Elizabeth Ray’s Reviews > Smart but Scattered: The Revolutionary "Executive Skills" Approach to Helping Kids Reach Their Potential > Status Update

$25 worth of quarters in a jar and one gets removed for every item not picked up by 5 PM. At the end of the week, the family counts the money and decides how to spend it.

Give your kids internal scripts for coping. Say to your child, before you start this assignment, I want you to tell yourself that it’s gonna be hard, but you will stick with it if you get stuck, you will ask for help.

“Protect your middle schooler by doing whatever you can to minimize the stress that leads to bad decisions.” Stress requires them to use up a lot of their prefrontal cortex.

Strengthen response inhibition and delay gratification-
Use first, then schedules
Set a timer- you can XYZ in 5 minutes
Front loading waiting- what will we do if there’s a long line for the water slide?
Offer rewards quickly for showing self control

“You can play video games as soon as you clean your room.” Instead of “you can’t play video games until you clean your room.” Emphasize the positive.

Try to make their brain come up with the answer. Don’t tell them they have to clean their room before they can call a friend. Ask them, what do you need to do before you can call your friend? If they can’t come up with an answer, say clean your what?

Break the chore down into smaller steps. Have them take frequent breaks. You can have a tour menu where they get to choose which chore they want to do each day. Have an incentive. Fast clean sessions. Turn the chore into a game.

“How hard does this task feel to you on a scale of 1 to 10? How can we move it down the scale? Take breaks? Only work for X amount of time?”

Have your child do just the first or last part of a task when they are first learning. For example, smooth the bed sheet when making the bed. Add on another step when the first one is mastered.

Make a sign saying “is your assignment in your backpack?” Move it on top of your backpack at night. Put it back in your room the next morning once you put your assignment book in there.