ADHD, Executive Function, and Perfectionism
Why can it feel so difficult for kids with ADHD to get started on a task? Why can they feel like they’d rather not do something at all than potentially do it wrong? What’s the most supportive way to bring up the subject of ADHD with your child?
Megan Barnett and I could talk about these questions for hours — and we nearly did just that on this week’s jam-packed episode. Megan is an ADHD & Executive Function coach with The Learning Collective; she and I have really bonded over our fascination with neurodiversity, high sensitivity, perfectionism, and our missions to be the compassionate advocates and educators we needed as kids ourselves.
What are executive function skills?
Executive function skills allow us to self-regulate and execute tasks. Time management, planning and prioritizing, and goal-oriented persistence are the classic executive function skills we recognize, like being able to make a plan, work through the plan, and persist through the end.
Executive Function Skills
Planning & prioritizing
Goal-oriented persistence
Working memory
Time management
Organization
Emotional regulation
Task initiation
Sustained attention
Flexibility
Metacognition
Response inhibition
Procrastination is one of the more common challenges we notice when a child’s executive function skills are impacted. It’s a manifestation of several executive functions all wrapped together: task initiation, time blindness, planning, and prioritizing.
One of the most effective things we can do for kids when this happens is to help them find activation activities. These are 5 to 10-minute activities that get the gears turning for their executive functions: playing with the dog, getting a snack, active and creative play — anything short and enjoyable that can help them transition from one task to another.
When a person is diagnosed with ADHD, these executive functions are the skill sets that are primarily impacted.
Russell Barkley, a leading psychologist in the field of ADHD research, found that children with ADHD may have up to a 30% difference in their executive function skill set compared to a child of the same chronological age. So a 15-year-old with ADHD, for example, may have executive function skill sets at around a 12 or 13-year-old level.
That not only helps put their behavior into perspective but also helps makes sense of why a lot of kids in middle school and high school start to struggle; there's more demands put on how many tasks they need to complete and how many things they need to stay on top of.
How can I tell if my child’s executive function is impacted?
Giftedness and ADHD
Often if a child is gifted that can mask some of the struggles of ADHD. These are the kids who can pass a test and be secretly shocked because they didn't even know the test was that day. And sometimes you only start to see the impacts of their executive function difference when they reach high school. There's such a sudden increase in the demand on executive function, and that's when we start to see challenges come through.
One common sign is if they have challenges with working memory. So you may notice that they truly don't know what they're supposed to be accomplishing for homework or what tasks they have to complete. They may be struggling to hold that information in their working memory, which is what we would use to write down a phone number, for example.
Distractability or frequently zoning out is another. We usually see this with the ‘inattentive’ type of ADHD, and it’s more common in females than it is in males. It's often diagnosed later too because kids don't display those outward characteristics that we all, even pediatricians, associate with ADHD.
And there’s also hyperactivity, which is classically what people think of with ADHD. Sometimes hyperactivity is combined with distractability as well.
How cognitive offloading can help with working memory
Cognitive offloading is taking a task from your working memory and physically putting it down somewhere. It doesn’t matter where as long as we’re offloading — some students love carrying a notebook, some keep a whiteboard by their desk, and some who prefer not to go the handwritten route use a Google doc.
It’s a simple yet highly effective skill you can teach your child. And we can combine it with building time awareness as well. We can include an extra column or parentheses to say how many minutes we think a task should take.
Including some form of a “have I completed this yet?” checkbox helps with executive function too, since it encourages working through a plan and persisting to the end.
Perfectionism, procrastination, and analysis paralysis
We see these traits really often when it comes to multi-step assignments — big projects, big essays, things that span a few weeks. One thing parents can try is to go over the directions with their kids to help them navigate: how are you interpreting what these instructions mean? How many slides have to be about this topic? What is the rubric telling you that needs to be the deliverables?
Breaking down assignments like that helps kids get un-stuck from their perfectionist cycle of wonder what exactly they need to do. That’s the murkiness that leads to the spinning stage and ultimately turns into procrastination.
“What does done look like? Not something that we would submit for a Nobel prize, but what does getting it completed look like? These questions can really help a kid start the task, and then they build momentum from there. You’ve helped them get over that awful overwhelming mountain they have to climb to task initiate.”
Kids with ADHD might often feel this strong pull of “I would rather not do it at all than potentially do it wrong.” On the surface for a parent or a teacher that may come across as laziness or stubbornness or not getting work done in class. But underneath it’s the challenges with perfectionism, task initiation, and anxiety about what the outcome is supposed to look like.
How can we help kids feel more motivated to start a task?
If you often feel like it’s a struggle to motivate your child to start a task or if it seems to create tension each time, Megan’s three-step communication strategy may help.
Reflective Listening: “I'm hearing you say that this feels like it's going to take forever. You really want to play your video games right now. And this isn't due until Friday so it doesn't feel that important.” A key here is to be supporting; you're simply reflective back to the child what they’ve told you. Sometimes they’ll hear their words reflected back and realize it's really not that bad or feel like they can do it.
If they're not there yet and they agree you heard them correctly, the next step is validating.
Validating: Oftentimes, this is the missing piece that creates the struggle or the tension. Children feel like their parents aren’t understanding them, they're not hearing what I'm saying and don’t get how hard or overwhelming this is. So it’s important to recognize and validate their feelings. “I can see how this is really overwhelming.” “I can see how this feels like a lot.”
Redirecting: Then we can move onto starting the task. “Let’s take a look at the prompt.” “Let’s look at the scoring rubric.” It’s clearly and concisely redirecting the behavior. And then there's power in the pause — wait for them to respond.
More Resources Mentioned in the Episode
Connect with Megan! She’s @thelearningcollectiveatx on Instagram and her website is thelearningcollectiveatx.com.
You can also find the parent crash course and student workbook she mentioned at the end of the episode, which are so beautifully designed to be a child’s gateway to feeling calm and in control. (The Learning Collective Store).
The shareable pamphlet I mentioned at the end of the episode for creating equitable learning environments for all students (pamphlet).
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Still curious about anything we mentioned today? I'd love to hear what's on your mind.
It's really a dream come true to have a platform to discuss these issues that are so near and dear to my heart with you. And I'm just so grateful that you're here with me today and ready to support each other on our journeys.
