Lorelei Woerner-Eisner – Intensive 2-Day Workshop: Enhancing Executive Function: Going Beyond the Prefrontal Cortex

Outline

Principles of Executive Function

• Attention and sustained focus
• Engagement and initiation
• Optimization and monitoring
• Efficiency and sequencing
• Memory storage and retrieval
• Inquiry and analyzing
• Solution and organization
• Holarchical Model of EF

Levels of the Whole Person

• Physical – movement, posture and anatomy
• Breath and physiological systems
• Intellect – cognition, self-expression and sensory
• Personality – preferences, values and behaviors
• Emotional tone and the subjective
• Brain development & autonomic nervous system (ANS)
• Pruning and the use it or lose it principle
• Vagus nerve’s relation to physical and emotional effects

Effects of Stress on EF

• The effect on neural networks
• Cortisol and fight/flight effect on the brain
• The differences between fear and anxiety
• Getting to the basis of anger and frustration

The Gut Brain

• Enteric nervous system: the “second brain”
• Neurotransmitters in the gut that affect mood
• The ADHD-gut connection
• Enhance mood and memory through nutrition

Sensory Processing

• 3 developmental levels of regulation
• Swings effect on the Reticular Activating System
• Adjustments in sensory input to create balance
• Calm the sympathetic nervous system thru sensory input

Strategies to Develop Healthy Habits

• Using your mind to change your brain
• The power of thought and visualization
• Routines and steps to build habits
• Method of enhancing neurogenesis and neuroplasticity

Yoga, Mindfulness and Meditation Principles

• Mind-body-breath connection
• Yoga poses for self-regulation
• Interoception to build deeper self-awareness
• The power of the pause

Breath and Regulation Techniques

• Using breath to affect arousal levels
• Increasing and decreasing heart rate and blood pressure
• Supports movement and posture
• Techniques for focus, delayed gratification and processing in the pause

Sensory Processing Strategies

• Using the sensory systems to promote self-regulation and calm the sympathetic nervous system
• A look at rhythmicity and touch as factors in enhancing EF

Attention-Memory Connection

• Learning requirements for memory
• Emotion-motivation connection
• Intrinsic motivation to enhance processing
• The driving force of optimism and hope
• How multi-tasking is counter-productive
• Strategies that support focus and recall

Putting the pause on Impulsivity

• Marshmallows: the importance of learning to wait
• Anti-rush therapy to promote waiting
• Do-overs to teach healthy alternatives

Self-Generation and Self-Determination

• Promote delayed gratification, self-monitoring, task initiation, emotional control
• Supporting persistence to stick with dull and challenging activities
• Allowing time for processing, planning and self-correction

Strategies for Healthy Social Connections:

• Using the whole self as a therapeutic tool: emotion, modeling and positioning
• The power of relationship in therapeutic effectiveness
• Cuing and facilitation to promote participation, engagement and increased independence
• Teaching tolerance and other awareness

Treatment Strategies for Challenging Emotions

• Decreasing stress to facilitate EF
• Understanding fear, as the basis for many challenging emotions
• Using the teachable-moment “failures”