Episode 89: What is it like to be an Executive Functioning Coach?

Below you can view or listen to Episode 89 of The Personal Brain Trainer Podcast.

In this episode of the Executive Function Braintrainer Podcast, host Dr. Erica Warren is joined by fellow executive functioning coach, Kim Sorise, to discuss the intricacies of executive functioning across different life stages, from elementary age to the elderly. They explore the importance of developing executive skills early, the impact of COVID-19 on these skills, and strategies to bolster them in various populations. Specific focus is given to children, middle and high school students, college students, and adults, with practical tips on improving motivation, managing academic workloads, and leveraging technology to aid in learning and memory retention. The conversation emphasizes proactive approaches, the benefits of gamification in learning, and the value of self-advocacy and metacognition.

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#89: What is it like to be an Executive Functioning Coach?

Erica: Welcome to the Executive Function Brain Trainer podcast. I'm Dr. Erica Warren.

Darius: And I'm Darius Namdaran. And we're your hosts.

Erica: Sponsored by the Executive Functioning Coaching Assessment, a quick online assessment that uncovers challenges and develops personalized strategies for success.

Darius: Sponsored by ivvi. Imagine turning your meeting's audio into a live mind map instantly so you remember what matters. Or, well, try ivvi for free now at ivvi.app. That's ivvi.app.

Erica: So I just wanted to tell everybody that I have a special guest today, and this is Kim Cerise. And Kim is also an executive functioning coach. Darius will not be joining us this week, and she's going to take his place. So, Kim, tell us a little bit about yourself.

Kim Cerise: Hi. Thanks so much for having me. I'm a big fan of the Brain Trainer podcast. My name is Kim Cerise. I am a director of Student Success Services at A K through 12 Independent School in Louisville, Kentucky. And I am also an executive functioning coach with my own practice called Metacognitive Minds, where I serve teens, college students, and adults.

Erica: Awesome. Yes. And I got to know Kim because she ended up taking my course, and we became fast friends. So today, what we wanted to talk about is what it's actually like to be an executive functioning coach. And we wanted to break the discussion down into life stages. So we wanted to start with the elementary and work our way up all the way to the elderly. So let's get started. We both have worked with pretty much all of these age groups, and I think the funny thing to think about is that even though we say that it's not fully developed until our mid-20s, it's something that is vital to develop at a very, very young age. As soon as we leave the womb, we can start to develop executive functioning skills.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely. I mentioned this to my younger students, too, that they are building these skills from infancy. What do we do when a baby cries? Right. That is the first thing to be able to support that element of emotional regulation. Or you can also do the same thing if you're always picking up a baby when it cries, as opposed to letting them learn to kind of deal with their own space and sit in that emotion, which is a tough thing for people as they get older, if they're not, you know, maybe brought into the world with that way.

Erica: Yeah, yeah. And. And I think it's a fine line between building resilience and giving a baby what they need.

Kim Cerise: Yeah.

Erica: You know, but as they age, there are some very, very important skills to teach them within the executive functioning realm. So let's get started with elementary kids. So, what are your thoughts about serving this population?

Kim Cerise: Well, this I will say is the population of child that I work with the least, I think in the position that I've been in at my independent school, I've always worked with middle and high school students. But through your course and through also additional research, you know, I do understand that executive functioning begins at birth. And I think that for our elementary school age kiddos, and we're talking, you know, kids K through five, K through sixth grade, it is the proactive approach. It's the building of the foundation of executive skills where we can support that emotional regulation. Also being able to support the flexible thinking, the inhibitory control, the working memory. The three things that you say are the big three for you, but also for me on my end, I really support that metacognition of saying you are an active participant in your life, and you can be even when you're 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10.

Erica: Yeah, yeah. And it's interesting because, you know, I think the typical pedagogical philosophy of teaching children is that they are these blank slates and that we are just giving them information and they are to absorb it. But I'm not a huge fan of that. By doing that, we're teaching them to be backseat drivers for not giving them the control to manage their own cognition. And that's what's vital. And I see that missing in some of the younger students these days, particularly post Covid, where they're really missing a lot of these vital skills. And personally, I think they are the foundation skills to learning.

Kim Cerise: I agree. I think across the board we're seeing probably a two-to-three-year delay, if you will, and

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Kim Cerise: executive skills for a lot of our students post-COVID. And so, yeah, even with older kids that are middle and high school age, I'm having to do some work to help them build foundational pieces because they're just struggling with things like emotional regulation or the ability to shift and pivot and think flexibly. One thing that we did sit in a meeting with some of my colleagues and talk to them about, you know, some of the challenges that we are seeing post-COVID. And one idea that was really brought up is when we put students in our school, because we're a tiny school, less than 300, we were able to bring students back pretty quickly during isolation and we potted them, and everybody was given their three-foot square of space. They never had to pivot. The adults in the room did all the shift, all the change, all the pivoting. They brought kids everything they needed and therein lied a big problem of building in flexibility to change and adaptation and adjustment. So even by trying to keep our children safe and our students safe, we were actually inhibiting that growth of that part of their executive functioning toolbox, if you will.

Erica: Yeah, it's. It's really interesting. And, and you know, even if you are to think about what are the most common complaints in elementary school by teachers, you know, you hear, well, they don't listen. That's executive functioning.

