Executive Functioning Skills - Is it too late to help?

Parents Forum
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A friend of mine has a daughter about to graduate high school. She has executive functioning problems not related to any other diagnosis. A few months ago, she began working with a coach who has been extremely helpful, although it is definitely a process and the help will continue into college. If you have some money to throw at this, a professional is an excellent resource. I think the best way to find someone good is to call on your communities for recommendations, eg, friends around town, people you know from home schooling, people at church/synagogue/mosque, the appropriate office at the community college, etc.

FWIW, I know two things about the approach of the coach I mentioned. She only deals with one or two things at a time. It’s too much to try to change everything at once. And she’s very big on routines and consistency. The coach helps her figure out (or just gives her) a system or routine for a task and then the idea is that she does it that way every time.

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It was a revelation to me when someone suggested that I give my son a monthly calendar and work with him on his schedule for the month and I realized the concept of a month makes no sense to him. Unless we discuss each day to come the day before he cannot plan. It’s real and he’s not going to grow out of it.

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I also don’t think homeschooling has anything to do with it. My daughter went to public school and had terrible exec functioning skills. (While my other daughter is super organized.)

We didn’t realize it until about 8th grade when the workload got heavier and harder. And each year the kids were supposed to be a little more self sufficient.

She was diagnosed ADHD-PI in 8th grade (she was so NOT hyperactive, that it never occurred to me. She is “PI” predominately inattentive). I remember a big thing was “slow working memory”.

She is just like her dad (my husband) and they are just wired differently. And it is hard for an organized person to understand - why, exactly do you need to keep a toothbrush in the kitchen?? (It makes sense in their mind.)

Learning about ADHD has helped me with my husband. For example, I don’t ask either of them to put away their X. They take that as I want them to do it immediately and get flustered. Now I say, can you put away X this week?

After accepting it, DD tried various meds and found what worked for her . But she was still a mess through most of high school.

She started working her senior year of high school, which really helped her time management skills.

And I let her be in charge - of school, talking with the doc about her meds, etc. I intervened less and less.

She decided to stay home and go to a local community college and boy, did things turn around! I think part of it was maturity (ok, I do have this issue and general maturity) and part “I am in college now and have to do this on my own”.

She kept her job, working about 12 hours a week and takes about 10 or 11 credits a semester. It is a good combination for her. She has asked us for advice on which classes to take and the like, but otherwise, she has done it all on her own, meeting deadlines, getting her accommodations, meeting with her advisor, stalking professors, etc.

She has been at her comm college 3 years and loves it. She is finishing up this year and transferring to a state school near us. She is going to commute there, so she can have the flexibility to go less than full time if she feels she needs to (she can’t live on campus unless full time).

She got a book on her own, “Learning Outside the Lines”. I can’t vouch for it, but I came across it the other day and it is full of post it flags!

She also uses a big day planner. And I think it has been helpful that in college, all her class stuff is online, so she can check due dates, if she turned in assignments, etc. (Teachers were much It was less consistent in high school.)

Good luck! He will get there. He just needs to take his own pathway and do it on his schedule.

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@jazzymomof7 How did my daughter turn up as your son? I could have written this post.

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My son was the same way in high school and I seriously considered a year of community college, but ultimately decided against it. He is now a rising senior. For him, he was so insanely busy in high school that coming into college with only four classes a semester was like a vacation. He scaled back a lot to only activities he was really committed to, so they were not a burden. That really helped.

We did a few things, which may or may not work for anyone else. First, we encouraged him to read his syllabi before the semester started as if it were a magazine article so he could understand the overview and get in his head the general feel of what each class would be like. Then we had him highlight through the syllabus anything that was important or that he might miss. On move in day of freshman year, I personally posted those highlighted syllabi right next to his desk where he couldn’t miss them. He did it for himself every other semester. I then reminded him regularly that semester to read the syllabi at least once a week and put in the front of his brain what was coming up. He found this so helpful that I never had to bother him again because he is now absolutely convinced that if he is completely familiar with the syllabus in a particular class, he will be fine.

