Family Handbook 2019-20

Academic Practices

Executive Functions Havergal College students are supported in developing ten executive functioning (EF) skills. When combined together, these functions and skills help organize the many processes that take place in your brain. They allow people to plan, organize and complete tasks more effectively. Below are the 10 executive functioning skills that we believe are important in helping our students to grow up into resilient and empowered young women: 1. Emotional Control ​ : The ability to recognize and regulate emotions in order to achieve goals, complete tasks and direct behaviour. 2. Shifting and Flexibility: ​ The ability to move appropriately from one situation to another; the ability to revise plans in the face of obstacles, setbacks, new information or mistakes. 3. Goal-Directed Persistence ​ : The capacity to persevere and follow a task through to completion. 4. Metacognition / Reflection: ​ The ability to self-monitor and self-evaluate by asking, “how am I doing?” or “how did I do?” 5. Planning and Organization: ​ The ability to create a roadmap, make decisions and prioritize for task completion; the ability to design and maintain systems for tracking information and materials. 6. Response Inhibition: ​ The capacity to stop, evaluate and think before you act. 7. Time Management: ​ The capacity to estimate and use time effectively. 8. Sustained Attention: ​ The capacity to attend to a situation or task in spite of distractibility, fatigue or lack of interest. 9. Task Initiation: ​ The ability to begin a task in a timely fashion. 10. Working Memory: ​ The ability to hold information and past experience / learning in mind while performing complex tasks.

Last Edited: August 20, 2019 Havergal College Family Handbook 2019–20

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