Executive Functioning for K-3: Building Core Cognitive Processing Skills

Dr. Sarah Oberle and Mitch Weathers, co-authors of “Executive Functions for Every K-3 Classroom: Promoting Self-Regulation for a Strong Start” discuss the increased need of support in working memory, inhibition, and cognitive flexibility in K-3 students, and the unique considerations and strategies needed for the primary population. 

Transcript

Lauren Clouser:

Welcome to the LDA Podcast, a series by the Learning Disabilities Association of America. Our podcast is dedicated to exploring topics of interest to educators, individuals with learning disabilities, parents and professionals to work towards our goal of creating a more equitable world. Hi everyone. Welcome to the LDA Podcast. We're here today with Dr. Sarah Oberle, a first grade teacher and author of Executive Functions for Every K-3 Classroom, and Mitch Weathers, the founder and CEO of Organized Binder. Thank you both so much for being here.

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

Thanks for having us.

Mitch Weathers:

Thanks for having us.

Lauren:

Of course. So before we dive in, I wanted to give you both a chance to tell us a bit about yourselves and how you came to work together.

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

I, as Lauren mentioned, am a first grade teacher, I'm just wrapping up my 18th year in first grade. Teaching first grade, not in first grade. And for the past 7ish years I've been studying the science of learning. So how the mind learns things like memory, attention, motivation, innovation, and executive functions. Mitch and I met probably in 2022, maybe 20. Yeah, that sounds about right. Because I heard one of his podcasts and I reached out and I said, you know, you're the first person I've ever heard talk about executive functions in the context of general education.

And I really wanted to learn more. And so we've been sort of collaborating across the country, on the east coast, west coast ever since.

Mitch Weathers:

Yeah, I spent most of my career as a 9th grade high school science teacher, a little bit of time in middle school before that. And you mentioned Organized Binder in the intro. I, during that time, designed a program that supports the development of executive functions called Organized Binder, and have since that time been working primarily with upper elementary, middle, high school and college level educators and students to implement that program. 

And about the same time I met Sarah, I had started working on a book project to really try to serve educators and individual families, parents that would reach out through the Organized Binder website and want to either bring the program to their school or their particular classroom. And there's a materials component, there's training and support. It's a whole program. And so we don't directly sell that to individual teachers, just because I'm kind of morally opposed to that. And yet I still wanted to provide value and serve those folks the best I could.

And so my first step towards that was writing my first book. But it's Executive Functions for Every Classroom, Grades 3-12. And when it came out, it was really well received. It came out in 2024, but the overwhelming feedback was from Sarah and all her colleagues in the K-12, K-3 space. Those primary years. Like this is great, but what about us? And so Sarah and I hatched a plan to do a follow up book, but co-author it, and really with a goal of translating the work in that first book into the primary years. And that just came out a couple weeks ago.

Lauren:

We're so excited to talk more about it and executive functioning in general. So you're both very executive function focused. Could you talk about what executive function encompasses, just before we move forward?

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

Sure. Executive functions are a set of interrelated cognitive processes, and they work together to support any type of goal-driven behavior. So anything that requires self control, self discipline, anything, it directs attention and it also is responsible for impulse control as well.

Lauren:

Thanks for that. So I wanted to talk more about what Mitch had mentioned that Sarah, you had reached out asking what is there for K through 3? What was the impetus behind wanting to know more about executive functioning and getting that out there for that level?

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

I mean, just being in the classroom for so long, every year it felt like we were seeing more and more challenges that were less content related and more learning behavior related. Kids that were really having trouble not only paying attention, but orienting their attention, almost like they were in a daze. You know, the mind wandering that is so locked in, it's hard to alert them out of it. So you know, really any type of engagement that we had, any kind of instruction that we did, it really didn't matter unless we could get them to pay attention to us and to think about what they were learning. That has become really, really challenging. 

And so after hearing Mitch, I just thought this is what we need for the early grades. Because, not necessarily that all of the little ones have some kind of developmental problem, but they are at the age where this is when these cognitive processes, particularly the three core, which are working memory, inhibition, and cognitive flexibility, those are exploding at 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 years old. And so we really need to learn about this in either in service or pre-service education.

And we don't really. It's only like the special education teachers that talk about executive functions. And even then there's a lot of misconceptions. So I reached out to Mitch to say, you know, I'm a general education teacher, but I'm seeing these concerns in my general education population and it creates an obstruction to learning. And I said, so we need this because for the little ones, we need our own scenarios, our own suggestions. We can't be clumped in with K-12, which we very often are. And it's hard for us as primary teachers to align to some of those examples. So I said, Mitch, hey, we need your help.

