Strategies to Develop Executive
Control Skills in LanguageImpaired Children
Kerry Howland, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Boston University
Department of Speech, Language and
Hearing Sciences
Plan for the Session
• What are Executive Control Processes (ECP)
– and why are they important to an SLP?
• Identification of children with ECP deficits
• How can we help to improve ECP skills in our
clients?
Welsh and Pennington (1988)
Definition of Executive Control
The ability to maintain an
appropriate problem solving set
for attainment of a future goal.
Executive Control Processes
• Managing attentional focus
• Engaging in goal directed behavior
• Employing strategies
• Inhibiting irrelevant/inappropriate responses
• Planning
• Prioritizing
• Reflecting on the learning process
• Taking another’s perspective
• Coordinating information in working memory
When are EC Processes Needed?
• Diamond (2006): When “going on
automatic” would lead one astray.
• When a new skill is being learned; until
that skill becomes automatized.
• To complete tasks that demand integration
and coordination of multiple skills.
IMPACT OF EXECUTIVE
CONTROL DEFICITS
• EC skills predict academic success more effectively than
tests of academic achievement or cognitive ability.
• Children with poor EC skills are at high risk for dropping
out of school.
• Children with poor EC skills are also at high risk for
social/behavioral problems.
• EC skills are essential to the development of theory of
mind abilities.
Executive Control
• Generally associated with frontal systems,
specifically the pre-frontal cortex
• Pietrus (2005): Networks almost always have
an “office” in the pre-frontal cortex.
• EC skills are employed until a skill becomes
automatized.
• Children with poor automatization abilities
compensate with frontal systems
Development of
Executive Control Skills
• The pre-frontal cortex is one of the last areas of
the brain to fully develop.
• There is a rapid increase in myelination of the
PFC during adolescence
• This development continues through the early
20’s and perhaps even beyond.
Executive Control and
Older Students
• As educators, we have increasingly and
appropriately focused on development of EC
skills in middle school and high school
• But... executive control skills don’t suddenly
emerge in adolescence. The foundation is laid in
early childhood and builds throughout the school
years.
• We can’t afford to wait until middle school to
work on executive control.
Environmental Influences
• Development of executive control is driven
not just by maturation, but also by
EXPERIENCE
• Given the right experiences, children can
improve executive control skills
• Children who live in urban areas are at
high risk for problems in executive control.
So...
• We need a developmentally appropriate
curriculum to directly teach executive
control skills from the start of school.
• Rather than problem behaviors that need
to be managed, we need to think of
executive control processes as skills to be
developed
What does this have to do with
speech and language?
• Executive control processes are intricately linked to
language development.
• In order to use language effectively in the classroom, we
continually need to integrate and coordinate multiple
linguistic abilities.
• Language is a primary tool for self-regulation, so the
child with language deficits may, as a result, experience
problems with executive control.
• We can’t escape the impact of EC processes in our
therapy sessions! They help us or they hurt us!
Core Executive Control Skills
• Working Memory
• Inhibition
• Planning
• Cognitive Flexibility
• Self Regulation
Baddeley’s Adapated Model
(2000)
Central Executive
Visuospatial
Sketchpad
Phonological
Loop
Episodic Buffer
Inhibition
• The ability to stop a “pre-potent” response from
occurring.
• Often measured by Go/No Go Tasks
• A fundamental ability that is key to
– Regulating attention
– Social adaptation
– Effective learning
• Inhibition is HARD WORK
Planning
• Planning skills become increasingly
important throughout elementary, middle
and high school (and beyond).
• Planning relies heavily on the interaction
between working memory and inhibition.
Cognitive Flexibility
• The ability to change or adapt plans as
circumstances demand.
• The ability to shift sets
• Requires recognition of the need for change
• Requires the ability to inhibit the original action
in favor of a new response
Self Regulation
• Intentional use of metacognitive strategies to manage
EC processes, including management of emotions
• Verbal mediation (self-talk) is a primary strategy for self
regulation.
