Bridging the Executive Function Gap in the Classroom in 47 seconds a Day (8 mins)

Bethany Febus is a Professional Certified Life Coach specializing in ADHD and Executive Function in Seattle, Washington, USA. Bethany is passionate about supporting her clients in understanding the way their unique brain works so they can develop supportive strategies and systems that are interesting and relevant to who they are. Her work with families includes improving skills around academics management, time awareness, planning, collaborative problem solving, emotional regulation, organization, social skills and more. Bethany trains and mentors coaches at the ADD Coach Academy, an internationally recognized coach training program.

If you are a fan of TikTok, and an educator, you may have come across reels of the middle school science teacher Maddie Richardson, or “Miss R.”, teaching her middle school students 8. She teaches science, but she includes a mini Social Emotional Learning (SEL) lesson as a “brain break” in her classes every day. Despite my ambivalent feelings about TikTok, stumbling onto little gems like Miss R. has been revelatory for me. As a certified ADHD coach, I’m inspired by this simple but impactful integration of SEL into the classroom.


As an ADHD and Executive Function Coach, I work with students to help them understand their brains better and to create personalized strategies and structures to meet their personal and academic goals. We focus on building skills in planning, prioritizing, organizing, problem-solving, and time management. This is what we usually mean when we refer to “Executive Function Skills”. However, there are additional executive function skills that I also work on with my clients
that are even more integral to student success, but that are often seen as less important in academics. These include emotional regulation, self-awareness, working memory, self-talk, social skills, self-monitoring, and motivation. The demand for my services has grown tremendously over the last couple of years as the stress of the pandemic has pushed students to the limits of their ability to cope and their ability to mask their challenges.


I sometimes work with my client’s teachers to better support their learning needs, and I often find their teachers at a loss as to how to help them. They often have exhausted their usual repertoire of support systems. I believe that this is partly due to a pervasive misunderstanding of how executive functions develop and impact student’s success. We tend to assume many of these skills are developmentally consistent across children, and we make assumptions about what students “should” be able to do based on their age 12. While a majority of children develop executive functions along a consistent timeline, many children need more support to bridge the gap between expectations and performance1. Worldwide statistics estimate close to 6% of children may have developmental delays of 3-5 years in executive functioning 11, 1. In the US it is estimated to be almost 10% 10, 1 . These numbers do not even include students whose executive functions may be impacted by lack of sleep, anxiety, depression, or a multitude of other life stressors.


For example, here are some factors that might impede a hypothetical 7th grader’s ability to succeed in math class:


A 7th grader walks into class after the bell rings, walks right past the turn-in bin without turning in their math packet, slumps down into their chair loudly, and then proceeds to stare out the window without taking out paper or pencil.

The teacher feels frustrated by what seems like disrespectful behavior and is worried about the pattern that seems to be developing with this student. They hold back their criticism and prompt the student to get out their supplies.


The student looks annoyed and snaps back “I know, I’m getting it!” They slowly pull out their notebook, and then loudly ask their neighbor if they can borrow a pencil. The teacher’s resolve crumbles.

Does this sound familiar? When we peel back the layers of this student’s experience and identify which executive function skills might be lacking, we can see the reasons that they are struggling: 

  • They take an inefficient route through the halls to their locker (planning/working memory/problem solving). 
  • When they get to their locker, it takes three tries to get their password right (focus, working memory, fine motor skill challenges). 
  • When they get their locker open their mind goes blank (working memory, situational awareness). They grab their math book and nothing else (working memory, future thinking, planning) They ignore the bag of pencils that have been sitting in there since the first day of school. 
  • The bell rings which sends a burst of cortisol through their system.  Fearing they will be late again (emotional regulation), they slam their locker shut and tell themselves how stupid they are and how they will never get anything right (emotional regulation, verbal working memory). 
  • When they enter the math class, everyone looks at them, which makes their stomach flop and their face flush (emotional regulation). They are flooded and shut down2. Even without the shutdown, they may not have had the situational awareness required to remember to turn in their homework.
  • They are so stuck in negative thoughts and fears that it feels to them like they have just sat down when the teacher prompts them to get out paper and pencil. The prompt reaches their limbic system like a threat to which they react reflexively. 
  • What does this have to do with Miss R. and her TikTok’s? Miss R. introduces Social Emotional Learning topics to her students that include the effects of lack of sleep on the brain, responsible decision making, making failure a norm, and more. Each lesson is about the length of the average TikTok video, 47 seconds. And from the enthusiastic voices of the students in the background, she has their full attention. I am not suggesting that every teacher start making TikTok videos with their class. What I love about this model is that it shows that it doesn’t take a lot of time to meet the needs of a variety of students. Some teachers are already finding ways to implement executive function education and support9. According to researcher and SLP, Sarah ward, those teachers have seen an increase in self-esteem and autonomy in their students as a result9. I believe this could be done on a large scale without curriculum changes. Teachers could weave this learning into their lessons and the classroom culture regularly.

