De Facto Leaders

Have you ever had a student spend 45 minutes avoiding an assignment that would have taken them five minutes to finish?

They argue about why they shouldn’t have to do it, negotiate over how much they need to complete, ask to go to the bathroom, or decide they need a drink before they can get started.

Meanwhile, you’re looking at the assignment thinking:

If you would just DO IT, this would have been over half an hour ago.

I had a student who did this exact thing during study hall.

Writing assignments could turn into an entire period of avoidance. He would find every possible way to delay getting started, and when we did get him to write, an adult often had to sit beside him and prompt him through the process.

From our perspective, his choices didn’t make sense. He was spending far more time and energy avoiding the assignment than it would have taken to complete it.

We see the arguing, negotiating, shutting down, or escaping and call it defiance, work refusal, lack of motivation, or “demand avoidance.”

Those labels describe the behavior we can see.

They don’t explain why avoiding five minutes of discomfort feels preferable to spending five minutes getting it done.

And that’s the question we need to answer before we decide how to intervene.

If we misunderstand what’s driving the avoidance, we can choose interventions that feel good in the moment but reinforce the pattern we’re trying to change.

That’s why students described as having pathological demand avoidance and work refusal at school can get worse when we continually lower expectations. Here’s why reducing demands may reinforce avoidance, and what students may need instead.

When a student argues, negotiates, asks to leave, or refuses a difficult task, reducing the demand can feel like the supportive thing to do. But temporary relief doesn’t necessarily help that student build the skills needed to handle challenge independently.

In episode 270 of De Facto Leaders, I explain why demand avoidance and work refusal can be signs that a student needs more support with executive functioning, not simply fewer expectations. You’ll see how planning, predicting, estimating time, visualizing an end goal, and talking yourself through discomfort all contribute to a student’s ability to persist with challenging work.

We’ll also look at how excessive prompting and repeatedly removing difficult tasks can unintentionally make a student more dependent on adults, and what we need to build instead.

In this episode, I mentioned the Task Execution and Planning Protocol that helps clinicians and educators support students who present with demand avoidance and require constant prompting during functional or academic tasks. You can learn more about the Task Execution and Planning Protocol here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/taskexecution

I also mentioned my free training, “How to Be Evidence-Based and Neurodiversity-Affirming By Support Executive Functioning”. You can register for that training here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/efleadership

To learn more about my YouTube channel called “Dr. Karen Executive Functioning Systems”, where you can learn how to build scalable executive functioning strategies you can use in your therapy sessions and classrooms. You can subscribe to the channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@drkaren-efsystems

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

We tend to think about math, literacy, language, and executive functioning as separate areas of development.

But the research shows they’re much more connected than we might think.

Early math skills are associated with later academic outcomes, and developing those skills draws heavily on language, vocabulary, and executive functioning.

And supporting early math doesn’t have to mean formal instruction.

A lot of it happens through play, conversation, books, games, and everyday routines.

That’s why in episode 269 of De Facto Leaders, I talk with Clarence Ames, an early childhood development researcher and curriculum designer specializing in early math and executive function, about what the research tells us about how young children develop math skills, and what adults can do to support them.

Clarence Ames has worked in Education Research, Implementation, and Policy for 15 years. He has a Master of Science in Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences from Utah State University, and a bachelor’s degree in Public Relations from Central Washington University. He is passionate about helping people develop the skills they need to become independent and self-sufficient, and his life goal is to empower students and teachers to create a system of education in which the only limitations on breadth or depth of learning are one’s own desire, passion, and motivation. 

In this episode, we discuss:

✅ What research shows about the relationship between early math, literacy, vocabulary, and executive functioning.

✅ Why early math skills are associated with later academic and life outcomes.

✅ How play, books, games, and everyday routines can build math concepts without formal instruction.

✅What the research says about educational apps and screen-based learning, and why adult interaction makes a difference.

✅How parents can support early math development even if they have their own math anxiety.

In this episode, I mention the Task Execution and Planning Protocol, which gives school clinicians an intervention strategy that takes students from “demand avoidance” and prompt dependence to independence during daily academic and functional tasks. 

You can learn more about the Task Execution and Planning Protocol here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/taskexecution
 
In this episode, I mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. 

You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

People often say to me, “I get why executive functioning is important, but when are you going to tell me how to work on it”?

