June 2025: The Missing Piece: How Executive Functioning Shapes Your Child’s Success
As both a child mental health therapist and a speech-language pathologist, one of the most common concerns I hear from parents is:
“My child is so bright, but they can’t seem to manage their time, stay organized, or follow through on anything.”
If that sounds familiar, your child may be struggling with executive functioning - and that’s something we specialize in supporting here at Be a Problem Solver Services.
What Is Executive Functioning?
Think of executive functioning as the control tower of the brain. It manages the day-to-day operations of our behavior, emotions, and thoughts, helping us get things done, even when we don’t feel like it.
Executive functioning includes skills like:
These are the tools kids and adults use to function independently, whether that’s completing homework, navigating friendships, or managing big feelings.
How Executive Functioning Develops in Children
Executive function skills begin developing in early childhood, but they don’t fully mature until the mid-20s. That’s why it’s completely normal for younger kids and teens to struggle with focus, planning, or self-control. But for some children, especially those with ADHD, autism, anxiety, or trauma histories, these struggles are more intense and persistent.
Why? Because executive functioning lives in the prefrontal cortex, the area of the brain responsible for higher-order thinking. And when a child is experiencing anxiety or emotional distress, that part of the brain gets overridden.
As we explain in our continuing education course:
In other words, a child may want to start their homework or calm down after a meltdown, but their brain isn’t equipped at that moment to do it.
Why Executive Functioning Skills Are Critical
These skills affect nearly every aspect of your child’s life:
Academically – Can they follow multi-step instructions? Keep track of assignments? Resist distractions?
Emotionally – Can they manage frustration, disappointment, or anger without becoming overwhelmed?
Socially – Can they pause and think before they speak? Read the room? Understand another child’s perspective?
Without solid executive functioning, a child may appear “lazy” or “defiant” when really, they’re under-resourced, not under-motivated.
How Therapy Helps Kids Build Executive Functioning
At Be a Problem Solver Services, we use a Relationship-Based Model of Executive Functioning, developed by our co-founders Dr. Cory Clark and Kate Melillo, CCC-SLP. This model integrates best practices in child counseling with cognitive skill-building and it's grounded in the belief that relationships are the foundation of growth.
“Mental health treatment, executive function treatment, and relationships often cannot be addressed without each other.”
We don’t just focus on checklists and charts - we build connection, confidence, and capability.
What Does Support for Executive Functioning Look Like in Therapy?
When we work with children and teens to build executive functioning skills, we focus on creating a safe, engaging space where they can practice thinking flexibly, managing emotions, and making thoughtful decisions. Therapy is hands-on, relationship-focused, and always tailored to each child’s needs. Rather than relying on rigid charts or behavior plans, our goal is to help children develop the skills they need to navigate daily life with greater confidence, independence, and emotional control.
In our sessions, we focus on:
Hands-On, Engaging Activities
Children learn best through doing. We use developmentally appropriate play, creative tasks, and problem-solving challenges to support growth in focus, planning, emotional regulation, and flexible thinking.
Guided Conversations
We help kids learn how to put words to their thoughts, emotions, and decisions. This builds self-awareness and improves how they handle frustration, manage impulses, and interact with others.
Relationship-Focused Support
At the center of this work is a strong therapeutic relationship. Children build executive functioning skills most effectively when they feel safe, supported, and understood. Trust is the foundation, and from there we can work together to practice new ways of thinking and responding.
Therapy is always tailored to your child’s strengths and needs. We also involve parents with regular check-ins and suggestions for supporting growth at home. When everyone is working together, meaningful progress is more likely to happen and last.
Family Involvement Is Key
One of the pillars of our approach is involving caregivers directly in the therapeutic process. As we say in our course:
“We know that treatment cannot just be therapy, goals, or medication on its own. Family involvement is critical and all of these elements have to work together for the most effective treatment.”
That means:
For Professionals: Learn Our Model
If you are a mental health counselor, therapist, or related service provider working with children and adolescents, you already know that executive functioning challenges are often at the root of academic struggles, emotional dysregulation, and behavioral concerns. Yet, traditional interventions can fall short when they fail to account for the emotional and relational complexities that impact executive functioning.
That’s why we created our NBCC-approved continuing education course: “A Relationship-Based Model of Executive Functioning: Using Clinical Best Practices for Counseling Children and Adolescents.”
This course is designed to bridge the gap between cognitive skill-building and mental health support. You’ll learn how to integrate executive functioning development into your sessions in a way that is both evidence-based and deeply relational.
In this course, we cover:
Whether you're a school-based clinician, private practice provider, or part of a multidisciplinary team, this course offers tools you can use immediately with your clients.
It has been described as both clinically rigorous and refreshingly practical because we believe therapy should be grounded in both research and the realities of real-world practice.
Final Thoughts for Parents
Executive functioning difficulties can be frustrating and exhausting for kids and their families. But the good news is: these skills are coachable. With the right therapeutic support, children can learn to manage their time, regulate their emotions, and build the confidence to solve their own problems.
And you don’t have to do it alone. At Be a Problem Solver Services, we’re here to help your child not just function, but flourish.
Check out a few of our printable freebies to help support your family’s mental health:
Offices in Cary, Chapel Hill, and Fuquay Varina, NC