Investigate, Incubate and More Questions, Oh My!

After much deliberation, reworking, second guessing and talking it out with my SET lab hero, Allison Furton, I finally narrowed down my study question to “What quantitative approach is best for students to use to demonstrate growth of executive functioning (EF) skills in order to show progress to administrators and parents?” To learn more about my ideation process, check out my first blog post “Questioning the Translation of Executive Functioning into Data” here.

While the first part of my study tested my very own executive functioning skill set of task initiation, phase two “Investigate and Incubate” lead me to my all time favorite nerdy pastime, research. I had no problem beginning this task. I have been pouring over academic publications on Executive Functioning and ADHD and reviewing the work of some of my favorite EF gurus, Peggy Dawson, Richard Guare, Ross Greene, and coaching mentor, Jodi Sleeper-Triplett. While reviewing the research, the following observations stood out to me the most:

• Through decades of research in their clinic, Richard Guare and Peg Dawson have observed patterns of behavior that strongly correlate a relationship between attention issues and executive functioning weaknesses. My takeaway: ADHD and executive functioning deficits go together like chips and salsa.
• In “Student Self-Assessment: The Key to Stronger Student Motivation and Higher Achievement,” James McMillan and Jessica Hearn showed that when students self evaluate, they can more readily identify any discrepancies between current performance and desired outcomes. My takeaway: Students do better when they are able to self evaluate their own progress.
• John A. Ross of the University of Toronto published the article “The Reliability, Validity and Utility of Self Assessment”. His research showed that when students are involved with defining the criteria to assess their progress they are able to use language and set measures that are familiar to the student. By defining the criteria, they will include features that are important to them. My takeaway: Students will be more motivated to collect their own data, if they have a voice in how it is measured.
• There’s not an abundance of research on ADHD coaching specifically, but there is a plethora on ADHD, executive skills and coaching techniques. My takeaway: While this seems like a set back, it actually encourages me. I love a good challenge.

Being the thinker that I am, I was left with a few more wonderings, such as:

How do you motivate a student to collect their own data when they have a difficult time with other executive functioning skills such as organization, task initiation and goal persistence?

I wonder if there is already an app that could make it easier for students to collect data, since they are attached to their phones 24/7?

While I have time to coach students as they make a plan, how realistic would it be for classroom teachers to use this strategy in the classroom?

As way leads on to way, and I continue through my study, I will be posting here on Medium as well as Twitter . To follow my progress as well as other SET Lab delegates in their action research, follow the hashtags #educationscientists and #SETlab.