by Kim Peeples, Head of Groves Academy
Groves Academy’s Head of School, Kim Peeples, is being featured by multiple Twin Cities media outlets this week to share insights on how parents can help develop executive function skills at home.
Students with learning disabilities often struggle with executive functioning — which are the skills we use to manage our time, prioritize our activities, regulate our emotions, and persist in achieving a goal or completing a task.
Think of executive function as a conductor for an orchestra: An orchestra is made up of a variety of talented musicians and with the guidance of the conductor, they bring sounds of multiple instruments together to create beautiful music.
Parents, here’s what you can do to help develop your child’s executive functioning skills at home:
- Involve your student in creating a goal they can accomplish by the end of the week, like creating a special family dinner
- Together, create the tasks that need to be completed
- Prioritize the order of completion for those tasks
- Create a schedule for when the tasks need to be done
At the end of the week, perhaps during the special family dinner, be sure to talk about the experience. What worked well? What was challenging? What could have been done differently?
I invite you to learn more about Groves and our additional resources!
