Why do I care so much about Executive Functions?

10/100 Why do I care so much about Executive Functions?
As a teacher and parent, I feel like I first started to hear this term a few years ago. Recently, I have been hearing it more and more but it wasn't until last year that I really started to try and understand fully what Executive Functions meant. I started by listening to a podcast (because that’s really how I learn anything) called @fullprefrontal and was immediately floored. The show focused a lot on kids who struggle with Executive Function and each week a different learning specialist, neurologist, scientist, psychologist comes on and talks about Executive Functions from their perspective. It felt like they were talking directly about so many people I know and love. It changed the way I started to see these people and think about them. In retrospect it was the first seed of this project.
Through my listening, I learned that a lot of Executive Function conversation revolves around kids, because they are still developing Executive Function skills. Executive Function skills are not something we are born with but something that we develop over the course of our life, skills building on top of each other over time, with EF skills not being fully developed until a person is around 18-25 years old. There are many variables that go into the how and when of each individual skill and it’s development in each individual person. There are also many things that can affect what is called “executive dysfunction” which can be found in both kids and adults. Executive Dysfunction can be genetic, or related to trauma, brain injury, ADHD or other learning disorders. The more I listened and learned the more questions I had, the more I needed a a visual project like this to process my thoughts. #100daysofefportraits #efportraits