SuccessFULL With ADHD

What Students with ADHD (and Their Parents) Need to Know: High School & College Success with Hannah Choi

• Brooke Schnittman MA, PCC, BCC • Season 1 • Episode 107

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College can feel overwhelming for students with ADHD, but support exists. In this episode, I talk with Hannah Choi—executive function coach and communications specialist at Beyond Booksmart. Hannah shares her personal ADHD story and practical tools to help college students build independence, manage their time, and advocate for what they need. From study strategies that actually work to understanding accommodations, we unpack how to set students up for a smoother transition into college.

Whether you're a student, parent, or educator, you’ll walk away with actionable strategies. We also explore gap years, what colleges are required to provide under ADA, and how executive function coaching builds confidence beyond academics.

Meet Hannah Choi
Hannah Choi, MA, is an executive function coach and Communications and Engagement Specialist at Beyond Booksmart. She helps college students and adults strengthen time management, task initiation, and self-advocacy skills. Hannah hosts the Focus Forward podcast, leads webinars, and facilitates motivation and accountability programs. She holds degrees in Psychology and American Sign Language from the University of Rochester and a Master’s in Education from UC Santa Barbara. Hannah lives in Connecticut with her family.

 

Episode Highlights
[0:00] What studying really looks like with ADHD
[2:26] Hannah’s ADHD discovery and coaching path
[11:09] Study strategies that build self-regulation
[13:37] How to start practicing self-advocacy
[15:52] Accommodations: from 504 to college
[21:06] Top executive function skills before college
[23:38] Managing all that “free time”
[26:33] Building independence (without overparenting)
[29:55] The case for gap years and transition programs
[35:41] How EF skills impact life after graduation
[38:50] Getting unstuck: motivation + task initiation
[46:35] Final takeaway: it’s never too late to change

 

Connect with Hannah Choi:

Instagram: @beyondbooksmartcoaching
Website: https://www.beyondbooksmart.com/
Focus Forward Podcast: https://www.beyondbooksmart.com/podcast 

Thank you for tuning into "SuccessFULL with ADHD." If this episode has impacted you, remember to rate, follow, share, and review our podcast. Your support helps us reach and help more individuals navigating their journeys with ADHD.

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Brooke Schnittman:

What does studying look like, and how do you help people with executive functions study? I'm curious,

Hannah Choi:

in order to remember something, not only do we need to revisit it, but we need to engage with it in multiple different ways. So you can't just read something and expect yourself to remember, and then you can't just read something, expect yourself to remember, and then you don't remember, and then beat yourself up for it like, of course, you don't remember it. Yes, some people can do that. Most people cannot. You need to really engage with the material, whatever that looks like. Maybe it's taking notes, maybe it's making flashcards, maybe it's studying in a study group. Maybe it's going to office hours. Please go to office hours if you're listening all of these things like engage with it more multiple times in different locations, with different modalities.

Brooke Schnittman:

Welcome to successful with ADHD. I'm Brooke schmidtman. Let's get started. Hey everyone, and welcome back to another episode of successful with ADHD today, I have Hannah Choi from beyond book smart. She's a communication and engagement specialist and executive function coach with experience supporting college students and adults in achieving their goals. So you're in for a treat. Today, we're going to be talking about how to support our college students with executive function, and Hannah specializes in helping individuals develop their time management skills, task initiation, self advocacy. And in addition to her coaching role, Hannah hosts focus forward, a podcast dedicated to executive function skills and leads, community education, webinars and presentation. She also serves as lead facilitator and content creator for the motivation and accountability program and as a school trainer for the brain tracks program. If that wasn't enough proof in the pudding that she's busy and she's qualified. She holds a bachelor's degree in psychology and American Sign Language, how cool from the University of Rochester, and a Master's of Arts degree in education from UC Santa Barbara, and she lives in Connecticut with her husband and her two teenage children. So this is very personal to you, this topic, having teenagers, having ADHD yourself. Can you share a little bit about the fact that you have ADHD and when you learned it, and how that connects to what you do right now?

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, sure. So I Well, first, I do want to say I believe that people in general are attracted to what they need. And so, I mean, not everybody, but I think, I think a lot of us are attracted to what we need. And so when I got out of grad school, I worked in the Office for Students with Disabilities. Now the accommodations office at a community college in Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara City College, one of the best community colleges out there. So I worked there helping kids take advantage of the services that they had been approved for the different accommodations and then, and I loved it. I loved it so much. And then I and then I had kids, and I stayed home with my kids until my son went to kindergarten, and when he went to kindergarten, I wanted to go back to work. And my sister was a coach for beyond book smart at the time, and so she was like, you know, I think this would be really good for you. So I started working as a part time coach, and I really fell in love with it. And I really fell in love with, like, the idea of helping people this really practical way, like through these executive function skills, just felt so tangible and real. And it wasn't. It was just, I don't know, it just it just, it just really fit so well with my own interests. And then as as I met all my clients, I just started realizing, like I thought, Oh my gosh. I felt like I kept wanting to say, oh my god, me too. And I'm like, I know you're supposed to disclose your own struggles to you know, normalize these things. But I felt like I was like, Wait a second. Can we just like, switch seats for a second? Can I tell you about my challenges, I had this one client in particular where I just had a lot of same, the same symptoms as him, and that's when I I started to hear this like little, little whisper in the back of my head, but, but I really ignored it because it didn't make sense to me, because I was successful and, you know, I have two degrees and and I'm happy In my life, and I didn't have sort of like the typical symptoms of of ADHD. But then when I started learning more about it, I was like, Oh, I actually do have a lot of the typical symptoms. I just have the typical, typical symptoms that people don't really talk about, and the ones that are less visible, especially with women. Then I was able to explain, yeah, yes. I was able to explain so many things about my life, how I think my anxiety, like just so much, my terrible working memory, very limited working memory, and it all just started falling into place. And it just made so much sense to me. And so now it benefits me so much as a coach, because not only can I really relate to a lot of their challenges, but I can also be a role model and say, you know, like you I don't, I don't, you know, say this explicitly, but you know, it's, it doesn't have to hold