Kim Cerise: Sure is.

Erica: You know, they're struggling with getting along with other students. That's emotional regulation.

Kim Cerise: Sure.

Erica: They can't focus. That's inhibitory control. So it's funny that all the classic issues that I hear about in an elementary classroom are executive functioning skills. And if we can teach them explicitly and give the kids the vocabulary, just like we teach them what a noun and a verb is, what a consonant and a vowel is, why don't we teach them what working memory, inhibitory control and cognitive flexibility is. Adults have a little bit of a hard time wrapping their minds around the concepts initially, but it's far less complex than learning how to read.

Kim Cerise: Oh, I agree. I think that sitting down with a young child and saying, hey, I know that you didn't get your way in this particular situation, but let's talk about your options. You know, I can see that you're upset. It's okay to have your feelings, but how are we going to move forward from that one tiny thing? Can't take down your entire day. And I know that that's a tricky thing to talk to a young child about, but I think with consistency, with support, with a lot of love and compassion, you can change the way children are behaving in classrooms and in group settings and helping to build their own sense of confidence and self-esteem. Because a lot of this I think is rooted in that struggle of a lack of confidence and self-esteem.

Erica: And I'm a firm believer that you can gamify it. Although they are intense things to talk about. I have a book that, that is definitely coming out because I absolutely. Releasing it this month has taken me a while. Executive functioning games for groups and classes. And there's a lot of. Actually they're games for elementary, middle school, high school, and even college. But yeah, having that opportunity to gamify it and work within a group so that they're able to see, hey, okay, if somebody's talking to me about some of these challenges, I have, wow, we all have these challenges. And everybody there's really a spectrum for each of these skills and you know, the working memory, inhibitory control and cognitive flexibility and even when these unite and create kind of the higher-level executive functioning, we are all on that continuum and we all have little blips in moments. But if kids can see that and they can support each other and they can have fun with it and they can play games to strengthen those skills, then why not?

Kim Cerise: Absolutely. I mean I love your games, and I use them with a lot of students, especially in my middle school with my seventh and eighth grade because that's really. They come into my office and it's one on one and they're like hey Ms. Cerise. I don't know how comfortable I feel being there. And it's a big difference when they walk in and on the table is a game and we just start the game and sometimes it's a two player and sometimes it's solo and. And it just gives them something

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Kim Cerise: to do with their hands and their body and their mind. In addition to it, it lowers their sense of uncomfortability and why am I in here in this one-on-one session? And then they just talk, you know, and we're able to really get to some bigger issues, some bigger challenges and sometimes even peel back some of the layers of the younger gen of things that they are struggling with that they didn't even quite realize are a heck of a lot easier fix than everything is going wrong. I can't do anything right. You know, just we have a lot of our students are coming from. I think they can be a little bit rooted in negative self-talk. And that is one thing that we focus on a lot. You know, the power of yet being able to flip our internal mindset of why am I always skewing towards the negative. I am a student, I'm growing. I'm not supposed to do things right the first time. Humans often don't. And that is a great thing. You know, just trying to get them. I deal with a lot of kids with perfectionism, and they get so bummed out and so heartbroken that the A didn't come easily. And sometimes I'm like the A's not even that big of a deal. Don't even worry about the grade. And that is really a mind blower for a lot of kids and parents too is it's not about the grade; it's about how do you feel. It is about your effort, it is about the response, it is about the growth. It is about so many other things other than that. That Grade that you're stuck on.

Erica: So I love that it's not about the grade, it's about the growth. And, you know, I can even remember when I was a child, and I was. I was struggling in school, and I was at a private girls school in just outside of Cleveland, Hathaway Brown. And they. I was struggling so much with the grades that they decided that they weren't going to grade me anymore and that I would only be graded on effort. And so then I started getting good grades. And it just completely changed me because I was getting the grades that I wanted, but I was being graded on the effort. So I was able to grow, whereas I wasn't able to grow. I had this kind of sense of learned helplessness and shame. And maybe I'm a dummy or I'm not good enough. And as soon as they were just grading me against myself, then it got me back into that growth spurt, which we want all of our kids to be in. And it's very, very common for kids that don't learn in traditional ways to fall into a sense of learned helplessness, meaning that they feel like there's nothing that they can do that's going to help them succeed. So they kind of give up.

Kim Cerise: Yeah.

Erica: And they fall into that kind of victim mentality of I can't.

Kim Cerise: Yeah. And that's why I'm such a proponent of beginning executive function training in the elementary school, because it is proactive. You are not going to get middle school kids coming into your office or into your practice with the, I don't know what to do. I can't do anything. I'm not good enough. If you are building in that flexible thinking, that inhibitory control, that metacognitive piece. I know what I'm doing. I'm thinking about what I'm doing. I'm an active participant. If children are built with those skills in mind, created with those skills in mind, you have a much stronger 11, 12, 13-year-old that understands that sometimes we fail, and failure is a part of learning.

Erica: Yeah. And why we don't bring that in, I think. I think another thing that's really important to me is that everybody should always be allowed to learn from their mistakes. So I think one of the biggest potholes that we've fallen into in education is we give back the grades and then we move on to the next unit. And those that didn't do well, they don't have the opportunity to learn from their mistakes. And they're the ones that need to learn from their mistakes the most. Somehow, they're just kind of given this grade now. If everybody knew that they could improve their grade, I mean, why wouldn't we, don't we want people to learn? Do we want them to stay stuck in their, in their poor grade? And then we wonder why they, they continue to do poorly. It's kind of interesting, but occasionally I'll see teachers that will allow students to get partial credit.