    Not sure where to start with your own classroom? We know that when students are regulated, they are more able to take in information and learn from it5. If educators could do one thing to support our students with executive function challenges, it would be to see the connection between emotional regulation and execution13. Help them find ways to get out of fight/flight (which many are otherwise trapped in all day long) and back into their learning brain. We can do this in many ways including modeling conscious breathing, mindfulness and considering sensory needs or sensitivities and movement needs. We can model and teach a “pause” before action. Dr. Russell Barkley, a well-respected executive function expert, says that students with executive function challenges need to “repeatedly practice self-monitoring, self-stopping, seeing the future, saying the future, feeling the future, and playing with the future to effectively plan and go toward the future6.” The key to supporting executive functions is to make them explicit and repeated. Your whole class may not need this, but they will all benefit from it, and they will all grow in empathy and self-awareness when they understand the various challenges and skills of their classmates.

    If a student isn’t meeting behavioral or academic expectations in the classroom, ask yourself, “why?”, and “why now?” Peel back the layers and see if there is a way you can include the whole class in the scaffolding. We can help students to understand that their inability to meet expectations in the moment is merely because of a skill they have yet to learn. Rather than telling themselves “I hate writing, I can never think of something to write about”, they might think “I couldn’t pick a topic today because my ‘decider’ was all worn out after picking a book, so I asked Miss Lara if she could narrow down the choices for me or let me have the night to think about it.” Giving language to the challenges they are facing helps students build self-awareness and ultimately independence4

    At the end of each lesson, Miss R. encourages students if they aren’t proficient at the lesson topic yet, “that’s ok, you are in middle school, let’s take a deep breath and let it go…And if you brought any stressors, depressors, or anxieties with you today, I want you to let them know you will be with them later … all you have to worry about right now is science and it’s not going to be that bad” The same message can be said to teachers. Maybe you are already doing all the suggestions I have listed and more. If so, Bravo! But, if you haven’t yet understood the role of executive functions in your student’s ability to access the curriculum, and you have blamed their behavior on something else entirely, or you have given up on a couple of students completely, I want you to take a deep breath and let it go.  As neuroscience changes how we understand the brain, we are all still learning how to effectively support our students, and all you have to think about right now is being the amazing teacher you already are and know it’s not going to be that bad. In fact, it could be pretty amazing!

    1Russell A. Barkley, Ph.D. Dedicated to Education and Research on ADHD (n.d.) The Important Role of Executive Functioning and Self-Regulation in ADHD© Russell A. Barkley, Ph.D. [factsheet] http://www.russellbarkley.org/factsheets/ADHD_EF_and_SR.pdf 

    2Brown, T. (2014). Smart but Stuck: Emotions in Teens and Adults with ADHD. Jossey-Bass.

    3Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University (29 Oct. 2020) Activities Guide: Enhancing & Practicing Executive Function Skills. https://developingchild.harvard.edu/resources/activities-guide-enhancing-and-practicing-executive-function-skills-with-children-from-infancy-to-adolescence/. 

    4Jacobson, R. (2021, August 15). Metacognition: How Thinking About Thinking Can Help Kids. Child Mind Institute. https://childmind.org/article/how-metacognition-can-help-kids/

    5Shanker, S. (2017, July 4). Self-Reg: How to Help Your Child (and You) Break the Stress Cycle and Successfully Engage with Life (Reprint). Penguin Books.

    6Barkley, R.A. (2012) Executive Functions: What they are, how they work and why they evolved. New York: Guilford

    7Shaw P, Eckstrand K, Sharp W, Blumenthal J, Lerch JP, Greenstein D, Clasen L, Evans A, Giedd J, Rapoport JL. (2007 Dec 4) Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder is characterized by a delay in cortical maturation. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A.;104(49):19649-54. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0707741104. 

    8 Richardson, M, [@themissrproject]. (2022, September 2) Day 17 –  #teamwork and #commucation also happy Space day #nasa #artemis1 🚀 (launch on Saturday)  #teacher #sel #leadership #teachersoftiktok #wholebrainteaching [Video].TikTok. https://www.tiktok.com/@themissrproject/video/7138930747238567214?is_copy_url=1&is_from_webapp=v1

    9Ward, S. (2014, July 12) A Clinical Model for Developing Executive Function Skills Sarah Ward   https://www.efpractice.com/_files/ugd/78deb2_0ee2dbd06e384650a209f48d9101ac3d.pdf

    10 Danielson M, Bitsko R, Ghandour R, Holbrook J, Kogan M, Blumberg S (2018 January 24) Prevalence of Parent-Reported ADHD Diagnosis and Associated Treatment Among U.S. Children and Adolescents, 2016. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, 47:2, 199-212, DOI: 10.1080/15374416.2017.1417860. Retrieved from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5834391/pdf/nihms937906.pdf

    11 Willcutt EG (2012) The prevalence of DSM-IV attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: a meta-analytic review. Neurotherapeutics. 2012;9:490–499. doi: 10.1007/s13311-012-0135-8.

    12 Sippl A (nd) Executive Function Skills By Age: What to Look For Life Skills Advocate [blog] accessed 2022 08 13 https://lifeskillsadvocate.com/blog/executive-function-skills-by-age/

    13 Barkley R (2012) Self-Regulation and Executive Functioning Theory Burnett Lecture Part 2 ADHD