• For this reason, many of our language impaired children
have trouble in this area.
ECP in Infancy:
• By 8-12 months of age, the foundation skills are being
set:
• Working Memory:
– Establishment of Object Permanence
• Inhibition:
– Understands and responds to “no”
– Detour Reaching – not yet established
– Repeatedly searches for displaced object in the same
location even when sees it move.
• Planning:
– Emergence of intentional action to gain a result or resolve
a problem  Still Face Experiment
• Self-Regulation
– Management of Arousal Level
– Ability to Attain a State of Calm-Alert
ECP and the Toddler:
Foundation Skill: Regulation of Emotions
• Working Memory
– Able to hold relationships in mind– phrases emerges
– More sophisticated levels of object permanence
• Inhibition:
– Not distracted as easily from goal.
– Remembers rules for NO.
– Inhibition is reliant on adult mediation.
• Planning
– Creates multi-step sequences to attain goal: (collects
stool, climbs on it to attain out-of-reach cookie jar)
• Emotional Self-Regulation
– Tantrums emerge – a good sign!
– Frustration with handling requirements of inhibition
– The time to really begin to teach self-regulation!!
ECP and the Pre-Schooler:
Foundation Skill: Inhibition
• Working Memory
– Children are thinking in the past and future now.
– Can maintain focus and interest for plot-driven
stories
– Recount own experiences in small sequences
• Inhibition
– Key transition from 3 years old to 4 years old.
– Three year olds understand go/ no-go but cannot
abide by the rules.
• Marshmallow Experiment
Inhibition and Theory of Mind
• 3 year old have trouble with TOM tasks
but 4 year olds are successful.
• Classic Tasks
– False Belief:
– False Location:
– Strategic Deception
Theory of Mind Tasks
• Certainly TOM requires an understanding
of perspective – BUT what else is
involved:
• Requires a high degree of working
memory
• Requires inhibition of the pre-potent
response (the child’s own knowledge)
Planning in the Pre-School Years
• Symbolic Play is the Best Vehicle for Assessing and
Observing Planning in the Pre-Schooler
• Changes in Level of Sequence Carried Out
– 2-3 years: short self-limiting single schema
sequences
– 3-4 years: Multi-scheme sequences encompassing
broader time frames - links sequences together.
– 4-6 years: PLANS the sequences out, coordinates
roles, uses language to set the scene
• Remember planning requires inhibition + working
memory
Self-Regulation in Pre-School
Child
• Tantrums subside between 3-4 years (for most
children).
• Increasing ability to abide by the rules
– Regulation of others emerges before regulation of self.
• Increasing ability to play rule governed games–
interest in these games develops and increases
– Predominantly non-strategic play– guesses same spot
over and over in memory until about 5 years old.
– Inflexible about rules– fantasy must abide by real-world
• Most children still have trouble tolerating losing– very
poor sports!
Assessment of the Pre-School Child
• Our tests require cognitive flexibility – is it language or
shifting set that is the issue –PLS for example.
• Play assessment is essential. Look at play sequence,
organization, and persistence.
• Discourse assessment is essential
– Is child stuck in the here and now?
– Can child recount experiences?
– Does the child follow stories with plots?
• Many kids ace the PLS and the CELF-PS, but show
problems in their organization of play and discourse,
even when adults are scaffolding them.
• Don’t brush this off as “immaturity” – a little work now
might mean a lot less work later!!!
ECP in Elementary School
Foundation Skill: Sustained Attention
• Working Memory
– Children become increasingly strategic– they try to
remember
– Working memory is essential to developing
automaticity with early academic skills– reading and
math
• Inhibition
– Increased resistance to distractions
– Children are expected to abide by rules of the
classroom
– Poor inhibition becomes increasingly socially and
academically penalizing
– Social skills and inhibition ability are intricately
intertwined
ECP in Elementary School
• Planning:
– Children regularly carry out multi-step directions
Children independently work in learning centers
Children carry out daily routines for school and home
– Children become increasingly strategic in playing
sports and board games.