Kim Cerise: We have this policy in our 7th through 12th grade segment of our school where all students are able to improve their grade. No test has ever taken a one and done. If a child scores below a 90%,

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Kim Cerise: 90%, they have the ability to improve their grade. If they score below a 70%, they must take it again. And this is also, and it's not the entire test, it's just the section that you struggled with or the pieces that you had a hard time with. It's also the same for projects, it's the same for presentations, it's the same for papers. So we do not believe in a one and done system in our school. And this was a shift that we made when we, we are in a five-year transition to standards-based grading and we're removing the A, B, C, D and F and the, the 0 to 100 system because 50% of that system is rooted in failure.

Erica: Yeah.

Kim Cerise: And that is absolutely not equitable.

Erica: It's not equitable, it's not motivating. But no system. I, I love that, I love that system because it is motivating, because it's motivating to those students that don't want to do the work because they know that they're going to have to do it anyway. So they're more likely to put their best foot forward the first time. And then that truly thought they knew it and didn't know it and had a bad day or have anxiety.

Kim Cerise: Yep.

Erica: Then it really relieves that intensity of pressure and competition.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely it does. And you know, our students do understand because it's preached consistently, you are only in competition with yourself. You know, this is your greatest growth standard is you, Are you a little bit better than yesterday? Did you improve a little bit better than the time before that? Everything we're doing, we are trying to build lifelong learners. So in doing that you also have to be able to help students build it, build in that self-motivation, you know. And I think as students get older, this is one of the things that continues to pop up. But yeah, I love executive function for elementary because it's proactive. When I start working with students in the middle and high school, it's often a reactive approach. Right. Because everybody's coming in with, I can't do this, or teachers are saying there's a deficit. And that's one thing that I've really tried to change at my school and through my practice and the success center at the school that I work with is that I want to shift that reactive approach to a skill-based deficit. Why are we not working to shift the mindsets of students, parents, teachers away from deficit to these are the things that my student is really good at, and let's maximize those. And then we can tweak the things with some true strategies for the parts that they have a hard time with.

Erica: Right. Or we can even figure out, wait a minute, maybe we're not matching their processing profile.

Kim Cerise: Yep.

Erica: And perhaps they're in a class with a teacher that lectures a lot and they're not an auditory processor. So by learning what our students processing profiles are, it's really quite remarkable.

Kim Cerise: It absolutely is. I think it's very important. Adjustment to be made in the classroom is to think about how each of the children in each individual processes information. And it's a heck of a lot more than just the visual, kinesthetic and auditory. You know, I work with students all the time that are like, this is how the teacher presents information. And my first question to them is, so how do you feel about that? Do you feel comfortable with the presentation of information? Do we need to make an adjustment in how you're receiving that information because that's something you can do? Or do we need to have a greater discussion with maybe sitting down with your teacher and saying, is there a place where you can find common ground? Because this is how the student processes, but this is how you are presenting the information. Can we work together? And I think that is also another piece that's very important too is that students need to learn to be self-advocating. And they also need to be comfortable in saying, this is who I am, this is how I learn, and this is what I need to find success. And they need to be comfortable with walking into a classroom and saying that to their teachers or to their bosses or to their colleagues, you know, because it goes all the way up the ladder.

Erica: Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. Self-advocacy is extremely important. And I, I gather that's something that you guys teach at your school too. Now I know that. I know people are going to be listening and saying, oh my gosh, I want to send my child to that school. Is this just a single school or is it, is it also available in other states?

Kim Cerise: We are A K through 12 independent school. We are

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Kim Cerise: part of the Kentucky association of Independent Schools, but we have our own approach, our own curriculum. And yeah, I think we are just a school that we are a college prep school. We are rooted in advanced placement in our high school, but we also are a whole child approach. We accept children as who they are and how they process and how they learn. And we know everybody needs something a little bit different. And I think that we can do that with highly trained teachers and also small classrooms and also the ability to have services in house that can support things with executive function. And, you know, our teachers model skills. And I think that's a really important thing. In the middle school, I have a couple teachers that have adhd. I have a teacher that also, you know, talks about their ADHD and talks about some of the things that they need in a classroom or how they have worked through challenges in their own life. And I think that's a really important thing for middle and high school students to hear is how do the adults in your life get things done? You know, do they write lists? Do they use reminders? Do they use the inner voice? Are they visualizers? Is it a combination? What is the toolbox that they've created for themselves that can be really transforming for middle and high school students when they see people that they have relationships with and trust? And those relationships are paramount for all schools. But it's something that we really put at the forefront at our school at Walden. But you know, kiddos want to say so, Ms. Cerise, how do you get through this problem when you run up against it? Well, I use my inner voice. I'm a talker. I talk all out all my ideas. And I also love lists. I believe in the power of the post it note. I like to write things down. I'm not always somebody that relies on technology, but then there's other times where it becomes really useful. So let's talk about your challenge. I'll show you what I do, and then we can find a happy medium based on how you learn and how you process information. So I think teachers talking about their executive functioning struggles, their processing styles, their workarounds, can also be really supportive for kids.