Since I had misgivings, I made a visit to the academic services office a condition of going away. They have seminars, webinars, videos, and professional who meet with students to help them find the best way to organize. They were very helpful and it left me out of the process. His support person checked with him weekly that semester, and he chose to visit again in junior year on his own. I also followed his grades carefully that first semester because I just wasn’t sure we were making the right decision. But it really turned out fine and I was able to step out after that semester, although I still expect to be informed of final semester grades as a condition of continuing to pay tuition. He understands that he is not entitled to our money, and if the GPA is not at a certain level he will come home. We mean it and he knows that.

My son got a job on campus in his department and it’s a responsible job with skills that will translate into permanent employment. He was excited and grateful to get this job, which gave him a further skin in the game of being more responsible. He came home from this past semester with a thank you note from the director saying how much she appreciates his follow through, willingness to step in, and his attention to detail. I swear to you that I framed that thing and hung it up in my dining room.

So I guess what I’m saying is that you should help him commit to the syllabi, be willing to really oversee for the first semester (despite what other parents may say), and encourage him to be willing to accept the professional services offered by the college. Those things can really help. Good luck!

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I’ve never been good at planners for any length of time. I finally seem to have hit a system that works for me. It’s called the Bullet Journal. I’m a grown up and self employed, so it’s largely for my business, but I see students using it too. What I like about it is that your write everything down. While there is a basic structure, I think the key is spending five or ten minutes every day review task list and writing everything you want to do that day (or the next day if you do the review at night.) The basics are here: https://bulletjournal.com/pages/learn You don’t have to buy Ryder’s book or the notebook. You can turn any notebook into a bullet journal though I recommend one that is 5"x7" so it’s easy to carry around with graph paper or gridded dots so it’s easy to be neat. This is also fun to watch: https://bulletjournal.com/blogs/bulletjournalist/bullet-journal-for-adhd

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DD has had a lot of success using the SOAR organization system. The same system works from elementary school through college. You don’t have to buy their system. It is easy to assemble what you need on your own. The book, however does a great job explaining it.

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@tutumom2001 It has been a huge relief for me to hear that other students have struggled with this, too, and have found ways to be successful.

@zoosermom I hadn’t thought of having him go thru the syllabi before move in day. I’ll do that with him and have him post them up so they won’t get lost. I’ll also ask him for access to the portal, just so I can oversee things until I’m sure he has it under control.

I found out his school has a peer coaching program where you meet with a coach once a week to help with organization, etc. If he can’t get into the program, we’ll definitely hire a private coach. I feel it will be worth the money if it can help him get thru school successfully.

I’m going to order some of thr recommended books, as well.

Thanks, all! I appreciate all of the supportive responses and btdt advice.

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Poor executive function generally means working on that issue for the rest of one’s life. So there isn’t any “too late”.

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@taverngirl I’m interested in the idea of a coach via skype. How did you find the one you have and what kind of results are you seeing if you don’t mind me asking.

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I found a coach for my son by looking for tutors. The person I found advertises herself as a writing tutor for high school students, and indeed she is that, but she also works with my son on organization and planning. She meets with him once a week or so, and texts with him every day to check that he’s on target.

Really, being a coach is not a job that requires a lot of training. What you want, really, is someone who’s kind of a nudge and busybody in real life.

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I don’t think it’s appropriate for a college student but here was my strategy when my kids were in middle and high school. When they asked me if they could do something that evening or that weekend, I would reply… sounds like fun, write down what you have to get done then let’s talk about it. It took some discussions and planning at first but eventually they got organized.

They always selected a yearly planner to keep track of assignments and wrote down deadlines in them. When it came to the huge tasks like college apps, I was their secretary and we met once a week to make a plan. (Both kids who have graduated college still use a written agenda or calendar.)