– Children can conceptualize long-term planning
(saving money to buy a toy)
• Self-Regulation
– Children are learning to be good sports – still working
on this.
– Children can focus on lessons for extended period of
time.
– Teacher and parents still carry much responsibility for
children getting work done-staying on task
ECP in Middle School and High School
Foundation Skills: Planning, Organization and
Self-Regulated Learning
• Working Memory:
– Demands within lessons expand exponentially
– Significant increase in the amount of new information
in each lesson
– Demands for memorization increase.
– Demands for multi-tasking (note-taking) increase.
• Inhibition
– Children need to self-manage distractions (ipod, IM)
– Planning and inhibition become increasingly
intertwined (choosing how to manage time, inhibiting
desired activity in favor of long term goal).
– Social pressure is very high– children must balance
social and academic priorities
Middle School and High School
• Planning/Organization
– Long range planning continues to develop and
become refined.
– Children are expected to become self-managed in
handling homework and school projects– Study skills
become essential
– Organizational Skills become critical in all aspects of
learning
– Initiation becomes a big factor– kids get stuck in
procrastination
ECP in Middle and High School
• Cognitive Flexibility
– Multiple teachers, classes, learning strategies to
manage
– Study skills include plans for different types of
academic tasks
– Social thinking carries a new level of importance
– Increase in demands for comprehending abstract
reading material
College/Adult Executive Skills
• Long Range Planning
• Time Management
• Strategic Learning
• Integration of information from multiple sources
and perspectives
KEY POINTS
• It is very difficult to divide EC Skills – They
are all intertwined.
• Successful Learners integrate a variety of EC
skills and language skills, and use them
efficiently and effectively to accomplish a
task.
• MANY kids have the component skills, but
cannot INTEGRATE them.
Why We Fail To Identify
Children with ECP Issues
• Many kids with EC problems do well on tests
of discrete language skills– Even discrete EC
tests don’t always identify students with
integration problems
• These are the kids parents refer for testing,
teachers complain about, and we test them
and say they are fine.
• They almost NEVER score below average
on the CELF-4.
Our Oral Language Tests
• Emphasize word and sentence levels
• CELF-4
– 1 subtest targets discourse level, and that one only
has paragraphs of 4-6 sentences
– Does not assess higher level language skills such as
inferences (except a few items on the Understanding
Spoken Paragraphs).
• CASL-TLC-TOPS
– Requires higher level skills, but…
– Tests them mostly at level of sentence or short
paragraph
Our Written Language Tests
• Very few written language tests evaluate discourse level.
•
Those that do, test mostly fictional narrative,
occasionally a procedural sequence.
• Often discourse items are only one of many items in the
test, and many pieces are analyzed.
• Example: TEWL story, narrative only, length over-rides
organization in many cases.
• OWLS only a few items are even discourse length, gives
one big score.
The Solution?
• Qualitative Analyses are Essential
–
–
–
–
Informal Reading Inventories
Pragmatic Inventories
Oral Language Samples
Written Language Samples
• You need not do them all– choose the ones best suited
to your client’s problems
• Without these analyses we cannot rule out language
problems based in executive control.
Discourse Comprehension and
Executive Control
• Open-ended assessment is essential.
• Qualitative Reading Inventory:
– Provides grade level text
– Analysis of re-tell gives lots of information
about organization skills, ability to select
relevant points
– Comprehension Questions (Factual and
Inferential)
Patterns of Performance on
QRI Re-Tells
• Ideal Performance:
– Makes a summary statement regarding all essential
parts of text
– Narrative: Setting, goals, all events, and resolution
represented by a statement.
– Expository: Main ideas represented by a statement.