Erica: Yeah, it can be absolutely amazing. For sure. So. So, Kim, let's talk a little bit about motivation in middle school and high school. What are your thoughts about that?

Kim Cerise: Mm, it's the prominent conversation, I think a lot of times with my high schoolers. Middle school too, but definitely high school and college. High school is stressful. There are a Lot of different changes and opportunities. Social is huge. They want to be in all the clubs. But then there's the assignment. I don't like this book. Or I'm really not into math. Or. Or, you know, science isn't my thing. I don't have that relationship with the teacher. I don't like this assignment. Okay, so we have to talk about motivation. How do we allow students to be themselves, but also to find that intrinsic motivation that I think so many of us have. But we have to learn to unwrap, right?

Erica: Yeah.

Kim Cerise: And a lot of it is the schoolwork is not reflective to that student's interest. That's so much of it. But there's also part of life that is not always going to be attached to your interest, but you still have to do it.

Erica: Yeah. Yeah.

Kim Cerise: So how do you do the thing that. That doesn't make you super excited? How do you do the thing that you're really not interested in, but, you know, there's a deadline and.

Erica: And then there. If we flip it, you know, there's the motivation piece, which is there are those students that get addicted to the last minute that they're not motivated to do things until it's much, much later. And it's that last moment, that last minute that really gets them. It gives them that kind of dopamine burst. But. But it really becomes an addiction. And I have to admit that I find them the hardest kids to remediate, and it's best to catch it as early as possible.

Kim Cerise: I would agree. Some students that are already in that routine for themselves, it is. It's. It's almost an addictive quality; I have to be honest.

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Kim Cerise: It absolutely is. They are. They love the rush. And I've had kids tell me that that when they spread things out, it's not as exciting for them to do a little bit over time because they are so rooted in the rush that comes along with that. Oh, my God, I'm going to be late. Oh, I'm going to get a failing grade. Oh, this is not going to be good enough. There's still that dopamine, that endorphin rush that they get from that piece.

Erica: Yeah. That is truly a motivation issue.

Kim Cerise: That it is.

Erica: And also sometimes it's. It's. It's the panic. It's the panic that's motivating so. Well, and it's interesting because there's a fine line because a little bit of stress is motivating. Too much stress is debilitating. So they're often these last-minute people who are toggling, toggling between being motivated and being in panic, and. Which is not good. And so they often don't sleep the night before. And perhaps the whole family doesn't sleep the night before because there can be meltdowns. But then they always bring it back to that place because they're really not motivated. That's where the addiction kicks in. I can't. I can't do it. I can't. And they feel that they can't because of that sense of motivation.

Kim Cerise: So what we do or what I work with students when I know a kid is struggling with their motivation is I really work with time, Tiny little bits of time.

Erica: Yes.

Kim Cerise: And we're making the steps smaller. We break things down into steps and. And we work with sometimes five minutes. Can I do it for five minutes? I don't want to, but can you do this for five minutes? Yes. Okay. After the five, do you need a break, or can you go on for five more? I can go on for five more. Awesome. Now we're up to 10. Then we, you know, we ask again, do you need another break? Nope, I'm good. And so we kind of start with these things, and then we talk about the feeling. How do you feel now knowing that you have been able to check this piece off of your to do list? This section of the project is now done. Do you feel calmer, more in control, less anxious? If we have all these yeses, let's learn to harness this feeling and how you can sit in it. And you feel a sense of accomplishment and you feel a sense of calm. You're not walking around with your heart beating way up here. Which one do you like better? And it is kind of. You got to let them sit in it. Do you really like this anxiousness a little bit more and all the stuff that comes along with it, or can you find a place of calm in that calm? Does that make you feel better? Does it make you feel more accomplished? Does it make you feel like you're on top of your game? That is also a dopamine boost. Take that one as opposed to the one that is crippling and is struggling for you to move forward.

Erica: Right. And then. And then, alternatively, you can also work with teachers where the teachers can create more deadlines.

Kim Cerise: Yes.

Erica: And we have to be, particularly with this population, we have to be really, really careful about not allowing them to always do the assignment late. Sometimes I see that with this population of learners that the teachers are always saying, well, okay, I'll give you One more day. Oh, I'll give you one more day. Oh, I'll give you one more day. And then eventually it all kind of falls apart and so creating kind of micro deadlines and it's not a bad thing to do for the whole course. Again, remember that executive functioning skills aren't fully developed until your mid-20s, so we can't expect them to be the functioning executives that many teachers expect them to be. And to break down all assignments into these micro goals is a great way to prevent that addiction.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely. I had just read, and I can't remember the name of the study, but they just came out and said, you know, childhood ends at 30, 30. And I think that that is so absolutely true, especially with this particular age that we're working with that is already walking in with an executive functioning delay. We know that executive skills are not built until maybe 25, 26. And then if you add neurodiversity on top of that, let's add a little bit more. And then we

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Kim Cerise: also just have a different brain in this generation of children walking around. It's different children that are digital natives. Consistently, they have a different makeup than their older counterparts do. Yep. So that, I think, is a tricky piece.

