Executive Functioning Mini Series: Part 2 - Principles of Effective Executive Functioning Intervention
Regardless of whether you’re interacting with a neurotypical or neurodivergent person, there needs to be a give and take in the relationship, and all parties need to consider how their behavior impacts others or how they’re coming across. This is important for self-advocacy, independent functioning, as well as maintaining healthy relationships.
That’s why I’m excited to share the second paradigm shift multidisciplinary teams can make when supporting executive functioning. You can learn about the first paradigm shift here.
In the first article of this series, I shared why we want to think of “social skills” or “pragmatic language” under the umbrella of executive functioning.
When done correctly, social skills intervention (or more accurately, intervention focused on executive functioning for social interactions) can give kids the skills they need to navigate the nuances of human relationships. Assuming they won’t be able to learn these skills puts them in a very vulnerable situation, as I explain in this post.
Kids also need to interact with peers and adults throughout their school day, so these skills are academically relevant.
But do social skills groups work?
The way people often do them, they typically don’t. However, that can change if we rethink the purpose of the “social skills group” and where it fits within your service delivery plan.
Many social skills groups are delivered as if they’re the “complete package”. In other words, the student, or students, come in for therapy, do some role play or a less on plan discussing feelings or social rules, and the intervention protocol ends there.
There might be an attempt at collaboration between professionals, but those collaborative efforts are thought of as the icing on the cake, not the cake itself.
When social skills groups are done that way, there is poor generalization (regardless of the credentials and skills of the person leading the intervention).
Sometimes kids may try to apply what they’ve learned to peer interactions, but it ends up feeling forced and awkward for them because they’ve learned a list of contrived rules instead of truly learning to read the room and respond during social interactions.
Many people draw the conclusion that we should ditch the idea of “social skills” or “social-emotional learning” completely, which is problematic.
It’s equally problematic to make the assumption that all social skills interventions are ableist. If you’re focusing on things like situational awareness and perspective taking, you’re teaching kids skills that are important for both neurotypical and neurodivergent people.
So…what is the “right” way to do social skills groups?
My first suggestion is to stop calling them “social skills groups”.
This could help reframe things for people and disrupt their default assumption of what happens in a “social skills group”.
Instead, we might just think of them as “meetings with students to prepare them for stuff coming up in their lives”.
In other words, there is an appropriate way for professionals to meet a student 1:1 or in groups to discuss upcoming events or situations; but the “meeting with students” is part of a bigger intervention plan, not the entire intervention.
It might still be listed as therapy minutes on their IEP, but we can think differently of how we utilize that time, and can potentially add some consultation minutes or accommodations to document other service models.
This goes back to the idea of “service delivery planning” vs. “therapy planning” because it requires multiple service delivery models.
Social skills groups have three components when we think of them as part of a larger service plan: Priming, Real-life Practice, and Review/Evaluation.
Priming includes planning and preparing for upcoming situations to give kids strategies and cues. This can include role-playing, practicing skills in a structured environment, and front-loading information or strategizing to help kids envision and plan ahead for future events. Here is an appropriate place in the service plan to do “meetings with students”.
Real-life practice is where the majority of the learning happens. Adults supporting kids in their daily life should be prepared to model and scaffold so kids can apply strategies they’ve been practicing in therapy. In order to make this happen, you’ll need to utilize other models like consultation, coaching, supporting materials, and a bigger strategic plan. This is not something we can do in a “social skills group” format; it needs to happen in a naturally occurring context (including a combination of structured academic and unstructured social situations).
Review/evaluation is a part of intervention where adults can help kids reflect on past situations, evaluate their ability to apply strategies, and help make decisions about how to use that new knowledge for future events. Within the same conversation, you may cycle back to priming for the future as you fine-tune skills and fade prompts. Here’s another place it would be appropriate to do “meetings with students”.
We want to start with the service plan and THEN insert the student groups where they fit, instead of thinking of the entire intervention as starting and ending with the group.
I’ll cover the third paradigm shift for multidisciplinary teams implementing executive functioning support in “Part 3” of this article series, which will help you implement multiple service delivery models even if you have time constraints.
About the Author
Dr. Karen Dudek-Brannan is the founder and owner/operator of Dr.Karen, LLC, a company focused on empowering therapists and educators to design interventions that support language, literacy, and executive functioning. She has a doctorate in Special Education and Director of Special Education and Assistive Technology credentials from Illinois State University, as well asa master’s and bachelor’s from Illinois State University in speech-language pathology. She spent 14 years in the school systems and has held various roles in leadership and higher education teaching and mentoring clinicians. She is the host of the De Facto Leaders podcast, where she shares evidence-based practices, her own experiences, and guest interviews on topics relating to education and healthcare form. She currently holds a management role with the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.
You can connect with Dr. Karen on LinkedIn here.
Sign up for her “How to Be Evidence-Based and Neurodiversity-Affirming bySupporting Executive Functioning” training here.
Download her “Executive Functioning Implementation Guide for SchoolTeams” here.
Listen to the DeFacto Leaders podcast here.
