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DSD Service System · Practice
What executive function is, why a process that assumes it fails specific people predictably, how to read behavior as information about the demand rather than the person, and how to design support around what someone does well.
45–50 minutes · 4 lessons · Voluntary learning
Meet the mental processes that let a person start, plan, track and finish, and see how a disability can affect them without touching understanding.
Learn to tell whether a difficulty is in the person's capacity or in what the process demands, and why the answer changes the response.
Learn to read the behaviors most often recorded as noncompliance as information about a demand, and to name the support that would change them.
Run a demand review on one process and redesign one step around what the person does well.
Take one form or process you use and list every executive function it assumes; then redesign the step that assumes the most.
A great deal of what gets recorded as noncompliance, disengagement or poor motivation is executive function: the set of mental processes that let a person start a task, hold a plan in mind, manage time, switch between things and finish. Many disabilities affect these processes, and almost every service process assumes them. This module covers what executive function is, how to tell a capacity problem from an executive demand, how to read behavior as information about the demand rather than the person, and how to design support around what someone does well. Nothing here is scored, ranked or collected.
Understanding and doing are separated by initiation, working memory and follow-through. A gap between them is information about a demand, not a verdict about a person.
Read follow-through problems as executive demands, reduce the demand before trying to build the capacity, and route support through what the person already does well.
Run the demand review on one process for one person and test one redesigned step.
Participation and course completion in this program do not count toward DHS-required training credits unless management, a director, or DHS leadership expressly approves an exception.
State program information on services for Minnesotans with disabilities.
Public information on the cognitive effects of brain injury, including executive function.
Minnesota resource on brain injury, including effects on daily functioning and supports.
Accessible description of the executive functions and how they develop and are affected.
Practical accommodations and supports for executive function difficulties in work and daily life.
State council offering guidance and technical assistance on disability access and policy in Minnesota.