Erica: So, yeah, motivation is big for high school, but it's also big for college too. So why don't we use this as a little segue into talking about coaching college students? I have to say I think that's my favorite population to work with. They're really, really fun. They're. They usually come voluntarily and they're excited about implementing strategies. So I find them to be very, very coachable for the most part. What are your thoughts on that?

Kim Cerise: I would agree with that. I find that most of my college-based population, they are really bright kids, they've worked super hard, but the piece that they struggle with is there is no longer the adult oversight in their life. So now they're on a college campus and they don't have a parent or guardian saying, don't forget that you have a test. Don't forget that you have a deadline. Don't forget you have class, and you have to go. And so that's really, that's kind of the big piece that I end up getting from a lot of my college students. That, and how do I study for a cumulative exam that, you know, there's only one or two tests in, in this entire course, Kim. And I'm like, yeah, it's okay. Let, let's talk about spaced repetition. Let's talk about all kinds of different Study skills to be able to support yourself. But yeah, I think that college students come in ready for a different level of skill. They want the more advanced executive function skill. But I've also had college students that struggle with their motivation too, because I think college maybe was the expectation, but maybe not always the choice at that particular time of that person's life. So they are still struggling with the maintenance of motivation. Some of them are struggling with. I don't get as many accommodations that I did in high school in a college setting, how can I make up for the difference or the loss? And then the other piece is the loss of the adult oversight of just the continual reminder. And now it's, now it's them.

Erica: Yeah, I think one of the big things I see is they're moving into a different way of teachers showing them the assignments that they expect. So in high school, the teachers typically week by week give assignments. I wish they didn't. Whereas in college they get this kind of semester long syllabi, and they have to manage it themselves. And so teaching students how to take all that information at the very beginning of the term and dally it all out in a way that's manageable because these teachers don't communicate with each other. You can technically have an enormous number of deadlines all landing at the same time and you have to be able to navigate around that, which means that you may have to start some things early and you may have to ask for an extension. Most college teachers will do that. If you're able to, you know, express and advocate for yourself. If you've got a lot of assignments due at the same time, but it's really about navigating that. And then I absolutely love, I'm, I'm a bit of a tech head. Darius and I both are just entranced with technology and, and I really believe that a lot of the technology tools are actually, I think it was our very last podcast that really take the dis out of disability. And some of the technology tools are creating new disabilities because you have to be very good at reasoning and conducting to be able to manage a lot of, in particular the AI tools. You have to be a good conductor. And if you're not good at that, then that's going to be another type of disability. But yeah, I'm a huge fan of so many things and I think, as people know, I. If you've listened to this podcast before, I'm a huge fan of Shovel, which was created by a Harvard grad who struggled with that very thing and couldn't find a tech tool that really enabled them to

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Erica: do everything in one place and created Shovel for that purpose. So I'm a big fan of that, and I have a discount that people can get, and I will put that in the show Notes.

Kim Cerise: Yeah, that's a wonderful application. And I love through the Shovel app. I had a meeting with him. I love that the application helps students find their free time. And one of the things that he also suggests is you schedule that right in. And that is one. One piece that I talk to my students about, too. You know, schedule in your free time. Give yourself rewards. You deserve it. You've put the work in. Do not forget about yourself, because if you are not feeling comfortable, you are not going to be able to move forward with all of the expectations that your life has for you. You know, so build this stuff in. There is always enough time. You just have to be able to give up that time and say, this is what I want to designate this time toward. I have some really, really highly motivated and very busy people on my client list, but they do understand now. There is always enough time.

Erica: And one of the nice things about Shovel, too, is that it has some AI features woven in so that if you have not scheduled enough time, it will let you know. You kind of go into this red zone, which I really, really appreciate, because there are those students that really, truly have a hard time making sense of time.

Kim Cerise: Yes.

Erica: So they're just really not good at time management, and that in itself can be a disability. But Shovel really helps you. And I also like the fact that it really enables you just to drag everything in. You can drag an assignment in, you can drag a class in. You can even allocate travel time. But he really has thought of everything, and. And his name is Petter and lovely guy, and he's very open to suggestions. So if you find something that you wish Shovel would do, he's pretty open to making those changes. And also there are the colleges that offer something similar to high schools, which is sometimes they use these tech tools that enable you to see all of your classes. There's one called Canvas where you can see all of your class assignments. But what Shovel does is it actually integrates with a lot of those. It integrates with Google Classroom. There's a whole list of them, and they're always integrating more and more. So if you don't want to have to put in your syllabis, in some cases, you don't have to, which is really amazing. And then if a teacher change changes the expectations of an assignment or the time that it's due, then it actually automatically gets changed and shoveled. So it's a pretty, pretty extraordinary program.

Kim Cerise: I want to step back to a piece that you had mentioned earlier about the big shift between high school and college and really is with that syllabi and getting the entirety of reading assignments, projects, test, we've actually structured in our school that we are doing that now for juniors and seniors, for teachers that are teaching those classes in a way to even more directly help our students in managing time and minimizing procrastination, to show them. This is. You do have control here. You can start your reading early. You can work on an assignment. For example, writing is experiential and everything that you write, it's never really ended. But you can always go back and make additions. You can always go back and improve. And we let our students throughout the course of the year, as long as we're still within the same grading period, they can go back in and improve papers. They can go back and say, hey, I only got a two on that presentation. Our standard is a three. I'd really like to do that presentation again so that I can attempt to be able to increase. But this piece with the syllabi of giving them the entirety of the semester up front so that they can start to better manage their time. That is definitely one thing that we want to do to be able to support our high school going into college, because that's a huge adjustment for them.

