when under stress, students work harder, but produce poorer quality work. The more stress you apply, the worse the results. While students are trying and giving it their all, they accomplish less. This also decreases motivation and makes students want to avoid challenges. This becomes even more harmful in the long run.

Sleep also plays a huge part on working memory, attention, and reaction time. Forth and sixth graders were paid to sleep one hour more or less for three consecutive nights. After a loss of 35 minutes each night for 3 nights (most couldn't make it an entire hour less) they lost two years of efficiency in these three areas. We are just starting to understand the impact of sleep and how many areas it impacts. I suspect this area of research to have a huge boom in the near future (3-5 years).

So, how do we motivate our children and students? Students need optimal challenges, feedback from the task (rather than from the teacher), freedom from demeaning evaluations, a sense of autonomy, choices, and self-direction. In other words, they need more meaningful projects and less testing. Good luck getting this in traditional schools. There are certainly teachers out there who are doing exactly this for each of their students, but they are becoming more and more rare.

There is one other thing I feel I should mention here. The brain interprets rewards and punishments as a loss of control, which is demonstrated by the stress hormones being released in the brain. The brain is wired to try to find ways of getting the reward without doing the job/assignment. We should stop fighting this and change the way we are teaching. 80% of education in public schools is competitive. While this is motivating for the top few kids, it's extremely demotivating for the other 95% of students. Why try if you aren't going to win? Stop and think about this - 95% of students are being discouraged 80% of the time in school. In order to address this, our society keeps adding more tests and rankings. We are just making it worse rather than embracing the research and trying to help the students.

What is Executive Function?

I attended a multi-day conference on executive function and how it relates to school success. Of course the first place to start should be to define executive function. Here's the problem, no one agrees. There are more than 30 credible definitions and 100s of less than credible definitions. So, here are the most common items included by various definitions:

Inhibition (self-control)
Working Memory (spatial and verbal)
Cognitive Flexibility

If you ask any teacher, these are the types of skills that are the most important in the classroom. It's much easier to teach a child to read than to teach a child self-control. Every Kindergarten teacher would rather have a class full of kids who have self-control, a good working memory, and cognitive flexibility than having a classroom full of kids who can read and do math above grade level. When you are pushing your child to be more academic stop and think about the things that are more important.

Let's look at each of these one at a time. Inhibition is more than just not hitting the jerk next to you (though that is certainly part of it). It's also controlling when you talk and what you say (I'm still working on that one). You also need to be able to inhibit the tendency to be distracted, to quit if bored or offered temptation, etc. I remember a band director once telling us the most difficult parts of any piece of music are the rests. That's the inhibition part of executive function.

Working memory is actually one of the best predictors of academic success. How much you can hold in your working memory and how you are able to manipulate it is pretty much how we define school success. This relates to reading graphs, reading books, following directions, having a discussion, and being able to consider things from multiple perspectives. Without working memory you can't make connections to other things, which is how we build neural connections in the brain. This is how we build all knowledge.

Cognitive flexibility is the most difficult part of executive function. This is being able to make mental, physical, and behavioral transitions. This is knowing the rules are different at school than at home. Pretty much every place we go, the rules are at least slightly different. Even within one place the rules can be different - at home with a babysitter versus a parent - at school in music class versus on the playground. We all know kids, and some adults, who struggle with these types of transitions. Cognitive flexibility also helps with being able to understand multiple perspectives. This is what allows us to have "outside the box" thinking and is crucial for problem solving.

Think of executive function as the director of an orchestra. Your brain does many different things, but the executive function tells it what to do and when. Many disorders start with executive dysfunction - ADHD, Tourett's Syndrome, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Depression, Autism, Learning Disabilities, Anxiety, etc. Ideally, we would test for executive function so we could help improve in all of these areas. Only, how do you test for something you can't define? This is the problem we are currently trying to address. There are some executive function evaluations on the market, however they don't cover most of what we actually want to know. I heard one analogy that it would be like giving an eye test and a coordination test and using that to determine who can drive. Those things are both needed, but there is so much more to driving, just as there is much more to executive function than the current tests evaluate.Follow my blog with Bloglovin