Lauren:

Absolutely. Anything, Mitch, that you wanted to add to that?

Mitch Weathers:

Yeah. To how we started working together, and backing up…. I was almost kind of haunted by the fact that so many…like for example, when the first book came out and, and even Organized Binder work, if you say, hey, this is a book study or this is a professional learning opportunity about executive functioning and executive functions, and you kind of throw it out to the district or through a county office of ed, or whatever it was, all the primary teachers would sign up, right? 

And they get their book, and then we would start, and there was kind of a disillusionment a little bit, trying very hard to pull things from the book study or the professional development. And there are definitely things that translate between both books. But as Sarah just mentioned, the respect that the primary grades need and deserve. We really wanted that to be this second book for those folks who, for me, anyway, reached out. And there's more to the story too.

Sarah hosted a Research Edition Conference in Delaware when she had first reached out and she's like, I heard you on this podcast and you're talking about executive functions as a tier one and not special that. And we need this. All the stuff she just said and I'm hosting this conference and I want you to come speak. I was like, okay, that'd be an honor. And so fast forward, a couple years later and I'm there. And I only bring that up because I was able to sit in on Sarah's talk and in her dissertation work, and her just passion around the science of learning, she is really an expert on cognitive load and working memory. And she gave a talk on the topic.

And I had just never heard such a clear and succinct explanation. And not that what she shared isn't for all grade levels, it certainly is, but it was really grounded in the primary years. And I had done a few focus groups with the disillusioned teachers I was talking about that were in the book studies. I'm like, can you meet with me separately and just talk to me? I just want to listen and try to learn. And my mom spent her career as a second grade teacher, so I knew how different the space was. And it just became abundantly clear, like, this work doesn't exist yet. And it needs to, there's a need. And that's what Sarah really emphasized to me.

And so one day I was literally going to pick up my daughter from elementary school and just had this kind of epiphany that we need to write this. And I know who I want to write it with. And I asked Sarah, would you be willing to do this project? And she said yes. So here we are.

Lauren:

That's fantastic. And I wanted to talk a bit more about what are those unique considerations for those who work with K through third grade students that weren't in your first book?

Mitch Weathers:

Yeah, well, it'd probably be helpful to start back up a little bit with executive functions in general. Sarah mentioned that there's two categories, or domains, if you will. There's core executive functions and higher order executive functions. And the reason they're broken up in that way, and what the research shows, is that it's biology, it's development. All these core executive functions, working memory, inhibition and cognitive flexibility are emerging in those years. And the higher order executive functions start to emerge or develop in later elementary, middle, high school and into our 20s. And so trying to, as a starting place, the first book was grades three through 12.

So it was very much those higher order executive functions, which really you'll also hear kind of synonymous with that as executive functioning skills. And we're looking, not that we're not looking for behaviors to manifest from these cognitive processes, but in those older years. And the reason that Sarah and I deliberately have the two titles overlap with grade 3…So our book is K through 3, the first one's 3 through 12, is there's this kind of inflection point that can happen right about that age or those grade levels where we, oftentimes unspoken, but expect students to just become more autonomous, more independent learners and do things like manage their time and learn how to get and stay organized and demonstrate goal oriented behavior and these behaviors that are a skill, but they're manifesting from these cognitive processes we refer to as executive functions. So that first book is really honing in on those particular skill sets. And  Sarah and I, like my initial idea was like, well, we have this first book and it's done really well. Like it's really serving a lot of people and it's been well received. We could use that as a map and we'll translate that, even just structurally in the book to the second book to serve grades K through 3. And we started writing and it probably, what, Sarah? Took two or three months before we just realized that's not going to work.

This is such a different space. They're of course interrelated. There's no question about it. But structurally, everything about it is very specific to those grade bands. So in terms of the book, that's what you're seeing different. This is all about those core executive functions, and we included cognitive load almost. It's not an executive function, but it's on the main stage with the three that we address in the book. And it's to the things we're seeing in the classroom.

And Sarah can speak to this because she's living it every day. It's some of what she's already mentioned. And the interesting thing about this, Lauren, is it's global. So was it the pandemic? Yes. Maybe. Is it technology? Screen times? The root cause we may not entirely know yet, but there's no debate about a shift in the young people that we’re teaching in those grades.

Lauren:

Sarah, did you want to add anything on that based on: is this something that the K-3 population has always needed or are you seeing that uptick, like Mitch mentioned, in more need for this type of support?