I wish I could jump right to the lesson plans and “here’s what you do in a perfect hierarchy to work on these skills”. But brains don’t work that way.

That’s why I start with the framework before the lesson plan. The macro before the micro. 

When you Google executive functioning, you often get a list of 8 or 9 skills, and a broad definition. This is important information, but it doesn’t tell you “the how”. 

It also doesn’t explain how you’d scaffold. That’s why when I help clinicians design executive functioning interventions, I start with five broad areas that start to make those abstract cognitive skills more tangible. 

In episode 268 of De Facto Leaders, I explain what those five skill areas are. I also explain why we can’t teach them in isolation, and why they have to be embedded into tasks students are already doing in their daily lives in order for intervention to be meaningful.

In this episode, I mention the Task Execution and Planning Protocol, which gives school clinicians an intervention strategy that takes students from “demand avoidance” and prompt dependence to independence during daily academic and functional tasks. 

You can learn more about the Task Execution and Planning Protocol here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/taskexecution

In this episode, I mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. 

You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

Many people think they’re working on executive functioning, but aren’t ACTUALLY working on executive functioning.

If you have students who have access to planners, visuals, lists, and other organizing tools, but still seem unorganized, this may be the case 
for your students.

Especially if you have students who flat out refuse to use organizers, or just forget to use them. 

Even though people with strong executive functioning skills present on the outside as people who are “organized”, this is just the external \
presentation that happens as a result of the internal cognitive skills that enable them to appear like they have their act together. 

That’s why when we jump right to the obvious tools for students, we’re often leaving a huge gap, which is why students often don’t know how to utilize tools they have at their disposal.

In episode 267 of De Facto Leaders, I elaborate on the definition of executive functioning, because this is the first step in determining how to help our students get to the point of “being organized” (plus many other things, which you’ll realize when you listen). 

In this episode, I mention the Task Execution and Planning Protocol, which gives school clinicians an intervention strategy that takes students from “demand avoidance” and prompt dependence to independence during daily academic and functional tasks. 

You can learn more about the Task Execution and Planning Protocol here:  https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/taskexecution

In this episode, I mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. 

You can learn more about the program here:  https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

“Demand avoidance”, poor generalization, prompt-dependence, and social skills challenges seem like isolated issues. 

But often they’re not. Many times they’re tied to executive functioning challenges. 

That’s why when I describe “executive dysfunction”, I cluster it into five broad areas:

Attention, Learning Challenges, Behavioral Issues, Organization, and Social Skills

Usually, this is the point that the lightbulb goes on for a lot of clinicians and educators in the room as they realize executive functioning is the common sticking point behind many of their students’ challenges.

When I support clinicians in designing executive functioning intervention frameworks, I start with explaining the external signs. 

Things like:

✅ Refusing to do even the simplest of tasks, and putting more effort into avoiding the work than it would take to actually do it
✅Behaviors that seem disproportionate to the situation, melt downs over things that barely phase their peers
✅ Always appearing to be several steps behind
✅ Not “reading the room” during functional tasks, and requiring tons of prompts
✅ Lack of awareness of how they’re coming across to others

In episode 266 of De Facto Leaders, I do a deep dive into these five external signs that tie back to executive functioning challenges. 

In this episode, I mention the Task Execution and Planning Protocol, which gives school clinicians an intervention strategy that takes students from “demand avoidance” and prompt dependence to independence during daily academic and functional tasks. 

You can learn more about the Task Execution and Planning Protocol here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/taskexecution

In this episode, I mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. 

You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

Many school clinicians know executive functioning is important. 

They also know that their entire team should be supporting it across general and special education settings. 

But they don’t always know what exactly that looks like in practice…

And if they do, they don’t know HOW they can change the practices of classroom teachers. 
There are a lot of unanswered questions. 

…How can I find time to think about changing teacher’s practices when I barely have time to manage my own workload? 

…What is my role if students don’t “qualify” for services on an IEP? 

…Doesn’t adding executive functioning to my plate open up a whole can of worms I’ll never be able to manage as a related service provider? 

…Even if I should be involved, how do I get teachers and administrators to “buy in?”

In this episode, I share how I help school clinicians not just answer these questions, but actually get executive functioning support in place…

Even if they’re not administrators…

Without taking them away from their existing responsibilities or causing role confusion…

And, even if they don’t have “buy in” from everyone on their team that they SHOULD be involved with executive functioning. 

