Students with executive functioning challenges often intend to complete tasks or meet expectations—but struggle to execute consistently. 

The reason? They aren’t mentally envisioning future scenarios, predicting the steps needed to reach a goal, and thinking about what they need to be doing NOW in order to meet that goal. 

This cognitive skill, called future pacing, allows students to visualize the process and outcome of their actions, building a critical link between planning and follow-through.

In the third episode in my “Five Skills to Create Your Executive Functioning Intervention Framework”, I break it down in detail. 

What I’ll uncover in this episode:

✅ What future pacing is—and why it's essential for supporting goal-directed behavior and flexible thinking.

✅ How future pacing interacts with skills like time perception, self-talk, and episodic memory.

✅ Why students with executive functioning deficits often struggle to anticipate obstacles, sequence steps, or understand how present actions impact future outcomes.

✅ Practical ways to teach students how to mentally rehearse tasks—bridging the gap between knowing what to do and actually doing it.

✅ How building future pacing into interventions improves self-regulation, motivation, and task persistence.

In this episode, I mentioned my upcoming free live virtual training hosted by Parallel Learning that’s coming up on August 14, 2025 from 6:30-8:00 PM EST. It’s called “Executive Functioning: Beyond Checklists and Planners”. 

You’ll earn a free CEU, get to learn about a company that offers remote work opportunities, and get to learn some of the concepts I teach in my paid programs. You can sign up for the training here: https://parallellearning-20474008.hs-sites.com/ashakickoffwebinar25?utm_source=partnership&utm_medium=partner_karen_dudek&utm_campaign=webinar_ashadrkaren_8.14.2025&utm_content=blank

I also mentioned my free training for school leaders who want to create a research-based executive functioning implementation plan for their school teams. You can sign up for the training here: https://drkarendudekbrannan.com/efleadership

We’re 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.