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

Yeah. So, you know, maybe 10 years ago you would have a couple of outliers and maybe they were the kids who had an IEP or at the time had a 504 or, you know, received some kind of itinerant service, and they were the ones that really stood out as having those needs of attention or being able to transition smoothly, things like that. Now it's much more commonplace in your classroom that you're going to just have a bunch of kids that you see those kind of deficits in, that they're struggling with. You know, they're struggling to remember the directions. They're struggling to keep their hands to themselves. They're struggling to help themselves just be able to do things that you think that kids, you know, used to be able to do.

And now they kind of look like…I don't know if that behavioral aspect is parents, is Covid, is technology, or what it is. But all that to say that what used to seem like a special education, like those are your concerns, is now a concern for us all. And so absolutely, you know, we have noticed kids that are just having such a hard time thinking about what's happening in the moment, keeping their mind where it's supposed to be, being able to start their work, being able to finish their work, being able to just emotionally regulate enough to get through the day.

And so, you know, Mitch's first book is fantastic. He very quickly, as we were reading, as we were writing this book, realized how different it is in primary because, you know, like he mentioned, we tried to just copy the chapter titles and just move from there. And it really became like we were trying to push a square peg through a round hole. It was like, this will not be authentic to primary if we do this. Because we're talking about kids who might still have a temper tantrum, you know, and the examples were very different. Like we're not just going to write things on the board because many of our kids can't read.

So that's not going to work for us. So we just needed to speak directly to the audience of primary teachers and help them to be able to contextualize what executive functions are, how they drive behaviors, what happens when you're disfluent. Now disfluency at that age can be developmental. It can be because there's some kind of neurodiversity, or it can just be because they're five and six and they're just still growing. They're not there yet. But you know, this is very contextualized in the early grades. And we really hope that it just resonates that the examples, the ideas are primary specific.

Lauren:

That makes a lot of sense. So Sarah, your work focuses on attention, memory and executive functions, but your bio says that you have an emphasis on pedagogy rather than programs. Can you explain what you mean by that?

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

So what I mean is alerting teachers to information that I think that they should have learned in their training, whether it be, you know, when they were in their pre service university training or ongoing professional development to professionalize their decision making. So I'm not saying here is a program that you need to follow, or here's a program that you need to facilitate with your students. This is not about anything prescriptive. It's not about me telling teachers what to do. It's about me empowering teachers with knowledge about how our students learn, which that is what we are supposed to do every day is help our students learn. And the fact that we aren't really taught how to plan instruction based on their working memory limits, how to set up a classroom that is in favor of their attention, things like that. So my goal is really just to say, here's this information, here's what it looks like. You use this in your context as you see fit with your students.

Lauren:

Mitch, I want to give you a chance to respond to that too. Based off of what you said earlier about organized binders, that you don't just want to sell somebody something and not let them know how to implement it. Do you want to talk about that?

Mitch Weathers:

For sure. And it's worth noting that in both cases, both books, Organized Binder. We're not talking about or trying to unpack or explain a curriculum or even a program, or even though I use the word program for Organized Binder. It's not about lessons that you teach on executive function, like what are they, why are they important, how do you develop them, etc. And that's true. The book that Sarah and I wrote, it's really about trying to create learning environments,to curate our environments in very specific ways that lead to better executive functioning. Because if we were here talking about this really great curriculum that's going to develop executive functions in first graders, where is a teacher going to fit that in? If we're talking tier 1 gen ed, all kids on campus or across the district, teachers don't have time for that at any grade level. We usually don't have enough time in the school year to get through what we're tasked with teaching or want to teach.

So this work is not adding to teachers loads, which is like Sarah's distinction there around pedagogy versus programming, is just trying to equip educators with knowledge like Sarah just mentioned, like professionalizing practice. Because in my experience, I've been doing this work for many years. Teachers are like, why aren't we learning about this in our teacher prep programs, or in my master's program, or so often you talk to veteran teachers like Sarah and I and it's like, oh, I figured this out through like, ignorance and an unwillingness to give up and like iteration after iteration, like finally, oh, starting to figure some things out. We're hoping that we bypass all of that and let's put, as I keep referring to in conversations, these executive functioning glasses on and just look at my environment. In this book in particular, we frame it through the environment, our instruction and our routines. Right? So it's not anything new or something else to do. It's considering those in very specific ways through this knowledge of this lens of executive functioning. And that's true of all the way, I mean, K-12 and into college.

Lauren:

So, yeah, that's huge. To build off of that a little bit. There's a focus on the science of reading right now, and now more recently, the science of learning. How does your work in executive functioning fit into this framework? Or if it does?