Just a heads up that most college portals are not like high school portals. When your student gives you access, it doesn’t share timelines, missing assignments and details to help someone stay on track.

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In my experience…writing down just the deadline does not help kids with organizational issues. They need to also write down each step they need to do before the deadline and set dates for the completion of those items. Otherwise…the night before a deadline…all panic breaks loose.

Learning to break tasks down into manageable steps is an important skill.

Also, these kids need to know it’s OK to make lists, check those lists, and then check off completed items.

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^^This. And the steps need to be small steps with short deadlines.

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Part of this is about creating routines so that you don’t have to remember everything. If you always put your car keys in the same place, you don’t have to devote memory, energy and stress to remembering where they are. And you lose the panic and time of looking for them as you are rushing to get to an appointment.

If you put things to remember on a list, you need to remember to look at that list , reorganize and prioritize, then execute on the actionable items. So having a dedicated time each day to go through the list is important. This takes training and discipline.

And part of it is about creating a space to do work that doesn’t have its own distractions. For most people, this means neat and pretty bare. (The feeling you get when you sit down at a table in the library, not the one you get at a cluttered desk, with bills to pay, a magazine, stuff to file.)

I live and work with some really smart folks with ADHD (not so H), and frankly, ordinary life has plenty of organizational challenges even for those without a diagnosis. It’s an ongoing effort to get and stay organized, and it takes a lot of pretty unimaginative discipline.

Your kid has to buy into whatever system he’s using, and you all need to understand that he, like all of us, is “developing a practice”. This doesn’t “get fixed”. You and he should also expect lots of little setbacks along the way.

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My son was dx w ADHD inattentive as a college student in the midst of crashing and burning. OP’s son is a story that could be ours. I would recommend a screening, if only to help your son identify his problems as not something that sheer wilpower and notebooks can solve, because they can’t. Or if he clearly needs to just find a routine that works.

Organizational tools look helpful to people who are already organized. For people who are not, it’s just more gibberish to manage. Routines are more helpful. Minimalist is helpful (one location, one phone, one calender). Fewer courses rather than maximizing a term load. Break tasks into very small steps, Don’t make lists. Coaches cannot replace the ability to complete tasks. (Coach can remind, check in, etc…but only Son can take the homework and turn it in)

Keep an eye on him as he enters college. It is very discouraging and can lead to depression (for any kid) to feel ready and then be overwhelmed. At college, there is no structure at all – at all — to provide guidance. Hr may do well one semester and terrible the next. That’s okay.

Organized people see the world as a very tidy city street lined with shops. Disorganized people experience it much the way we enter a huge mall we’ve never been to , in a foreign country ---- noise, sound, color, not sure where to look or go, but plunge in.

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“At college, there is no structure at all – at all — to provide guidance.”

This comment is not really accurate. Some colleges have a great deal of structure for students, and others have very little. When applying to schools this question wasn’t even on our radar. By the time our child was deciding among her acceptances, we were much more attentive to the EF concerns and supports built into the schools’ structure and ethos. The school she’s attending in the fall offers a LOT of structure that can help her with her EF challenges. (Whether any given student takes advantage of the available structure remains to be seen, of course.)

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Yes, many schools do offer support services. I was thinking more of choices – And at the end of the day, nobody gets you out of bed and to class on time. Nobody comes and turns off the light and says go to bed.Nobody can make you attend class. I work with college students every day who can’t see the connection between their choices and their outcomes.

I think we have different definitions of structure, that’s all. And if there are support services, those are usually reserved for identified students with diagnosed need, which OP’s son is not.

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@greenbutton. Great description!

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I don’t have the details, but a friend hired a therapist who specialized in helping teens & young adults in what you are describing.

It helped a LOT, and had the bonus of taking the parents out of the equation — which in their case allowed them to all enjoy each other more and lessen the frustration all around.

Not too late!