Brooke Schnittman:

you back Absolutely. Well, it sounds like you said you were successful. And I was going to ask, like, how do you define success? Because that's the name of the show, right?

Hannah Choi:

Oh yeah, that's right,

Brooke Schnittman:

on purpose. And yes, you said you have all these degrees, right? You were able to get an amazing job, and then you saw yourself in your students, and you realized that they weren't alone, and that you were one of them as well. So you then went into anxiety and all these things. So I'm just curious. I mean, now you're a mom with two kids, teenage kids, and like, what is success look like for you now that you have that diagnosis?

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, totally different. It's so interesting, because that's such a great question. Before I would have defined success as, you know, I got my master's degree. I'm in a, you know, I've been in a long term relationship and and, you know, I mean, all relationships are hard, but you know, for the most part, we are doing very well. And, you know, we I have sort of all my needs met, or I thought I had all my needs met. I had sort of all my those, like tangible needs met. And then after going through the adventure of learning about my own ADHD, and then reconciling with my past and kind of figuring out like, oh, wait a second, I actually was masking a lot of the time. I was really denying myself the opportunity to explore certain challenges that I had, because I it was just sort of easier to ignore them, push them to the side, and not deal with them. But when I compare myself to how I am now, like, if I think of myself sort of like before, this exploration that I've done, I I realized that I was successful in this sort of like society's view from outside, but from the inside, I did not feel that way, and I did not feel confident. I had very low self esteem. I was pretty mean to myself with my self talk, and so in that way, no, I wasn't and now I feel just so much better. And I have this. I have this, this, like very vivid memory. And it was such a simple thing, it was almost a non event. I was walking home from dropping my daughter off, my kids off at school, and I thought, You know what? I think I can be happier. And I think this was in 2016 or 2017 and then I and then I said, I think becoming happier is probably going to involve reading a lot of books, like a lot of self help books, little did I know, it also involved, like, getting an ADHD diagnosis, right? I can say now a very Yeah, taking, like, doing many more things than just reading books, but it's so cool now, because while there are tons of more things that I would love to work on, and I'm still working on, and I'm still addressing, I can say yes, without a doubt, I am happier than I was on that day.

Brooke Schnittman:

You mentioned that you have working memory struggles. I also struggle with working memory. So what did that look like in getting a master's and learning sign language and psychology and becoming an executive function coach? How did that impact you before you knew you had ADHD?

Hannah Choi:

That was just sort of a quirk of mine that I like had to write everything down and and I was going to be the person who would forget to bring the thing they were supposed to bring to the party, or if I was going to someone's house, and I was supposed to drop off the sweatshirt that they left at my house before I would never bring it. I'm sure. My apologies to anyone who's listening that I like owe you money, or I have something of yours that I was supposed to bring to your house that I accidentally own now. I mean, I always think, Oh, when I die, I think, I hope I get this chance to, like, look back and see, oh, yeah, right, I was gonna do that. It's amazing. Somehow, somehow I got a degree. I don't I, I really, actually don't know how I did it. I assume when I look back, especially college, I look back like how I don't know how I did that. I really don't know somehow they agreed that I should get a degree, but I don't really have I made it throughout the degree, yeah, I did. I got, yeah, my master's. I think one thing that made a big difference was I. You can tell when you look at my grades. My junior year is when I got rid of all those classes I didn't want to take and had to take the silly foundation classes, and then I was able to take all the classes that I really wanted to and I went I had a 4.0 in my last four semesters. That's amazing, because I was just like, totally into it. I never even had to force myself. In the first two years, I really struggled. It was really hard for me to study. I would look around and I would see all these people, like, how do they just study? They just study. And then they just get an A, yeah, yeah. Like, I would work so hard and be like, okay, minus

Brooke Schnittman:

and, yeah, I'm sure you know this as an executive function coach, and same with me that people think that just studying is looking at the material. Okay, I studied. I stared at the material, and now I'm going to memorize it. What does studying look like, and how do you help people with executive functions study? Yeah, curious,