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

As we discussed a little bit earlier, there are six cognitive processes that make up executive functions. And Mitch had said that there's two different categories. The one that we focus on in the early years book is called the core executive functions. That is working memory, inhibition, and cognitive flexibility. Working memory is a huge character in the science of learning because it is so important for receiving information, perceiving information, hanging onto it, manipulating it, doing a lot of the things that we expect kids to do in an academic setting, right? Not just like you're hanging out. And there's no stakes, like the pressure's on to remember, to make connections, sequence, to calculate. All of those things happen in working memory. And working memory is very, I'll say limited.

It's limited in how much it can hold, and it's limited in the amount of time it can hold. And it varies from minute to minute. So, you know, I may be really well rested and I am completely fluent in my math facts. So me doing a word problem activity, I feel good. I've got the background information that's not going to really use much of my working memory. But the next day I am writing sentences, and I still am not fluent with individual sentence mechanics, with spelling. And on top of that, you know, I'm hungry, I don't feel great. So that's going to be a really heavy cognitive load for me because of a combination of variables.

I share that because, as we said, working memory is one of the core executive functions. And so if you study the science of learning, working memory is, like I said, a very popular topic. The other executive function that isn't directly mentioned in the science of learning, but it is super relevant, is inhibition. Because inhibition is not only our ability to control our impulses, but it also is very important in terms of paying attention. Because inhibition is what helps us filter out what is not relevant in the moment. So when we think of paying attention, we think we're just actively doing something. We are actively focused, but we are also actively not focusing on things that are not relevant. And we know for science of learning there’s also lots of information on attention.

So I studied. Before I knew Mitch, I studied working memory very heavily, and my dissertation was on science of learning. But a lot of my work previous to my dissertation was all on working memory and to tie in the science of reading. One of the things, and hopefully this will resonate with some of your listeners, that I was noticing over and over as a first grade teacher is my kids who were struggling to build word fluency. They would segment, so they would make each sound and then they would go to blend the sounds together and it would be something completely, like they would blend block and then they would say cup. And I'm like, what? None of those sounds are in cup. So it got me really thinking, what is breaking down? Why is this happening? And ultimately it came to one of the reasons is overloaded working memory.

So we know, you know, the focus on science of reading and phonemic awareness and cognitive load is very relevant for our beginning readers and their background knowledge, making sure that they are building fluency along the way with each individual skill so that whatever they're learning in the moment, whether it's word blending, whether it's word fluency, whether it's, you know, comprehension, that they have the prerequisite skill automatic so that they're not sort of creating a pile on effect. So, yeah, science of learning, I would say they are. If you have the venn diagram of executive functions and science of learning, there's a huge overlap there. And science of reading, I've noticed people who are, I would associate more with science of reading starting to talk more about science of learning. Now, science of learning is content agnostic, but because of that, it is relevant for reading because, you know, we have to be cognizant of cognitive load and we have to be cognizant of how much we can put on our students' working memories before they will implode.

Lauren:

Yeah, definitely. And like what you said earlier about if those core executive functions aren't in place, no learning can take place. So that's a really good overview.

Mitch Weathers:

I've heard somebody, I think it was at a science learning event, actually a conference, where a speaker said that Sweller's cognitive load theory might be the most important thing every educator could be well versed in and know about, which is most of what Sarah was just saying. Like this recognition that working memory is finite, it's contextualized, it changes all the time. And when I put these particular glasses on, I'm trying my best to protect those limited resources so that students can manage themselves and be more likely to focus their attention on the things they're trying to learn.

Lauren:

Yeah. Well, and then, Mitch, before I let you both go, I wanted to ask you a bit more about Organized Binder. Did you want to have a minute to talk a little bit more about that?

Mitch Weathers:

Sure. I love talking about that. It all really stemmed from my early thinking. I didn't have the vocabulary, if you will, to explain what we're all talking about right now. But I just had this gnawing sense when I got into the classroom. I'm based in Northern California and taught at a large Title 1 public high school. And most of my students were multi-language learners. And funny enough, my master's degree is cross cultural pedagogy.

So here I am technically, you know, quasi expert. I'm supposed to know how to bridge this gap. And I didn't, I really didn't. But as I got to know this student, my students in my first few years, it just became clear like, oh, you can, you're totally capable of doing this, being successful, but you're not being successful. And that means I'm not being successful. So what's missing? And I just started, of course, reading like crazy, voraciously devouring books, trying to just figure out, going to professional development and trying to answer that question like, how can I help these students be successful? And from that, through iteration, iteration. I had designed this system that really is predicated on a predictable daily routine. How we begin, how we transition, where we put our stuff, how we conclude, all that kind of doing school stuff that doesn't get in the way with the teaching of your grade level subject area or the content.