As you listen, I invite you to consider that you MIGHT NOT need to get buy-in to start. 

The buy in comes with the process because it helps to “stack” the evidence you need to gain traction along the way. 

And…the reason that no one can give you a clear answer on how or what your role is because a clear framework doesn’t exist. 

People don’t give you an answer because most people don’t know HOW executive functioning support should look in schools. 

That’s an opportunity for YOU to define how that looks. Which you are one of the most qualified people in your building to do if you’re an SLP, social worker, psychologist, counselor, or other related service provider. 

And if you do it the right way, it can save you time and get better support for students in place at the same time. 

I share why that’s the case in episode 265 of De Facto Leaders.  

In this episode, I mentioned my free training where I share three mistakes professionals make when supporting executive functioning (that result in prompt-dependence and dysregulation). 

In this training, I cover the following:

✅ Already working on executive functioning, and not seeing results? It could be because you're NOT truly working on executive functioning, even though you think you are. Learn how to make the subtle shifts that make all the difference.

✅ Are severe behaviors preventing ANY true skill development? Learn the common mistakes school teams make (related to executive functioning) that create prompt-dependence and dysregulation, and what to do instead.

✅ Are students struggling with peers, even though you're working on social skills? I'll share why "social skills groups" rarely result in good skill-transfer, and how to shift your service-deliver model to help students self-advocate and form relationships.

✅ Not sure your team will buy-in to supporting executive functioning in classrooms? Learn the 3-part framework I teach SLPs, social workers, psychologists, counselors, and other interventionists that helps them implement building-wide executive functioning intervention, even with a huge caseload.

You can sign up for this training here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/efleadership

In this episode, I mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. 

You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

Many school teams AREN’T actually working on executive functioning when they think they are.

As a result, they’re being more flexible and accommodating than ever, giving students a chance to process after behavioral escalations…

Yet they’re seeing students continue to be dysregulated. In some cases, it’s getting worse. 
The same thing goes for helping kids stay organized and manage work. 

Kids refuse to use organizers and lists, forget to use them when it’s relevant, or require a ton of adult prompting when they actually ARE using them.

In my free training, I share why these things happen. This free training, which I’ve recently updated, is called “How to Be Evidence-Based and Neurodiversity-Affirming With Executive Functioning Support”.
In the training, I cover three common mistakes school teams make when implementing “executive functioning interventions”. 

In episode 264 of De Facto Leaders, I share two of those three mistakes. 

When you listen to this episode, you’ll discover:

✅ Why students sometimes seem MORE dysregulated when asked to talk about melt downs or why they made a poor choice.
✅ The relationship between executive dysfunction, anxiety, and time perception.
✅ Why students aren’t more organized, even though you’ve giving them organizing tools like lists and planners

Plus, I share two case studies, including:
✅ The student who was melting down during passing period, and why giving him more time to process his feelings was the last thing he needed (and how we supported him)
✅ The student who could make himself throw up whenever we asked him to do a non-preferred task who became MORE distrustful of adults the more flexible we were.

In this episode, I mentioned my free training where I share three mistakes professionals make when supporting executive functioning (that result in prompt-dependence and dysregulation). 

In this training, I cover the following:
✅ Already working on executive functioning, and not seeing results? It could be because you're NOT truly working on executive functioning, even though you think you are. Learn how to make the subtle shifts that make all the difference.
✅ Are severe behaviors preventing ANY true skill development? Learn the common mistakes school teams make (related to executive functioning) that create prompt-dependence and dysregulation, and what to do instead.
✅ Are students struggling with peers, even though you're working on social skills? I'll share why "social skills groups" rarely result in good skill-transfer, and how to shift your service-deliver model to help students self-advocate and form relationships.
✅ Not sure your team will buy-in to supporting executive functioning in classrooms? Learn the 3-part framework I teach SLPs, social workers, psychologists, counselors, and other interventionists that helps them implement building-wide executive functioning intervention, even with a huge caseload.

You can sign up for this training here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/efleadership

In this episode, I mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. 

You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

You’ve been told that social skills interventions are ableist.

But you’ve also been told that we need to prepare students for real-world expectations. You have teachers and administrators coming to you with concerns about behavior, participation, and social interaction, and you’re expected to address it.