– Events told sequentially
• The Goldilocks Effect
– Recalls too many details
– Recalls information from only one section of the text
• Misses the Organizational Frame
– Narratives: missing the goals and resolutions
– Expository text: missing the main ideas
Patterns of Performance on
QRI Questions
• Scores at Frustration Level despite average
reading skills on other measures.
• Often misses the inferential questions even
with look-backs
• Over relies on previous knowledge rather
than info presented in the text.
• Perform differently depending on text type
– LI kids tend to do better on narrative tasks
– ASD kids tend to do better on expository tasks
Language Sampling
• Oral Narratives
– Fictional Narrative
– Conversational Narrative: Personal Experience
– Conversational Narrative: Movie or Book Re-Tell
• One technique is to show a video clip and re-tell
that clip
– Expository Narrative: Game Explanation
• Written Narrative
– We collect one timed sample:
• Middle School and High School: Persuasive
Essay
• Elementary School: Descriptive Sample
– We also request samples of work from classroom
Oral Language Characteristics of
Children with ECP Deficits
• Disorganization is the biggest problem
• May have many verbal disruptions, as a result of word-finding
problems
• Goes off on irrelevant tangents
• Explains minor points with excessive detail.
• Overproduction is the biggest problem, but underproduction is
also a concern
Kids with LLD and EFD both “use a knowledge telling
strategy (i.e., pouring out any information that comes to
mind without concern for its relevance). Nippold & Scott,
(2010), pp 178,
Written Language Characteristics of
Children with ECP Deficits
• Starts writing immediately, and ignores offer of graphic
organizer
• Writes until done, hands in paper without re-reading.
• Again, organization is the biggest concern
• Much more likely to under-produce for written
language than oral language.
• Often express extreme dislike and reluctance for
completing the task.
Analysis: Macro-Structure
• This is relatively quick and can be done online by an
experienced tester, although transcription is better.
• A flip camera allows for a quick review and is easier to
deal with than an audiotape– also allows for pragmatic
analysis more easily.
• Check off the major components as you hear them.
• Note tangents.
• Tally verbal disruptions/mazes: If they occur on more
than 20-25% of utterances, that is excessive
Microstructure Analysis
• Use of complex sentences is more common in the
expository text, so only analyze this text for syntactic
complexity.
• Count number of subordinating conjunctions used/tally
ratio of simple to complex sentences
• This is more essential for the LLD kid, and chances are
good that formal tests of syntax will highlight the issue
• If child seems to under-produce – transcribe the sample
and get a productivity count.
Intervention Skills: What to Target
• Pre-School-1st grade
– Inhibition
– Planning through Play/Center Times
• 2nd-5th grade
– Develop Strategy Use
– Graphic Organizers
– Self Regulation of Attention
• Middle School and High School
–
–
–
–
–
Independent and Flexible Strategy Use
Planning/prioritizing/Organizing
Being systematic
Self regulation/self monitoring
Self advocacy
Inhibition Skills in At-Risk Children
• Boston Public School Early Learning Center:
Grades K0-1st grade
• Children are teacher-referred for support in
developing phonological awareness skills
• We noted that a high percentage of the children
who were referred had trouble with inhibition.
Can you teach executive control to
Pre-Schoolers
• Tools of the Mind Program
– http://www.mscd.edu/extendedcampus/toolsofthemin
d/
• Based on Vygotskian principles
• Diamond et al (2007) found that children
enrolled in this program improved significantly in
performance on a battery of Executive Control
Tests
Facilitating Inhibition
• Distance helps
• Hala and Russel (2001) found that three year olds could
perform strategic deception if they pointed with a pointer, not
with their own hand.
• Children perform more successfully on false location tasks if
the change in location is described but not observed by the
child.
• Dowsett and Livesy (2000) found that inhibition
can be directly taught
– Performance on a go/no-go task improved after
children practiced a cognitive flexibility task (similar to
Wisconsin Card Sort).
– Just training inhibition alone is not as effective as
embedding inhibition into a more complex task.
