599- Parent-Child Executive Function Training: Help Yourself, Help Your Child  🔗 **Source:** [599- Parent-Child Executive Function Training: Help Yourself, Help Your Child](https://share.snipd.com/episode/a90349f7-ba9c-4d99-ae1e-6935f6801ba3) ## Highlights - **Measure Parenting By Process Not Product** - Define parenting success by your process, not your child's behavior. - Tamar Kahana says learning is slow; measure success by how you implement skills, not immediate child compliance. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. And then we're going to talk a little bit about the brain and understanding the neuroscience behind this. And then we're going to talk very quickly about EF and SEL, about executive functioning and social emotional learning. And then we're going to spend some time diving deeper into five foundational skills powers that are going to help you move from feeling helpless to feeling more empowered or from feeling More agency in your life in terms of knowing how to help yourself and help your child. And today's seminar is mostly going to be for directed to parents. That being said, all these skills that you're going to be learning today are going to be helpful to you regardless of whether you are or not a parent. So the next slide is really about three mindset shifts like we spoke about that are going to help you move from feeling to feeling more empowered in your life. They're paradigm shifts. The first one is product to process. The second one is external control to internal control and connection. And the third one is from behavior to skill. Let's start with the first one, from product to process. Most of us define our success with our child generally based on them doing what they need to be doing. If they're doing what they need to be doing, then we're successful as a parent. What's the problem with that? Well, really, there are two problems with that. The first problem is that we cannot control their behavior. And so it's kind of a setup for us to feel hopeless. As much as we would like to be able to control their behavior, understandably, and we think we can sometimes, the reality is we can't. And so defining our success based on their behavior is not terribly helpful. The second problem with being in a product approach is that we try things and we say, I tried that, doesn't work. I tried that, doesn't work. And we ping pong from one parenting strategy to the next or from one teaching strategy to the next. And we stay stuck and we don't give our child an opportunity to really learn. Because by definition, learning doesn't happen like that. Learning is a process and it takes time. And so I'd like to invite everybody here today to redefine their success with their children, not based on whether their child did what they expected them to do, not based on their child's Behavior, but based on how they are implementing and practicing the skills that they're learning. ([Time 0:05:40](https://share.snipd.com/snip/e317b72a-6167-4dc3-84af-ec1bf79fc0c8)) - **See Misbehavior As A Skill Deficit** - Discipline should be a learning opportunity that teaches cause and effect. - Kahana reframes misbehavior as skill deficits and asks parents to identify what skill to teach in the moment. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. Many of us, again, define our success based on whether we can control our child. And that leads us to doing things like using fear-based model to get them to do what we want them to do, maybe threatening them, maybe screaming at them, right? It comes from a good place. We want them to be successful. Get it. I understand. And in the moment, we can even get them to do what we want them to do based on that sometimes. But I promise you, this has a short shelf life. And inadvertently what it does is it breeds rebelliousness in your child and it prevents them from learning to be able to connect the dots. What do I mean by connect the dots? Ultimately, discipline at its best is a learning opportunity. It's a time to teach your child something. What are we trying to teach them? We're trying to teach them to see cause and effect. If I do this, this is what happens. If I do this, this is what happens. That's what enables them to make good choices for themselves. And we know children with ADHD have a harder time with this. So it's even more important that we shift and think about discipline as a time to teach them something. And if you think about kind of, if we're going to use discipline in this way, we need to be asking ourself, instead of saying, why are they being so difficult, the behavior, we want to move To the skill. And we want to be asking ourselves, huh, this behavior is actually representative of a skill deficit. This misbehavior right now is coming from a place of my child having not yet developed the skills they need to be successful. What is it that I need to teach them at this moment to help them? ([Time 0:08:47](https://share.snipd.com/snip/9bc3a488-267c-4c75-94b4-648b15048282)) - **Teach When The Upper Brain Is Online** - Teach when the 'upper brain' (prefrontal cortex) is online because regulation enables learning. - Kahana uses Dan Siegel's brain-in-hand model to explain that dysregulation disables executive functioning. