An area I greatly enjoy working with students and their families on is Time Management and Executive Functioning.  Usually the student has landed in middle school and the parents are beside themselves because their son or daughter cannot remember to bring home their planner, much less write down the homework assignment.  Their backpack and room are a mess, they’ve handed in half their assignments for the quarter and each party is tired of yelling at each other!  This is where I usually enter the picture.  Somebody heard from somebody, that this situation can be healed.

Well there’s some good news and some bad news.  At this point the student (if they’re motivated to change) can begin to learn some strategies to increase the likelihood that they’ll begin remembering assignments and eventually need less reminders about cleaning up their room.  Adolescents are developing in their abilities related to insight, judgment, inhibition, reasoning and social conscience.  So you’ll begin to see signs of a light at the end of the tunnel.

The bad news is that their frontal lobe development is not fully complete until the age of 25.  So even into their college years, students who struggle with time management and organization may need support with remembering their assignments, among other things.  In addition, it becomes even more troublesome for the parent to be the one who takes on the role of constant reminder. It is a wise and healthy step to enroll a third party not only for support, but also to learn new strategies and begin the life-long dialogue between parent and child about how to organize one’s life.  If your family can related to these challenges, please don’t hesitate to give me a call.  Best of luck!