Erica: It is. It's really important that we start to bridge that gap. And if there are any school administrators listening to this, I really want to encourage you to start to build that into junior and senior year because it is vital. And also what

00:40:00

Erica: what I'm also noticing in a lot of high schools is there are kids that want to get ahead. They may have an event coming up. They may be going on a vacation a little bit early. They may have a family disaster. There's things. Life happens. Right. And sometimes we. We need to get things done in advance. And that is a wonderful executive functioning skill. But when the kids only get the assignments a day or two beforehand, we can't even teach them spaced repetition.

Kim Cerise: Yeah. Or a study guide two days before your exam. That does not work. I teach my college kids and also my high school kids. How do we keep running study guides based on the curriculums that we're learning so that you can actually be ahead of the teacher if you struggle with working memory? Previewing is a beautiful strategy to use always because you know you're not walking in and hearing things for the first time. You've already looked at the headlines of that chapter. You understand the vocabulary you've read, you know, maybe the captions of the photographs and the graphs and all of that sort of stuff. So, you know, your brain is checking into that info now for a second time. And then, you know, so that helps to build the understanding. Yeah, being able to work at a different sort of pace beyond maybe the teacher's pacing is a really useful skill for upper high school and college level students.

Erica: Yeah, I love the pre-processing, which you were just talking about, but also there's the post processing. I'd love to teach my students, certain students, depending on how they process, how to use NoteBookLM, because there are times where the teacher might be presenting it in a way that doesn't really work for them. And they can take that information and they can create a podcast based on the class information, but they can focus the podcast on however they want. So they might say, my teacher taught it in this way, and it didn't work for me. I love metaphors. So I want you to generate a podcast on this content with my teacher's notes and even, maybe even a YouTube video that the teacher had recommended. You can't upload PowerPoint slides, but you can save those as PDFs and then upload it. So then you, it's, it's really got the teacher's content, but it enables them to reprocess it. So they might say, yeah, I love metaphors, love metaphors. Just teach me the whole thing through metaphors. But you can even interrupt the podcasters and say, I still don't get it. Just tell it to me like I'm a third grader. And then they, then they'll shift, and they'll pivot, and they enable you, particularly for those that are the interactive processors. I mean, how often do you get to interact by yourself? Well, now you can, you can interact with the content however you want by talking with the podcasters. And they will have discussions with you when you ask them to test you, which you can, what they'll do is they'll give you the question and then the answer, but you can interrupt right in between the question and the answer and answer it yourself. And then they'll, they will actually give you feedback on your answer. So it's really quite remarkable what you can do with some of these AI services. So sometimes I'm just teaching my students. Okay, so your teacher doesn't teach the way you learn. Here. We can reprocess it in NoteBookLM. Here you can see a mind map. Here you can see a timeline. Here you can discuss it with a couple podcasters that are really experts. You're, that are very much focused on what your teacher said so that they tend to stay very much in line with the information that you gave them. Unlike many other AI tools that will kind of give you everybody's perspective. So that's pretty cool.

Kim Cerise: Yeah, AI is, I will say, I know you're a tech head. I'm kind of, I'm a little bit more analogous. I'm very respectful of it and I have a think; I think a respectful fear of what it can do. But I also use elements of AI with some of my older students too, especially around note taking. For example, I have a lot of students that are saying I really struggle in any situation to sit down and take notes while someone else is talking to me. And so they may have as an accommodation on their support system or on their support plan to say, you know, they need guided notes, or they need a note buddy. But another piece that I've, you know, taught them is said, hey, we can go into AI, tell them that you are a first-year college student. This is a biology class.

00:45:00

Kim Cerise: Let's write in your textbook if you know what that is. Tell them what unit you're on and what you're learning, and you need guided notes for this section, and it will give you guided notes. Then you can go in, listen more and write less. And all you're having to do is just fill in outside information that is not being generated in this skeleton of class-based notes for you. But the majority of the information that you need is absolutely there. It allows you to focus more and write less. I don't want, I think it's a struggle if you just take away the issue. I don't want to take it away. We still have to manage the fact that this, our brain may work a little bit differently here. And, and let's create a strategy and a workaround. Not to always remind a student that this is a problem that they struggle with, but I think giving them the tools to say it still asks them to be actively participatory is what I'm saying.

Erica: Right, right. And, and of course there's the, the tool that Darius has released called ivvi ivvi.app and it does listens to the lecture, records the whole lecture, and then does a mind map. So for a lot of students that actually do better by listening and not taking notes because the notes actually become a Distraction from listening. And their best way of processing is to listen. Then Ivy can get the transcript, do the mind map. But you can interact with the mind map. There are little things where you can double click to highlight. You can. And we're integrating, I'm helping also with the, with the project. Integrating all sorts of cool little tips and tricks so that you're not a passive learner, that you are actively, but you're more conducting again versus having to do the fine motor. Because we do have those kids that have things like dysgraphia, or it just doesn't help. It just, it just becomes a, a barrier. You know, I have a student, for example, right now that I'm working with and his best way of learning is auditory. But he's struggling in school because he has to take note. They force him to take notes. And tactile is one of his worst ways of processing. And what ends up happening is he says, yeah, I take notes and I. And it gets in the way of me listening. So I've had to advocate and write a report indicating that it's better for him not to take notes, that we should explore that and see what are some other ways for him to, to gather the notes. And what I like, which is what you were suggesting too, I believe is taking light notes like annotating. So I love it when teachers offer the slides in advance and then the students can annotate in the margins. That to me is amazing because then what you're doing is you're recording your processing of the information. And it's when we're processing the information and making the connection where learning really gets fully integrated into the brain and into long term memory.

