Is it a struggle to get your children ready for school every day? Do you feel like a broken record as you repeat the same instruction approximately 328 times each morning, only to eventually yell at your child just to get their attention, and then have them look at you in surprise that you are so annoyed? Does a change in the routine cause a lot of stress for your kids? Do you notice your child’s emotions going from “zero to sixty” after a change in plans or minor disagreement? As we get closer to the end of another semester and the holiday season is in full swing, all of us are probably struggling with task persistence and managing our time. We are here to provide you with more information about executive function for your child with ADHD, autism, language disorder, or learning challenges to help make the days run a little bit smoother! 

A few weeks ago, we talked about five important facts every parent needs to understand about executive function.Today, I’m diving deeper into one...

How’s your week going? Let me guess...

You have everything running perfectly on schedule, right? You’ve gotten all the house projects done, laundry put away, finished everything at the office at least 48 hours before it was due, and baked three dozen sparkly cupcakes for the bake sale... AND your children got along without fighting, listened every time you asked them to do something, and sat quietly (without prompting) when you had to answer the phone. Whew, a truly perfect day. Or was it a little more complicated than that?

Regardless of what you accomplished today, let me reassure you that this parenting thing is a lot of work… for all of us! And when you really think about it, it’s amazing that as parents, we are able to balance so many different roles at one time. Seriously, how do we do it? Whether you realize it or not, you constantly use executive functions to help you get through your to-do list every day. This unique set of cognitive skills helps us every time we set a goal,...