Making It All Work: Integrate Executive Functioning and Study Skills Into Daily Instruction

Description

Do your elementary students struggle with planning, organizing materials, or finishing tasks on time? Do you want practical ways to teach executive functioning without adding another program to your plate? Study skills and executive functioning skills develop over time and are most effective when they are explicitly taught, practiced, and reinforced within daily instruction, and integrating these skills into everyday routines and academic tasks strengthens metacognition, independence, and positive learning behaviors for diverse learners. Join Melissa Mann and learn how to integrate planning, organization, task initiation, working memory, flexible thinking, self monitoring, and time management into the lessons you already teach using clear models, visual supports, and scaffolded routines. You will leave with classroom ready strategies that fit your schedule, reduce off task behavior, align with grade level standards, and build consistent systems that save time, strengthen self regulation, and increase student ownership and confidence.

Objectives

1. Identify key executive functioning skills and the purpose of each in elementary classrooms.
2. Explain why explicit teaching, practice, and reinforcement within daily instruction strengthen study skills and self regulation.
3. Implement a routine that teaches one executive skill within an existing lesson using a visual support and brief modeling script.
4. Examine a current unit plan to determine where executive skill routines naturally fit without adding separate lessons.
5. Judge the effectiveness of an embedded executive skill routine using observation notes or student work and decide what to adjust.
6. Design a weekly plan that integrates two executive functioning routines across subjects with clear cues, student roles, and reflection prompts. "‹

Key Take Aways

• Integrate executive functioning into core lessons with simple routines that fit your existing instruction.
• Use visual supports, modeling, and scaffolded practice to build metacognition and independence.
• Create consistent systems for planning, organizing materials, and managing time that students can own.
• Align executive functioning supports with grade-level standards across literacy, math, and content areas.