Then you’re told to make your intervention more “functional.” To collaborate more. To focus on generalization.

And somehow, all of that responsibility gets funneled into a 20-minute social skills group.

What are you supposed to do when you know that a short, isolated session isn’t going to result in meaningful carryover?

The issue isn’t that social skills intervention is a bad idea. The problem is we're using the wrong model to support them. 

When we think of "social skills intervention" as beginning and ending within a siloed therapy session, we'll continue to see poor skill transfer.

A therapy session with students is ONE layer. We can keep that layer, but we need to add more layers to it to bridge the gap.

In this video, I walk through how to shift from relying on one intervention bucket (a.k.a. the isolated social skills group) to building a service delivery model that frames social skills as "executive functioning for human interactions".

This episode was created based on a video I previously published on YouTube. You can view the original video here: https://youtu.be/vdpzfG5l6wo

In this episode, I mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. 

You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

“Accommodation” is a loaded word. On one hand, we want to provide reasonable accommodations in K-12 so kids can access their education.

But determining what is “reasonable” accommodation or modification can be messy.

Both parents and educators can unintentionally “overaccommodate” in the moment without realizing it, which over time can impede a child’s ability to work through daily challenges and solve problems on their own. 

This can be in the context of adding too many “cookie-cutter” accommodations on a 504 Plan or IEP, or it can be unofficial accommodations in the way we interact with kids. 

My colleagues who work on college campuses are seeing the impact of this “overhelping” in K-12. 
And it’s not just kids with neurodevelopmental disorders. It’s the neurotypical kids too. 

That’s why I invited my colleague, Jill Fahy, back to De Facto Leaders to talk about the state of college readiness, the upstream impacts of what’s happening in K-12 on success both during and after college. 

Jill Fahy, Professor in the Department of Communication Disorders & Sciences, serves as the Director of STEP, a transitional education program for EIU students with autism. STEP programming supports the development of executive functions, social communication, self-appraisal, and self-regulatory skills to facilitate students' management of their academic and university living demands. Ms. Fahy specializes in the assessment of executive dysfunction, particularly as it is associated with concomitant disorders of language, cognition, or social/pragmatics. She is a widely-known lecturer in the area of executive functions, speaking nationally and internationally on aspects of evaluation and treatment of executive dysfunction, and the role of language in executive functions. Ms. Fahy is co-author of The Source for Development of Executive Functions, 2nd edition, and various articles on self-talk and executive functions.  Ms. Fahy teaches graduate courses in Aphasia/Right Hemisphere Dysfunction,  Cognitive-Communication and Executive Function Disorders, and Medical Grand Rounds. She previously taught undergraduate courses in Neurology and Advanced Clinical Practicum and Diagnostics. Prior to teaching at EIU, Ms. Fahy worked for several years as a medical SLP providing services for patients with acquired neurological deficits resulting from stroke and TBI, including those in acute care, inpatient and day rehabilitation, and home health. 

In this conversation, we discuss:

✅ The difference between accommodations and modifications, what “overhelping” looks like, and why it impedes development of important metacognitive skills.

✅ The state of college student mental health, and how it relates to the opportunities students have to practice self-regulation and experiencing failure.

✅ Skills many college students are lacking, including managing due dates, extended writing assignments, study skills, working through conflict, and managing their daily life.

✅ How and when to start fading supports, and how to recognize if you’ve been “overaccommodating” for a student

You can connect with Jill at [email protected] or on LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jill-fahy-250478b/

Learn more about the Students with Autism Transitional Education Program (STEP) Program at Eastern Illinois University here: https://www.eiu.edu/step/

Be sure to listen to my first interview with Jill on De Facto Leaders here: Executive Functioning for College Students: Beyond Checklists and Planners (with Jill Fahy)
Link here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/ep-122-executive-functioning-for-college-students-beyond-checklists-and-planners-with-jill-fahy/

You can also listen to my commentary on her first interview in this episode: Balancing Language, Academic Content Areas, and Executive Functioning (featuring Jill Fahy)
Link here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/ep-232-balancing-language-academic-content-areas-and-executive-functioning-featuring-jill-fahy/

In this episode, I mentioned Language Therapy Advance Foundations, my program that gives speech pathologists a scalable framework for building language skills needed to thrive in school, social situations, and daily life. You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarenspeech.com/languagetherapy

I also mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.

