Executive skills may help advance learning
Developing certain executive-type skills typically obtained on the job are often overlooked in the classroom, but can be taught and may be key to students’ academic success, experts say. Referred to as the “hidden curriculum,” executive skills go beyond typical skill sets taught in the classroom, such as critical thinking and writing. Rather, they are more discrete skills that help individuals execute tasks, such as finishing an academic project from start to finish or setting academic goals, according to Peg Dawson and Richard Guare, psychologists and educational leaders.
“In many ways, they constitute the hidden curriculum in schools because teachers know that students need them but typically don’t go about teaching them explicitly,” write Dawson and Guare in the published article, "Executive Skills: The Hidden Curriculum." “Teachers tend to hold students accountable when they don’t have executive skills, but fail to recognize that the skills can be taught the same way that students are taught to perform geometry proofs, outline a book chapter, and write an essay.”
Types of executive skills
Teachers arguably help children and adult learners alike develop some of the most basic executive skills, such as organization, time management, planning, working memory and metacognition. Yet a secondary set of executive skills warrant equal and further attention because they help regulate the behavior of students as they advance their academic goals, note Dawson and Guare in their 2010 book, "Executive Skills in Children and Adolescent: A practical guide to assessment and intervention."
“Executive skills enable us to manage our emotions and monitor our thoughts in order to work more efficiently and effectively,” the book states.
Additional executive skills within this behavior-oriented category, as identified by Dawson and Guare, include:
- Response inhibition —The ability of a person to think and evaluate a situation before acting
- Emotional control — The ability to regulate emotions to better direct behavior, achieve goals or finish tasks
- Sustained attention — The ability to focus on a task or situation in spite of distractions
- Task initiation — The ability to start projects sans procrastination and in a timely manner
- Goal-directed persistence — The ability to set and follow through with a goal
- Flexibility —The ability to adapt plans to changing conditions
Learning and teaching executive skills
The authors suggest executive skills correlate with brain development, and are “built in” at birth yet only developed as a person’s brain matter develops. Educators can play a significant role in the development of these skills by instituting instructional support for students of various ages. Specifically, the authors suggest educators implement a tiered support system to strategically strengthen these skills through coursework and instructional modifications. These tiers can be adapted based on the educators’ class-specific assessment and modified based on the students’ grade level.
The following is an overview of the recommended tiers and associated support system:
Intervention Tier — This is how educators approach the students as they attempt to develop executive skills within the classroom. There are three focus groups, or tiers: universal (all students); targeted (10-20% of students for whom the universal approach is insufficient); and intensive (for the 1-7% not helped by the universal or targeted approaches).
Environmental Modifications — Educators can tweak the classroom or online environment to strengthen those executive skills they identify are weakest. This may involve establishing the management of coursework tasks, such as planning strategies for long-term projects or establishing behavioral ground rules.
Instructional Supports — Once the above are established, educators can teach specific executive skills through course activities and instruction. This may involve lessons that incorporate methods for students to retain information, strategies to initiate tasks and dispel distractions; or small group coaching.
Motivational Strategies — Lastly, educators can incorporate incentive, including penalties, to encourage students to incorporate executive skills. This can include fun activities to follow “effortful classroom tasks,” the authors note.
Important to the bigger academic picture
The authors believe failure to incorporate and develop executive skills could adversely impact the ability of students to successfully grasp and meet traditional curriculum benchmarks, ultimately derailing their academic success and goal completion.
“Upon learning about executive skills, administrators may conclude they are another ‘add-on’ to the curriculum that will tax overworked teachers still further,” write Dawson and Guare in “The Hidden Curriculum” article. “But executive skills are essential if students are to master the curriculum that is already in place.”