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. Okay. So I like to use the brain in the palm of my hand. It's Dan Siegel's model of the brain. Looks just like a brain, doesn't it? And explain to you the following. This here is the upper brain. It's where the prefrontal cortex is lodged. Where executive functioning is lodged. It's our reasonable, logical brain. Okay. It's our human brain, our upper brain. Here is the limbic system. Here is the amygdala. The limbic system is the seat of our emotions. Here is our lower brainstem, our sensory brain, our lizard brain. It responds more quickly. So when our amygdala gets triggered, our upper brain, our reasonable logical mind, goes offline a bit. Yeah, goes offline a bit, which means that we don't have access to our reasonable logical minds at those times. Right? So if we're dysregulated, we're not fully, our upper brain is not fully online. If our child is dysregulated, their upper brain is not fully online. Not the best time to teach, especially if we're talking about a child who has ADHD. Because why? Their executive functioning is not very well developed to begin with. We wanna make sure they're fully online when we're disciplining them, which means we need to be regulated and they need to be regulated. ([Time 0:12:39](https://share.snipd.com/snip/dec7d189-babb-4479-a8f2-e68af8ad01c6)) - **Use The POWERS Framework For EF And SEL** - Use the POWERS acronym to teach executive and social skills: Prioritize, Organize, Work, Exercise, Regulate, Social Awareness. - Kahana defines each core skill and ties them to EF/SEL challenges in ADHD. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. So POWERS is an acronym. There are six core skills to POWERS. You can see on the slide. Prioritize. Organize. Prioritize is about managing our time. And I'm going to end. Organize is about organizing our thoughts, our things, our feelings, our space, and time. Work is about developing work endurance in our children, helping them learn how to work hard to persevere. You can pretty much get better at anything in life if we raise our children to be good at working hard. And so work is about helping them grow their work endurance. Exercise we use to help children regulate their emotions, their attention, obviously very important for this community, and their fatigue, right? Exercise can help us all with all these things. Okay. And regulate is about regulating our emotions. And social awareness is about our ability to be in a meaningful relationship, to be able to perspective take, all those other things that we mentioned before. ([Time 0:18:24](https://share.snipd.com/snip/d540a719-50ed-4e5a-b310-82216c061e90)) - **Foundation Skills Feed The POWERS Tree** - Foundational skills nourish all POWERS abilities; Kahana highlights five to start: neuroplasticity, give the gift to get the gift, knowledge vs skill, ask don't tell, pause praise progress. - These form a reusable toolbox for daily parenting moments. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. And those are the skills we're going to be focusing on today. What are the foundational skills? The foundational skills are represented by the earth that has the nutrients in it to nourish this entire beautiful tree. Without the foundational skills, and there are 12 foundational skills and powers. I'm only going to be teaching five today. Don't get too anxious about it. But the 12 foundational skills, powers, without those skills, this tree would not be able to grow and thrive and powers wouldn't be powers. And they're represented by the earth here that nourishes this entire beautiful tree. Okay, for today's focus, we're going to focus on five foundational skills. Neuroplasticity, give the gift to get the gift, knowledge versus skill, ask, don't tell, and pause, praise, progress. ([Time 0:21:08](https://share.snipd.com/snip/706dd558-9e71-44e3-bdff-96903c41fed1)) - **Teach Neuroplasticity To Change Identity** - Emphasize neuroplasticity: brains change with practice so ADHD differences don't define potential. - Kahana recounts a 22-year-old who believed she 'can't' until taught that skills can grow with practice. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. The first one I like to start with, and that we do start with at the center, is the foundational skill of neuroplasticity. Which is what? It's the awareness of neuroplasticity, which is the brain's ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections throughout life. Meaning our brains can literally change and grow in response to learning, practice, and experience. We can grow new neural pathways to process things. This is a wonderful place to start and really, really important for us to keep in mind and have that awareness of neuroplasticity. ADHD reflects differences in how our brain activates and connects. It explains why things are hard. It does not define your child's potential. I want to take a