The Best Free Following Directions Activities

Posted by Erica Warren on

Learning to follow both oral and written instructions is a vital skill that students need to learn at an early age.  However, grabbing their attention long enough to learn the complicated process can be challenging!
cover for free following directions activites

Why are Following Directions a Difficult Skill for Young Learners?

Following directions involves a combination of mental tasks. Therefore, for a student to be good at this, he or she needs to be proficient at the following skills, and he or she also needs to be able to do them simultaneously:
  1. Attention is the ability to maintain focus on a selected stimulus, sustaining that focus and shifting it at will.
  2. Receptive language is the ability to understand language “input” - including both words and gestures. 
  3. Memory is the ability to understand and remember information over time.
  4. Verbal reasoning is the ability to understand and reason with words.
  5. Executive Functioning is the ability to multitask, self-monitor, self-initiate, plan, prioritize and organize information.  It is the internal system that controls and regulates our cognitive processes.

How and When Should I Teach This Skill?

cover for mega bundleI love to teach this skill through games and fun activities.  I often use them as morning warm-ups, a reward when students finish classroom assignments, and they are great for language arts learning stations.  I also like to use them in one to one sessions with students that struggle with the language behind multi-step rules and multiple choice questions.

Where Can I Find Fun Materials? 

To get your FREE Following Directions Activities, CLICK HERE  If you would like to learn more about Dr. Warren's suite of following directions activities, CLICK HERE.

I'm always here to help. Reach out any time.

Cheers, Erica

Dr. Erica Warren is the author, illustrator, and publisher of multisensory educational materials at Good Sensory Learning. She is also the director of Learning to Learn and Learning Specialist Courses.


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