Are we really “overteaching” phonics, or should there be a hard stopping point where it’s not taught past a certain grade?

Are current stories trending on popular news outlets aligned with best practices for supporting dyslexic learners?

Is the public becoming more educated on how we learn to read, write, and spell?

I invited my colleague, Lori Josephson, an author, consultant, and former teacher to discuss these questions. 

In this episode, we discuss:

✅ Common literacy “urban legends”, including “Dyslexia is seeing words backwards” and “look at the picture and guess the word”

✅ Why phonics gets a bad wrap and where the Science of Reading is often misunderstood

✅ Handwriting, keyboarding, and how they relate to neural connections

✅Making instruction more effective by integrating language, print, spelling, and executive functioning instead of siloing.

Lori Josephson is an Author, Dyslexia Specialist, and Educational Consultant who is a  Fellow of the Orton-Gillingham Academy, a retired Wilson Language Trainer, and holds a Master’s Degree in Special Education-Learning Disabilities. She has had the privilege of teaching hundreds of struggling students how to make sense of print and text, as well as the honor of working with thousands of teachers training them how to teach and reach their students using methods based upon the complex brain processes involved in attaining literacy, the body of knowledge referred to as the Science of Reading. Her recently published book, “Calling All Neurons! How Reading and Spelling Happen”, explains how the human brain attains literacy in a fun, easy to understand manner where specialized neurons take the stage to provide this explanation. Lori serves as a Moderator of the wildly popular Facebook Group, Science of Reading-What I Should Have Learned in College, and is on the Advisory Council of The Northern Ohio Branch of The Dyslexia Association.

You can connect with Lori in the following places:
o Website: lorijosephson.com
o LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lori-josephson/
o X: @lorijosephson2
o Facebook: Lori Josephson
o Instagram: @calling_all_neurons
o Medium: https://lorijosephson.medium.com/
o Substack: @lorijosephson686067

We mentioned the following resources in this episode:
Lori’s book, “Calling All Neurons! How Reading and Spelling Happen”: https://lorijosephson.com/calling-all-neurons-how-reading-and-spelling-happen/

The Cost of Over-Teaching Phonics by “Liana Loewus”: http://bit.ly/4eIKJAQ

Has Technology “Broken” an Education System That was “Just Fine”? by Natalie Wexler: https://nataliewexler.substack.com/p/has-technology-broken-an-education

“Don’t Blame Technology” by Holly Korbeyhttps://hollykorbey.substack.com/p/dont-blame-technology

The Digital Delusion: How Classroom Technology Harms our Kids’ Learning-And How to Help Them Thrive Again: https://www.amazon.com/Digital-Delusion-Classroom-Technology-Learning/dp/B0G5622DQQ

In this episode, I mentioned Language Therapy Advance Foundations, my program that gives speech pathologists a scalable framework for building language skills needed to thrive in school, social situations, and daily life. You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarenspeech.com/languagetherapy

I also mentioned School of Clinical Leadership, my program that helps related service providers design scalable executive functioning interventions to ensure students get the scaffolding they need across the school day. You can learn more about the program here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/clinicalleadership

Learn more about today's sponsors, Playworks and IXL:

We’re proud to be sponsored by Playworks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with evidence-based practices that help schools improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play.

If you’re a school or district leader struggling with the challenge of chronic absenteeism, as so many are across the U.S., you may not realize that structured recess is a research-backed approach to keep kids in school. In fact, a UC Berkeley study of Title I schools found that those partnering with Playworks had significantly lower chronic absenteeism rates. Further, Mathematica research demonstrated that Playworks schools spent 27% less time transitioning from recess back to learning, saving teachers valuable instructional time. 

These results are possible for your students, too. Learn how Playworks can help you improve student-educator relationships, belonging, and attendance by signing up for a quick no-obligation conversation. 

We’re also thrilled to be sponsored by IXL. 

IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is accelerating achievement in 95 of the top 100 U.S. school districts. Loved by teachers and backed by independent research from Johns Hopkins University, IXL can help you do the following and more:

• Simplify and streamline technology
• Save teachers’ time
• Reliably meet Tier 1 standards
• Improve student performance on state assessments

🚀 Ready to see why leading districts trust IXL for their educational needs? Visit IXL.com/BE today to learn more about how IXL can elevate your school or district.