Kim Cerise: Yeah, that's exactly what I'm suggesting is. But sometimes teachers forget to print out the slides or they run out of time, and they don't have the notes in advance because they're talking extemporaneously because they're professionals at this material life gets in the way for teachers too. It also gives students a way out and a moving forward. And I think that's always the thing. You can always have a challenge. But are you resourceful enough to be able to move yourself forward? And I think that is where some of the technology can come in and really support our students. So you didn't get the guidance notes from your teacher, but AI can certainly help you and give you the guided notes and then you can go in and annotate and how are you connecting with this material? Maybe it's. I totally don't even understand this entire section; I need some remediation. I need some one-on-one time to be able to talk with the teacher about it. You know, I need this presented to me in a completely different way. But you will know through your listening skills and also through some basic annotation, nothing that needs to be a big deal where, where those gaps in your learning are. And I think that we've also built in at our school. We have before school even starts. So from 8 to 8:40 in the morning for our 7th through 12th grade division, we have a common work period, or CWP is what they call it, that all teachers and all students are available for one on one and small group remediation. Or you

00:50:00

Kim Cerise: know, I have to retake this test, or you know, I'm going to give a presentation again. But it allows students that ability. So to be able to go back in to say, I need more help. I need something different than what you gave us in class.

Erica: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So why don't we segue? Let's segue into adults. Oh, adults are so much fun.

Kim Cerise: They are so much fun. I was trepidatious about opening up the practice to adults and it's been really awesome. I think I found a new love of my peers beyond just working with teenagers. So I really love working with adults.

Erica: Yeah, it's really fun and it's different because it's not academic. It can be if they're going back for some training. But I find that it's really more about accommodating life, how to move through life in a more organized way to just tweak ways of being able to even in the workplace, in their relationships with their family members. What are you seeing?

Kim Cerise: I see a lot of all of the above. I have some Gen Xers, which I am with late-stage diagnosis, you know, getting diagnosed with the ADHD or dyslexia in their 40s, ADHD in their 50s. And so they're coming and saying, I've always had these challenges but I've always kind of worked through and there's to be a better way. I also have some adults that are entering now. They've had advanced education and now they're entering into life and realizing that they appreciated the structure of academia and now they have to manage life now that academia is over. So that's been a nice transition and one that is certainly interesting, that is where my adult clientele is coming from is late-stage diagnosis or I am moving into this new stage in my life where my time in a college is over. And so is a lot of that structure. And now I have to manage it all on my own.

Erica: That's right. It's helping them to create the structure that they need to succeed and where, where are the areas? So I'll often start a session saying is what's been tripping you up lately? What's been getting in your way? What's making you uncomfortable? And then it's just a matter of brainstorming strategies on, on dealing with those. I also really enjoy working with the elderly. That's very interesting. Cause it's really the other side of the corner coin. You know, they're. It's almost like working with the Littles again because they're losing some of their executive functioning skills. But I really am a firm believer that if you exercise, just like if you exercise your body, you exercise your brain, if you exercise your executive functioning skills, it helps to keep them intact.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely.

Erica: It just adds the lubrication, shall we say, just to keep everything fresh. Not too dried out as a metaphor. But it can be really fun to work with the elderly, and they tend to be very open. They have the time for the most part and really appreciate that kind of support.

Kim Cerise: I.

Erica: It's a, it's a whole other life. But it would be absolutely wonderful to do executive functioning games and activities with the elderly in these old folks homes.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely. I think some of your games could even be transferred pretty easily. You know, I think you know the memory game. Right. Is one of the first kind of EF style building games from years from our childhood. That also is really from their childhood. That is an executive function building game. And one of the things I think in terms of that we lose first is our working memory, you know, that that starts to minimize itself.

Erica: Yeah.

Kim Cerise: And some of that flexible thinking.

Erica: I appreciate you saying the memory game because the memory game's a really interesting one. That's the one where we put. We had pairs and we flipped the cards over and then we had to remember. You flip over two cards and see if you remember the pairs. And what's fun about that one specifically for. For memory is that it's really strengthening a couple of our tools within our working memory. One is just purely your remembrance of that image and then the other one is the spatial piece.