moment to just share with you a story from a child, not a child, a young adult that I saw at the center who I met with her parents first. She had seen three to four people before me. She was 22 years old and really, really struggling in college to get by. And so I met with her parents just to get a full history. She asked me to before I met with her. And then at my first meeting with her, I began to talk to her about her struggles and what her goals were for herself. And she looked at me and she said to me, Dr. Kahana, didn't you meet with my parents? I said, yeah. And she said, well, didn't they tell you? I have ADHD. I can't do any of those things. And I said to her, yes, I did meet with your parents. And yes, they did tell me that you have ADHD. And yes, those things are definitely harder for you because you have ADHD. And I can absolutely help you get better at them. And I taught her about neuroplasticity. ([Time 0:22:19](https://share.snipd.com/snip/d084b441-7e5e-46f6-aab6-1896db90fe85)) - **Develop Your Skills Before Expecting Yours** - Give the gift to get the gift: develop skills you weren't given so you can model and teach them to your child. - Kahana urges parents to regulate, listen, and apologize to model skills like flexibility and repair. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. If I have this cup of tea my child is really, really thirsty and I love them. Of course, I have this cup of tea to give them and I'm going to give it to them. And I can do that. What if I don't have this cup of tea to give? And they're really, really thirsty and I want to give it to them and I love them. I'm not going to be able to give it to them. Give the gift to get the gift is about the following. We all have been given certain gifts by our parents. And I don't mean gifts like presents. I mean certain skills that we've been given generationally from our parents that we want to give to our children. Good stuff that we've been given. And we all have stuff probably that we don't want to give to our children. It's very easy to give the gifts that we have. I have it. I can give it to you. But if I don't have it, I need to first develop it so that I can give it to you. So give the gift to get the gift is as follows. It's about if I want my child to become more regulated, then I need to get better at regulating myself. Not easy, especially if I haven't been given that gift, right? And we just learned about neuroplasticity. We know we can develop those things. We can get better at them. And it's a process, not a product. It will take time. And there are things you can do absolutely enough. Watched it over and over again at the center. So give the gift to get the gift. If I want my child to get better at listening to me, which I'm guessing everybody here in this audience, all of you would like that, then I need to get better at listening to them. And I don't mean doing what they say. And you're probably thinking, oh my gosh, what is she talking about? I need to listen to my child. I'm the parent. I don't mean do what they say. And I don't mean listen to them in the sense that you're agreeing with them. What I mean is we need to take a moment to pause and understand their perspective. Because when we can do that, then they will have the gift to give back to us and to everybody. So give the gift to get the gift. If you want your child to get better at apologizing for their mistakes. We need to get better at apologizing for our mistakes. It sounds easy. It's not. Give the gift to get the gift is about recognizing the gifts that we want to give to our children and working on giving them. ([Time 0:24:47](https://share.snipd.com/snip/dbe66b09-d372-4416-b71a-34f406716d34)) - **Treat Knowing As Different From Doing** - Distinguish knowledge from skill and expect practice; don't assume knowing equals ability. - Kahana compares a few tennis lessons (knowledge) to actual playing skill to explain repeated practice is required. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. The next foundational skill powers is called knowledge versus skill. Knowledge is easy to acquire. Skill, not so much. We all have more knowledge than skill, including myself. And it's really important for us to begin to notice that. Knowledge is like if I take a few tennis lessons, I'm going to have the knowledge of where to stand on the court, how to hold my racket, how to change my grip, how to keep score, all those Things. I'll have a lot of knowledge after a few tennis lessons. Will I have skill? Will I be able to be a tennis player? Of course not, right? And if I thought I would be a tennis player after a few tennis lessons, then what would happen? I'd likely throw my racket on the ground and say, tennis isn't for me. This isn't working. I'm terrible at tennis, right? So knowledge versus skill is about inviting you to notice when you have those moments where you have the knowledge, but you don't yet have the skill of that thing, or where your child Has the knowledge and doesn't yet have the skill of that thing. Really important to start to notice those