Incorporating Inhibition Goals
Into Therapy
• Games
• Visual and/or Tactile Reminders
• “Prophylactic” Cueing
• Peer regulation helps self regulation
Games to Develop Inhibition
• Duck Duck Goose
• Freeze Tag
• Simon Says (simplify for the younger child,
do what the “good puppet” says, not what
the “naughty puppet” says).
• Slap (Tap) Jack (we do this with letters)
• Musical Chairs
• Mother May I?
Visual Reminders
• Rule board with simple visual symbols. (we use
boardmaker symbols)
• Stop/Go Signs
• Thought bubbles and whispered responses to help
inhibit talking out of turn.
• Self-cues
– Fingers to lips to inhibit talking
– Hands behind back to help resist touching materials.
Prophylactic Cueing
• Treat inhibition as a skill that is being taught.
• Cue and remind before mistakes are made.
• If needed cue continuously through the “no-go”
time.
• Set small goals and make them attainable.
• Make it motivating, fun and desirable to inhibit.
Regulation of Peers
• Children can recognize violations of rules in peers before
they can self-regulate
• By regulating peers, they can improve their own self
regulation
• Suggestions from Tools of the Mind program:
– Child who uses a loud voice can monitor volume in the class
– Child who never cleans up can monitor if each area is clean
– Incorporate target goals into pretend play scenarios with the
child
Combining Inhibition and
Phonological Awareness
• Tap the card that starts with a given sound
suppress responses to other cards.
• Feed cards with target sounds to puppet, throw
the others in the trash.
• Variations on UNO (letter and color rather than
number and color).
• Board Games that require go/no-go responses.
• Earning an “inhibition game” as a reward for
successful participation in the session.
Perspective Taking
• Inhibition co-develops with theory of mind skills.
• Build theory of mind games into circle time
activities.
• Play barrier games in the classroom.
• Discuss character perspectives, feelings and
during story telling activities.
Planning and Pretend Play
• Play is the best vehicle there is for building
EC skills and language skills
• Encourage your teachers to coach the
children in the dramatic play areas –
teacher suggests/expands on themes
• Build pretend play into circle times by
acting out stories.
Planning Skills in Pretend Play
• Have a pretend play theme each week.
• Develop scripts for each theme.
• Discuss what roles and props are needed.
• Guide the play sequence, helping children to enact each
next step.
– Boardmaker symbols might be used to help children move
through steps.
• Repeat the play theme several times during the week.
Planning and Center Time
• Before children enter a center, they have to verbally state
(or draw) a brief plan.
• For pre-schoolers, this can simply be a single statement of
intent
– I’m gonna make a block tower
– I’m gonna put the puzzle together with Jimmy
• Note that it is not critical that the full plan is carried out
• Evaluate afterwards: did you make a tower or did you
change your plan?
Planning in Kindergarten/1st Grade
• True planning begins at this age
• Emphasize planning elements in story telling activities
(what is the problem, how can they solve the problem?
What should they do first?)
• Readers Theater is a great way to combine planning,
perspective taking, inhibition and reading fluency.
• Involve children in every step of the planning process,
from assigning roles, to developing props, to making
scripts, to inviting guests.
Planning Throughout Early Grades
• Use visual cue cards in centers to help children to carry
out a sequence of steps independently.
– Have children make their own visual plan card before entering
the center.
• Verbally plan what to write about in morning journal.
• Involve the children in planning projects, trips, classroom
events.
• Verbalize your own planning process to give a model.
Use the word plan, frequently. Discuss instances when
plans go wrong, and how they can be changed.
Language and Working Memory
• Virtually all complex language tasks place a heavy
demand on working memory
– Following Directions
– Understanding a Story
– Comprehending the steps in a science procedure
• This includes formulation demands as well as processing
demands.
– Formulating complex sentences
– Telling a story
– Explaining a procedure
Can you directly improve
working memory?
• Not much evidence yet to answer the question
• There is some evidence that intensive
computerized intervention programs show some
generalized language effects.
