The Executive Function Skills - An educational techniques for ADHD and ADD

Individual with ADHD and ADD often have difficulty with Executive Skills, also called Executive Functions. These are the skills that help us manage and direct our lives. They are analogous to the activities that an executive engages in to manage and direct a company or business.

Executive Skills allow us to plan and organize our behavior, make well-considered decisions, overrule immediate disires in favor of longer-term goals, take consious control of our emotions, and monitor our thoughts in order to work more efficiently and effectively.

There are a number of different theories and definitions of the skills that constitute executive functions. The following is a compilation that illustrates the full range of skills needed to effectively manage out lives.

Executive Functions

Planning and Prioritizing

The ability to create a plan to complete a task or to develop an approach to achieveing a goal. This skills includes making decisions about what to direct attention toward and ordering the steps needed to achieve the goal.

Time Management

The sense of that "time" is important concept, the ability to accurately estimate how much time a task will take, knowing how to apportion your time, and how to stay within time constraints to meet deadlines.

Organization

The ability to arrage ideas or objects according to a defined structure.

Working Memory

The ability to remember information while using the information to perform complex tasks.

Metacognition

The ability to take a top-down view of your problem solving approach and to self-monitor and evaluate performance.

Response Inhibition

The power to resist the urge to say or to do something; taking time to think before acting.

Self-regulation of Affect

The ability to deal with emotions so that they don't get in the way of completing tasks or achieving goals.

Task Initiation

The ability to start a task at the appropriate time without delay or procrastination.

Flexibility

The ability to adapt your responses, behaviors and plans when necessary in order to achieve toward your goals.

Goal-directed Persistence

The ability to follow through to complete task and achieve goals.

Sustained Attention

The capacity to pay attention to a task, particulary if the task is not interesting.

Disengaging Attention

The ability to stop directing your attention towards one thing and direct it towards something else.

Regulation of Processing Speed

The ability to make a conscious decision about how slowly or quickly to perform a task based upon its importance to you.