moments. It's going to help you get unstuck. And in particular with children with ADHD in this community, ADHD is not a knowledge problem. These kids are very bright. It's an activation problem. It's a skill problem. So those knowledge skill gaps tend to be very big with children who have ADHD and very confusing for us as adults with our kids who have ADHD. I don't get it. They know they're supposed to do this. Why aren't they doing it? Right? So our job is to begin to get curious about those moments where we have more knowledge than we have skill and make that tweak with a kind inner voice, both for ourselves and our children. ([Time 0:30:50](https://share.snipd.com/snip/763f9e91-00bc-43bd-bde9-29aafc153681)) - **Activate Kids With Ask Don't Tell** - Use Ask Don't Tell to activate a child's executive function instead of doing tasks for them. - Kahana's clinic example: asking 'What are you forgetting?' triggered a 10-year-old to retrieve his coat and water bottle himself. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. And this is really, really helpful in terms of activating your child's EF. Ask, don't tell. This is something you can put into action right away with your child. Ask, don't tell. Children with ADHD get told what to do 24-7. Why? Because they have poor EF skills. And we are kind of carrying their EF in a sense. We are functioning as their external EF. Doesn't work well. Not for them and not for us. Ask, don't tell. What it does is it helps our children turn on their own brain and practice activation. Wow. Children with ADHD, we know, have difficulty getting activated and noticing what they need to do. I'm going to share a quick story with you of an application of Ask, Don't Tell from the center, from a boy I saw this week, who came into the office. He's about 10 years old. And he had a coat and a big water bottle. And he left the coat as he's at the end of the session, he left the coat on my couch and the water bottle on the floor. And as he was walking out the door, in two seconds or less, I could have said to him, make up a name, Jason, you left your coat and your water bottle here. And he would have taken it and that would have been it. But at that moment, I would have been functioning as his external EF. Instead, I used the power skill, ask, don't tell. And I said, Jason, what are you forgetting? Oops, I think you forgot something. And he looked like that and he goes, I don't know. And then he looked around. He said, oh, my coat and my water bottle. And he took them. That was a tiny moment. But that tiny moment is helping him get activated. It's helping him increasingly become more aware of his environment. And if we can do this with our kids in micro moments all the time, it's a game changer because we're literally scaffolding executive functioning at those moments. ([Time 0:33:12](https://share.snipd.com/snip/f080e5a8-2dad-49bd-8984-958a0b831b72)) - **Use Triple P To Celebrate Progress** - Practice Pause Praise Progress (Triple P) to notice wins and sustain process-based parenting. - Kahana teaches a self-hug gesture to acknowledge parental and child efforts and reduce focus on mistakes. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. The next foundational skill of powers that is very near and dear to my heart is what I call the triple P. Pause, praise, progress. It's about giving yourself a little hug, literally a little hug. You can all take your hands for a second and go like this. I know it looks silly. But it's about giving yourself that moment of giving yourself credit for the good stuff you do. I work with parents all the time. And I find when I start with them, they can tell me everything they did that was wrong, all the mistakes they made and their children made. They have a much harder time identifying the good stuff that they're doing. And pause, praise, progress is an antidote to that. It's kind of helping you begin to notice the good stuff you do. And when you define your success based on a process, not a product, this is really like the nutrient that feeds your ability to do that in a sense. It helps you shift from a product into a process-oriented approach. Remember, as power as parents, you define success not based on your child's behavior, but based on your efforts. And this skill can be incredibly helpful in nourishing and nurturing that. Pause, praise, progress. Your own progress, your child, the other people in your life that you love, if you're not a parent, it's the triple P. ([Time 0:35:36](https://share.snipd.com/snip/fe22e53d-fed5-4453-a268-2d07d7dbddf6)) - **Repair Early Relationship Gaps With Awareness** - Repair relationships by naming awareness, apologizing, and using kind self-talk. - Kahana reassures parents they can rebuild even if they lacked skills earlier, citing awareness as the key to change. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. I want to start by saying to this woman that awareness is the key that unlocks change. And when we have that awareness, that awareness, maybe we weren't given those things, it's super important not to totalize ourself around that awareness, right? So clearly, if you're asking this question, what I would say to you is you're obviously a loving mommy who cares deeply about your child, or you wouldn't be here today at the seminar and You wouldn't be asking this question and the answer to this question is yes it's a process and yes you can and remember when I said give the gift to get the gift if you want your child to get Better acknowledging their mistakes then it's really helpful to learn to acknowledge your own and to do it in a kind way, not by totalizing yourself for it, but by saying, you know, I'm A pretty good mom. Maybe I'm a really good mom and I have a problem that I scream and I'm working on it and I'm sorry. So yes, absolutely. Give yourself a triple P for being here today, wherever you are. ([Time 0:44:44](https://share.snipd.com/snip/5f709ad6-987b-4c43-afde-de8f7d30fdec)) - **Step Back Gradually From Doing Everything** - Step out of being your family's external executive function gradually; scaffold rather than abandon. - Kahana suggests stepping out with Ask Don't Tell and letting short-term misses happen for long-term skill gains. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. So I think what I'm hearing is you have this awareness that you need to step out so they can step in. And yet you're also worried about, uh-oh, there are these things that they need to do that they're not going to get done if I step out. So remember, this is a scaffolding and you don't need to leap out. You can step out. What does that mean? It means that you can ask, don't tell. Try that. That's one strategy. But I think also just that awareness for all of us here today of the fact that I said this before, I'm going to say it again, is children who have EF difficulties and have ADHD need more or Less practice doing these things. They need more and they get less for that reason. So sometimes you also need to forego a short-term goal for the long-term goal and allow them to actually, yes, miss an assignment or these things. ([Time 0:46:55](https://share.snipd.com/snip/1fe9eddf-80b7-491e-aca6-43c67efd9909)) - **Use Empathy To Unlock Flexibility** - Label moments of rigidity with empathy and offer structured flexibility. - Kahana suggests saying, 'You're having a hard time being flexible' then offering compromises like brief rewards or trade-offs. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. Well, that's definitely part of my book. That's a really good question. So the whole concept of the powers methodology and philosophy is about organizing our brain in a way that we can retrieve the skills more readily, apply them more often, and take the Knowledge that we have and grow the skill. So you're asking a really good question, which is, and I'm going to answer it, which is, yes, you should be labeling it as a problem with flexibility, meaning that your child is struggling, Not in a critical way. Remember, we want to keep our child's brain online in a curious way, like you're having trouble being, and again, you'll make mistakes. I don't want anybody to leave here thinking they need to be perfect parents. That would mean that I did not do a good job today. I want to make sure that everybody understands that we'll make mistakes. Define your success simply by applying these skills, which means make mistakes with my child, acknowledge it. Okay. Sorry, honey, I made a mistake. I shouldn't have X, whatever it is. It liberates us. Promise. Many of us never had parents who said I made a mistake. So it's very hard to give that gift, but it's really helpful to develop it because it helps us grow and learn. We know that. We don't necessarily have the skill of that. ([Time 0:49:35](https://share.snipd.com/snip/dd79b85d-b0de-4a3d-b18b-4bff6a71ab98)) - **Use Befores And Afters To Manage Mornings** - Structure mornings using 'befores' and 'afters' and use afters as intrinsic motivators. - Kahana recommends checklists and conditional screen time (after tasks done) to reduce morning chaos and support activation. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. So we know mornings are transitions and therefore they're often triggers and stressful and there are certain deadlines that we need to accomplish. Is that correct, Nicole? Is that what you were asking kind of thing? How do we hear both those things? Am I understanding you? Yep. Yeah. Okay. So how do we do that? So one thing that we can do that I find to be incredibly helpful is to, in our own head, understand what are the befores, what are the afters, and structure our children in terms of that. You know, we can't give that gift if we're not aware of that ourselves. Children, if they came with a manual, especially children who have ADHD, the manual would say, structure me, please. I think that might be one of my Instagram posts. By the way, please follow me on Instagram if you'd like to get more tips like this and just kind of, actually, I don't even like to call it tips because it's much deeper than that. If you'd like to get more tools and strategies and skills, but to develop them. But in any event, so what does that look like in the morning? So it looks like you say to your, you use ask, don't tell, and you say to your child, what are your befores? And you pause and you let them come up with the answer. And then what are the afters? And maybe you scaffold that by making a checklist of all their befores and what are the afters? What's beautiful about that is the afters really are motivators and children with ADHD have a hard time motivating themselves. I think we're almost out of time. Is that correct? Yes. Nicole Carr We have five more minutes. Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. Okay. Keep going. Nicole Carr We've got five whole minutes. Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. Okay. I just got a warning sign. So I wasn't sure what that was about. Ignore and proceed. Okay. Okay. So anyway, so basically what you want to do is you want to try and set it up. So there is a motivator because again, children who have ADHD have trouble activating themselves. So you want to use the afters as an intrinsic motivator, not, not a threat, not a whatever, but an intrinsic motivator for if they can be finished with no, no screens the morning until A, B, C, D, and E are complete. And if they're complete, maybe you want to consider letting them have some screen time before school, as long as they can get to the bus on time and you have a plan in place for that. But that would be an example of how to kind of structure, use a sub-skill, just one sub-skill from prioritize, take it out of the toolbox and use that in the morning together with Ask, Don't Tell to grow that ability to have a calmer transition in the morning, so to speak. ([Time 0:53:02](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ae71c9d4-edcd-456d-984e-d642e921dab7)) - **Apply Ask Don't Tell In Classrooms** - Teachers can use Ask Don't Tell and regulate their own tone to support classroom EF. - Kahana shares a teacher example where asking 'Where do you need to be?' prompted a student to self-initiate walking to phys ed. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. Here's a great example. We train teachers sometimes. I just got a call yesterday, a few days ago from a teacher who's working as a, like a CET for a child who has ADHD. And, you know, we could talk about teachers who were in charge of the whole class too, but this is a great example come to life where this girl has a lot of difficulty transitioning from One thing to the next, and she does not like phys ed. And it was phys ed time, and the classroom was empty, except for her with this para., the educator said to her, you know, it looks like the classroom's empty. Where do you need to be right now? And she was shocked to see, because she had just kind of attended a training that I had done. She was shocked to see that this girl said, oh, we have phys ed. And she actually walked to phys ed. So ask, don't tell can be a really helpful way to help children as teachers turn on, you know, teachers help their students, excuse me, turn on their own brain as well and be more self-directed And strengthen their EF. There are lots and lots of other ways that teachers can do this. Obviously, the most effective teachers in the classroom are the teachers that give the gift to get the gift with regard to regulation. The teachers who are effective in the classroom when the kids get dysregulated or behavior problems tend to focus on their own regulation. They maybe turn off the lights. They start talking in a quieter tone, right? They're really giving the gift to get the gift. They're working on regulating themselves so they can help regulate the entire classroom. ([Time 0:56:14](https://share.snipd.com/snip/2aba10b0-869e-4417-b4c4-9c9f922c6a9e)) - **Spot Power Struggles By The Argument Pattern** - Power struggles show up when parents and kids argue with fixed reasons and neither listens. - Kahana advises pausing and listening to understand the child's perspective first to defuse escalation. Transcript: Tamar Kahana, Psy.D. Parents, you know, I love what you said because that's the first step. You need to identify. You have to have that awareness. Oh, my goodness, I'm in a power struggle right now. That awareness is what's going to be the key that unlocks change if you're able to step out of it. That being said, typically a power struggle emerges when you start arguing with your child and giving them all the good reasons why they're wrong. And they're not exactly taking out their earplugs. They're usually giving you all the good reasons if they're still, you know, speaking and not screaming for why you're wrong, right? And so what can you do? Give the gift to get the gift. It's a great moment to unlock that. How do you unlock it? You start by just taking a pause and listening to understand what is my child saying at this given moment? I don't need to agree with them. I'm just gonna hear their perspective first and then maybe they'll take out their earplugs and hear mine. ([Time 0:58:35](https://share.snipd.com/snip/fd2de6f5-b971-47d5-b55c-41fe90917b8b))