• Perhaps these programs are serving to
strengthen verbal working memory capacity
Minimize Working Memory Demands
• Use Visual Cues, Pictures or Organizers
– Story grammar outline to keep the story on track
– Manipulatives to help with math
– Practice writing down key words to decrease juggling
demands
• Over-learn the core skills– skills that are automatic take
minimal working memory
• Memorization and Working Memory
– If you cannot hold information in STM, transfer to LTM
for retention may progress more slowly
Memory Strategies: Direct Practice
• Rehearsal may not take a student far if they have short
term verbal memory deficits.
• Visualization strategies may prove more effective for
some of our LI students.
– Adaptations of the Lindamood Visualization and
Verbalization program can be helpful for some
students.
• Pair a motion/gesture with each step
• Help children discover whether they remember best with
auditory/verbal, visual, or kinesthetic cues (or a
combination)
• Use Clip Art: Let students select images they will
remember
Help Students to Chunk
Information
Storm Vocabulary:
Hurricane
Cloud Vocabulary
Tornado
Nimbus
Cirrus
Blizzard
Nor-easter
Cumulus
Stratus
Teaching an Organized Approach To
Reading and Writing
• Teach text types and their signal
structures
• Place a high focus on identification of main
ideas
• Teach self-questioning and self monitoring
strategies.
Text Types and Their Signal Words
• Easier Types
– Description:
• For example, Characteristics of, Refers to, Someone who,
Something that
– Procedural
• First, next, last, finally, before, during, if-then
• Harder Types
– Causation
• As a result, As a consequence, Therefore, Due to, For this
reason, Since
– Compare contrast
• Although, However, On the other hand, In contrast
Effective Use of Graphic Organizers
• Linear organizers work best for language assignments.
• Keep organizers simple. Use only a few types.
• Organizers should be school wide and system wide
would be even better!
• Have students identify the type of assignment and match
it to the right type of organizer
Using Organizers for Comprehension
• Tailor the organizer specifically to the reading
assignment.
– The organizer should have the same number of main
ideas and details as the text it is used on.
• Identify main ideas first
• Teach students how to use KEY words to
summarize content on an organizer
Multi-Paragraph Organizer
MAIN IDEA
MAIN IDEA
MAIN IDEA
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
RAP (Ellis & Graves 1990)
• Read a paragraph,
• Ask yourself “what were the main ideas and details in the
paragraph”
• Put the main ideas and details into your own words.
– Teach concept of key words
• This works great if the student actually knows how to find
the main idea.
Control Text Complexity and Type
• Select Easier Text Types First
– Descriptive
– Chronological Sequence
• Control Readability
• Use Same General Format Repeatedly
• Move Systematically from Concrete, Imageable
Concepts to Abstract Ideas.
Multi-Paragraph Organizer:
Descriptive
What it looks like
detail
Where it lives
What it eats
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
detail
Self Monitoring Comprehension
(AKA: DON’T just skip the parts you
don’t get)
• Identify/Highlight Unfamiliar Words
• Identify Confusing or Contradictory Statements
• Resolve:
– Look up in your textbook or online
– Ask your teacher or a peer
• Give students texts that contain errors in logic, ask to
identify the error
Written Formulation
• Teach writing as a process:
– Don’t start writing the moment you get the piece of paper!
– Planning does not need to take a long time
• Give focus to the paragraph as the central part of writing
• Practice Many Short Answer Paragraphs
–
–
–
–
Brainstorm Ideas
Organize into a main point– discard details that don’t fit
Make a topic sentence
Write the supporting details
Topic Sentence/Main Idea:
Detail 1
Detail 2
Detail 3
Conclusion/Transition
EmPOWER PROGRAM
A Strategy for Teaching Expository Writing
Singer and Bashir (2002)
Innovative Learning Partners, LLC
EmPOWER =
•
•
•
•
•
•
Evaluate
Make a Plan
Organize the Information
Work (Write)
Evaluate
Re-Work
Generating content is particularly
problematic for many of our students:
– Assess/Teach Researching Skills
• Internet Searches
• Evaluating a source
• Choosing relevant information
– Assess/Teach Brainstorming skills
• Activate knowledge base using sources
• Conduct brainstorming in group settings
• Practice divergent naming
– Build Confidence and Motivation with
Familiar/Preferred Topics
Study Strategies
• Make a Nightly Homework Plan
– The Learning Center should not be “just a place to do
homework”
– It should teach you HOW to do homework/How to Study–
Strategy oriented!!