If you're in a secondary or in a college setting, be mindful of that because we already talked about the time crunch we all face. And really what it comes down to, I call it in the first book I explained it is the three keys, clarity, modeling and routine. Where I'm going to clearly model, hence this physical binder that you can see and there's a class sample, and that binder is the tool to participate or engage in this daily routine. And as a byproduct of each step of the routine, students get practice and exposure to these various executive functions. So we're going to start with, how I explain it is, and it's not flexing like a muscle, but like flexing your working memory through retrieval practice and spaced retrieval every day. We're going to begin that way, we're going to conclude that way. And we know through Marzano and others’ research that just the more opportunities to or more exposure to what I'm learning another way, engaging my working memory, holding things in that active cognitive space, the more likely I am to retain it.

That process is important. So I don't want to have to start class and be like, okay kids, think about this thing. Because the more you think about it, it doesn't work that way either. Like, you know, get metacognitive. Like no, it's got to be this, this byproduct of routine. Second step, we're practicing time and task management with the calendar. Third step, we're going to take a moment, 30 seconds to get organized every single day. And so it's really built on predictable learning environments.

And as a byproduct of those, students get practice with an exposure to these executive functions, specifically the higher order. But all of that is rooted in everything Sarah just said, protecting working memory. So I talk about working memory front and center in the first book too. Even though it is kind of a higher order executive function focus. Same thing with Organized Binder. Because the more predictable the environment, the less of that cognitive bandwidth which is working memory. I'm used to navigating the environment. So with Organized Binder it creates, it's such a predictable environment that I don't even have to use words to explain.

It's color coded. There's all this non verbal visual cueing. And the beginning or its genesis was I was trying to reduce the amount of mental calories my multi language learners had to use just to keep up. Because I felt that it was an equity issue if it was a heterogeneous classroom because you're translating everything you're hearing, everything you're reading, and the kid sitting next to you is not, how's that fair? They just have it because they speak that language. So it's everything Sarah just said, which is the second book, but kind of focused at the higher order. And with Organized Binder I had mentioned a program with the materials. The other thing worth noting that's different from the book Sarah and I just wrote in the first one is there is kind of a program element. There is this physical binder, there's these materials, they're manipulating them, they're having to do stuff with them.

And we could talk about all of that. But any time you do have some type of programming or systems, teacher load is a real thing too. And so what I didn't want to do is with Organized Binder, you're asking about is say hey, here's what we know, here's the researchers, the programming. Now go create this program and maintain it and all that stuff can trip up or get in the way of getting to the work of it all. And so with myself and my team at Organized Binder, if Sarah was implementing Organized Binder in her classroom, there'd be, we call them the Student Bundle. They get everything they need for the entire school year. We engage in the ongoing training and support of teachers and they can just focus on the work as opposed to having to create something. So that's a little bit about it.

Lauren:

Yeah. Well, I wanted to thank you both so much for being here today and I wanted to give you both a chance, not to put you on the spot, but if there's anything that I didn't ask that you wanted to talk about before we wrap up.

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

I would just say, I think, primary teachers are teaching the foundation for an academic career. So it is so important that during those years our students are successful. And so we hope that this book really makes primary teachers feel seen and valued and speaks to the world that, hey, we're important, we need our own context and executive functions are important for everyone, even adults. But for our little ones who are just developing their identity as a student, in addition to all the content that we teach, we just, we hope that this is super helpful and we thank all the primary teachers for what they do.

Mitch Weathers:

I'll echo that, Lauren. We really wanted primary teachers to be heard and seen. And my journey with Sarah in writing this book, it's funny I mentioned my mom before. It became very evident to me that every secondary teacher would benefit from spending some time in a really gifted primary teacher's classroom that's equipped with this executive functioning knowledge. Just the intentionality, the chunking, the everything they do. So yeah, I just want to echo what Sarah's saying that it really is different and it's the most important. Not that the other grades aren't important of course, but none of that happens. You can't show up to my 9th grade class and I give you multi step directions for a 15 minute group activity and it goes pretty well without what Sarah's doing and everyone else in primary. So hats off to them. I want you to be heard and seen through this book.

Lauren:

Absolutely, so glad you both brought up that point. That's so key. And thank you so much for your work and for these books that I think are going to help a lot of educators and their students. And I wanted to thank you again for your time and for being on the podcast. It was a pleasure to have you.

Dr. Sarah Oberle:

Thanks Lauren. Same Thanks Lauren.

Mitch Weathers:

It was fun. Nice chatting with you.

Lauren:

Thank you for listening to the LDA Podcast. To learn more about LDA and to get valuable resources and support, visit LDAAmerica.org.