Helping your Student Develop Goal-Directed Persistence (An Executive Function Skill)

By Monica McGuire, Director of Communications, Russell Coaching

This week’s executive function skill is goal-directed persistence. Goal-directed persistence helps us push through to complete a task, even when we are engaged in tasks we don’t enjoy. These tasks can be day-to-day ones like homework or chores, or ones that require long term persistence such as saving up for a big purchase, completing a semester-long project, or continuing to practice a musical instrument. Here are three ways that you can help your student grow their goal-directed persistence.

Encourage your student to join a team or group. This doesn’t have to be a sports team, any team or group with a common goal will do. Teams/groups generally have clear goals such as winning as many games as possible, playing harmoniously in the upcoming concert, putting together a beautiful yearbook, or creating a robot that can play a particular game. These clear goals make teams a great place to learn about goal-directed persistence and the best part is, your student will have teammates to help keep their spirits buoyed when the road is long or tough. Being on a team also provides the opportunity to see how time and practice yield improvement. If your student internalizes the notion that time and practice can yield improvement, this realization can go a long way towards fueling their persistence in other circumstances. Help them build these connections by asking questions as you talk with them about what they learned from their time on the team.

Investigate the root cause of your student’s inertia; then start small. Is there a particular area of your student’s life that requires persistence that they just don’t have? Consider starting small and building up endurance over time. Take exercising for example. I needed to do it but didn’t because of the time it took to drive to the gym, exercise, and drive home. Then I decided to start small. With a 10-minute exercise video at home, I went from rarely exercising to exercising 4-5 days a week. The 10-minute commitment was so small, I knew that I could stick with it. And on days that I have extra time or energy, I was able to add another 10-minute video.

So start sleuthing. Ask questions and find out if your student knows what is keeping them from being able to commit to completing a task. Once you understand their roadblock, see if you can find a way to help them start small. Starting small can have many benefits including helping build your student’s confidence and their willingness to commit to a task. Continued success can help build your student’s endurance and propel them forward on this task and others.

Offer rewards for completed steps and tasks. We all have moments when a task becomes boring or repetitive or when interruptions make it difficult to stay focused. Breaking tasks down into attainable steps and offering a reward when a step is complete can be just the motivation your student needs to push through to the end of a task. Rewards don’t have to be big — think time to play a game, take a walk, read a book, practice a sport, play music, talk with a friend, be on the computer, or eat a special snack. Knowing that a reward looms at the end of a difficult or boring task is often just the incentive your student needs to take a task to completion.

Encouraging your student to join a team or group, investigating the root cause of your student’s inertia, and offering rewards for completed steps and tasks can all help your student build their goal-directed persistence. Practicing these skills helps your student develop an understanding of the rewards of persistence and, hopefully, sets them on a pathway towards a more satisfying life.

About the Author
Monica McGuire is a writer and parent who believes all relationships, including parent-child relationships, flourish under mutual respect, curiosity, kindness, and compassion. She lives in Michigan with her family where she is constantly being challenged to listen to, understand, and appreciate her teenagers’ points of view. You can reach her at monicamcguire100@gmail.com.