00:55:00

Erica: So spatialization. There are really three tools within working memory. There's spatialization, there's visualization and then there's the inner voice. But you could really use all three of those tools because this is a thing. When you get older you might stop using one or two of those tools. And so that's part of the reason why you might not be doing as well as you were. And if you can reintroduce those tools and exercise using those tools, it's a very simple, yet profoundly good game, kind of for us to play throughout life just to keep those. Those skills sharp.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely. Simon is another one. I have a couple different Simons. It's auditory, it's visual, it's tactile, it requires working memory, sequential. It's pattern based for my musical learners, you know, so that is another game that, you know, we kind of all. I always just have on deck. Yeah. I think there's so many uses to continue the idea of using games, especially into adulthood and also as people continue to age, I think being able to help keep the aspects of working memory as sharp as possible. When you said a lot of people lose one, the one that I see with my clients that they lose quickness is visualization. They forget to visualize. And so when I bring up visualization, which I learned so much through your course, because it is really rooted in the importance of using visualization. I have always been an internal voice person myself. I talk a lot to myself, but I don't visualize the same amount. And I am a lot more as an individual going through your course. And I'm using that piece for so many of my students, but especially with my adults, because it's just something they don't do any longer. You know, I think visualization is totally attached to a reading strategy rather than a life strategy.

Erica: It's interesting you say that. I think that's. That's true for some people. And then there's some people that don't visualize at all when they read. I'll never forget this one elderly woman who watched me work with her grandma grandson, and I was talking about visualization and reading and. And I think I've told this story before in one of the podcasts, but she was listening very intently. And two weeks later she. She sent me an email and said, I heard what you were saying to visualize. She said, I can visualize, and I can read, but I never thought of pairing the two. Wow. She was in her 70s, never thought of pairing the tool to. And then she said, and I read a book, and I visualized. She said, it was wonderful. It was absolutely wonderful. I never thought of doing that. But that's what's so incredible about doing executive functioning training with individuals, because you never know when you're going to hit that sweet spot where someone Says, I never thought about pairing those two things together. I can do that, and I can do that, but I never made that connection. And that happens all the time in executive functioning coaching and coach. Things that you think are obvious because they might not be obvious to that person.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely. That made me stop just a second because it made me think what an incredible gift for her to receive of pairing these two. But there's so much that you lost out on by not knowing to pair these two skills together throughout the entirety of your life. So I'm glad that you were able to give her that skill. Now, whenever you get it, whenever you learn the information, it's fascinating.

Erica: But that's the beauty of executive functioning coaching is just that these moments where people are like, oh, my goodness. Or wow. Or holy Toledo, how did I never do that before? Yeah. I've got a funny story of I have this half-moon window above my. Above my desk. And sometimes the sun's coming up and the light's right in my face. And for years, I just struggled with trying to figure out how to block the light during that particular time of year. And I have a screen right above my desk that just pulls down that I could have been using this whole time. I just. And it took me like three years before I was like, oh, my God, how did I not see that? That is the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen in my life. You know, I've been struggling with something, with the answer was right there all along. So don't hesitate, don't hesitate to get help with these things because the answers do lie within you,

01:00:00

Erica: and sometimes they're right there. And you just need that other person just to give you that little nudge. And you're like, wow, sometimes it's a lot easier than you think.

Kim Cerise: Absolutely. In a different life, when I was a reporter and a radio engineer, I had an engineering director that said to me, if something doesn't work the first time, don't freak out, go check and make sure it's plugged in.

Erica: Right.

Kim Cerise: And so I remember that. And I think that that that reminder can be used in many, many times in our life. If it does not appear immediately, take a beat, take a breath, and just go see if it's plugged in. Give yourself that opportunity to just make sure that the foundation is set.

Erica: Yeah.

Kim Cerise: And then you can move forward, you know, But I think that just checking, checking the foundation. Do you have power?

Erica: And look. I love that too, even as a metaphor. Right. Are you plugged in? There you go.

Kim Cerise: I mean, are you an active participant. This is why I'm so. I love the metacognitive piece of it so much is like for teenagers, for college kids, for young children. They feel as if somebody else is always making their decisions for them. And I want to give them the power and the control to say, no, you have this. You have a choice. You can be an active participant. If you just let everything happen to you, your anxiety is higher, your stress is greater, and you're going to struggle more to move forward. If you can give yourself back saying, you know, hey, I am active, I know what's going on, I can see what's around me, I have some element of situational awareness and I even, even if the plan is fuzzy, you can still be able to move forward if you are present, as opposed to just having everything happen at you. You know, do you have choice? Don't lose your choice. Don't lose the opportunities that are sitting in front of you. We can always tweak, we can always do it again, but you must be present.

Erica: Absolutely. I think that's a perfect place to stop the podcast, and I really appreciate this and I'm looking forward to having you join me on another discussion in the near future.

Kim Cerise: Oh, I would love to. Thank you so much. It's been a wonderful way to talk about executive functioning and to be able to introduce it to so many different people. I think, you know, it's a new, newish direction, I think, in education and in the therapeutic realm, but one that I think is incredibly important.

Erica: Well, thanks again, Kim, and until next time. Bye for now.

Darius: Sponsored by ivvi. Imagine turning your meeting's audio into a live mind map instantly so you remember what matters. It's ideal for students and managers with dyslexia or adhd. Try ivvi for free now at ivvi App. That's ivvi.App sponsored by the Executive.

Erica: Functioning Coaching Assessment, a quick online assessment that uncovers challenges and develops personalized strategies for success.

Darius: Thank you for joining us at the Executive Function Brain Trainer podcast.

Erica: Check out our show notes for links and resources, and follow us on social media.

Kim Cerise: It.

01:03:38

Episode 89: What is it like to be an Executive Functioning Coach?

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