– Make a homework plan and evaluate how it works!
• Develop Time Estimation Skills
– Kids with EC deficits have a poor sense of time
– Ask them how long it will take to complete a piece of homework
– Have them time themselves on the task
– Report back their accuracy
• On-Task Log
– Repeat timer goes off every two minutes, student checks
whether they were working or not (reality check for how much
time spent texting, etc).
Find Best Study Environment
• Do I need to be alone?
• Can I have distracters present
– Phone?
– Internet
– Music/TV
• Does it help to study with a friend, sibling, or with parents
around?
• Do I want formal homework group?
We ALL need Motivators!
• Help Student Choose Incentives
– Rewards to get through the homework
– May be at end of task, after each math
problem, etc.
– Off-task moments work well – finish math then
text a friend for five minutes. Set a timer.
• Initiator Reward: Snacks can work very
well. Start the task, eat a chip!
Working With Helicopter Parents
• Parents of Kids with EC deficits know their kids don’t
self-manage– so they do it for them.
• This can lead to learned helplessness– kids do ok in
high school, and flunk out of college
• Help parents to set up, and follow a plan to gradually
decrease the structure (and nagging).
• Help students to strategically use their parents support.
Ask for what they need.
Test Prep and Test-Taking Strategies
• Time Planner: How far out to start studying for what type
of tests.
• Strategic Memorization:
– What to memorize
– How to chunk it into categories
– Finding your best retrieval strategy
• Preparing for In-Class Essays
– Brainstorm questions
– Brainstorm main idea and supporting detail answers
– Practice writing paragraphs in time frame allotted.
• Taking Multiple Choice Tests
– Strategic Guessing
– Look for clues from other questions
Test/Homework Review
• After an assignment is given back- don’t throw it away!
• Self-Analysis: Did I get the grade I wanted? If not:
– Did I study the same material that was tested?
– What/How can I study differently next time
– Will I need this skill again? For the next Lab? For the
final? For MCAS? If so:
• Do I understand what I did wrong?
• Can I now do it correctly?
• Who can help me learn what I don’t understand?
Principles of Strategy Development
• Simply telling student how to use a strategy
doesn’t work. Strategy Development Involves:
• Instruction and Rationale for Strategy
• What to do
• Why to do it
• When to do it
• Intensive teacher modeling of strategies, many
times across many contexts
Strategy Development Continued
• Guided practice, many times across many
contexts–
• Student learns and explains steps in using the
strategy
• Student evaluates how the strategy worked
• Grades incorporate strategy use as a factor (build
motivation)
• Peer-mediated, or or teacher-monitored practice
many times across many contexts.
• Independent practice with teacher spot checks
Strategy Development
• Training in how to modify the strategy to
meet task demands
• As multiple strategies are taught, students
especially need guided practice in when and
how to use each strategy.
• If the student does not independently,
consistently and flexibly use the strategy, you
have wasted your time.
Consultation in the Classroom
• Many classroom teachers do not know what EC skills
are, let alone how to accommodate for them.
• Help teachers set up systems that promote selfregulation
– Homework always handed in at the same time, and in the same
place.
– Homework written on the board, and ideally in an online website.
– Procedures for how to complete a task written in sequential
steps, visible in the classroom during the lesson/practice/test.
– Study strategies discussed explicitly
• Help teachers build strategies into the classroom, model
their use, and guide students toward independent use.
References
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