Hannah Choi:

yeah, yeah. And so I work with, as you said in my bio, I mostly work with college students, and I think, I think what I didn't know at the time, and I think a lot of college students don't know, and a lot of just people don't know. And what I have learned over the years is that in order to remember something, we need to not only do we need to revisit it, but we need to engage with it in multiple different ways. So you can't just read something and expect yourself to remember and then you can't just read something, expect yourself to remember, and then you don't remember, and then beat yourself up for it like, of course, you don't remember it. Yes, some people can do that. Most people cannot. You need to really engage with the material, whatever that looks like. Maybe it's taking notes, maybe it's making flashcards, maybe it's studying in a study group. Maybe it's going to office hours. Please go to office hours, if you're listening, you know all of these things, like engage with it more multiple times in different locations, with different modalities, different mediums, both

Brooke Schnittman:

both modalities, like learning modality and media, exactly. Yeah, I love how you said go to office hours, because it's not just about learning at office hours. It's about the relationship with

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, the teacher, right? Yes, yes, absolutely. One of the things that I challenge all of my college students to do is to introduce themselves to their professors in the first two weeks of school. They don't have to become best friends, but they they need to introduce themselves in person, if possible. Of course not, if it's an ace, if it's a, you know, virtual class, but that is such a game changer. My husband was just telling me that he read a study, or maybe not a study, but that the president of Harvard said that he thinks, or maybe they did a study, that the way to have a great educational experience is to have a close relationship with your professors and at least one where you really, really, really trust them and you and you there's someone that you could imagine becoming friends with, or, you know, at least staying in touch with, and I have seen that in my clients, absolutely, the students Who are feel comfortable to make that effort and make that happen. Just they just get it's almost like they get things handed to them on a hate because it's so true. Top of mind for those professors, yeah. Oh, they need a Research Assistant, Assistant. Oh, this person, because I already know them,

Brooke Schnittman:

those little things. It's literally like the who you know rather than what you know. Same thing happened to me when I was in college, to your point, I was way more engaged my senior and junior year in undergrad. But then when I went and got my master's in students with disabilities, that's I was laser focused. I it was all core subjects that I love, and hands on placement for students with disabilities. And, yeah, it was amazing. And then, to your point, I remember I was in this humongous lecture class for science, I think it was biology, and I was getting B, I was pushing like, a, b, b minus. And I emailed the teacher, and I said, I've been attending all of your lectures. I've been doing this. I kid you not. I got an A minus in that class because I emailed her, yeah. So you just never know, yeah, yeah.

Hannah Choi:

And you know this, this part of the conversation brings up something that is just so important about going off to college and being in college is learning self advocacy skills. And there's so much involved with self advocacy, and so that's why I love to talk about that with my clients, with my clients parents, if they are also in the picture. And. And just how important it is for kids to first learn to identify what they're feeling so they can identify what they need. If you don't know what you're feeling and what you need, you cannot communicate to someone what you need. And then if you can't, don't, if you don't feel comfortable communicating it to someone that, of course, you're not going to speak up and get your needs met. So that is just, it's such a big part of success,

Brooke Schnittman:

and it's such a difference from high school, because if you have an accommodation plan, if you have an IEP, usually you get what is written on there, and then you go to college. And to your point, you have to self advocate. So can you share with people listening how someone makes that transition, if they have an accommodation plan of 504, going off to college, how they get the services that they need? What from start to finish, what do they need to do?

Hannah Choi:

And that's that's one of the biggest learning curves for families, is recognizing that the law is a little bit different. So when students go off to college, it's a really, really, it's really important to connect with the accommodations office at whatever school you're going to go to, so that you understand how you'll get your accommodations and what they'll look like. And they may look different than they did in high school. But to go back a little bit farther, when you're starting to look at schools, if you If college is part of your path, if you are when you are starting to look at schools, just remember that all schools need to meet the ADA minimum requirements for accommodations, and then whether they add more is kind of up to them. And so there are some schools that are that have really robust programs. And so if you are a person who typically uses a lot of accommodations in high school, and you think you might want to use them in college as well, even if you're even if you're not sure if you actually will use them, but you're curious about them. It would be really worth your time to visit the accommodations office on campus if you can and virtually if you can't. The reason for that is so that you can one see if there are additional accommodations and services that they provide above and beyond the ad, requirement, ADA requirements, and also, just to get the vibe of that accommodations, office, some of them are going to be more of just like a fill out the paperwork and do the thing office. And then others are going to be more of a community and more of, you know, they're all going to be very welcoming. Of course, nobody's going to be like if someone works in an office like that, they're probably there because they love helping people. They love helping people, but you just might find more of a expanded community at some schools. So it's just something to consider, and it's worth your time.

Brooke Schnittman:

I think that's huge. And sometimes the special education department of the high school will have those fairs with colleges there that show what type of supports they have, if they have a learning center, or if they but I'm just curious, going back to the ADA, what is the minimum requirements that these colleges need to provide?

Hannah Choi:

Well, it would depend on the diagnosis. It would really depend on that. And I'm not an expert in that. What the goal of the accommodation would be to is to level the playing field. It's not to give the student any kind of advantage. It's just to get to level the playing field. So some things it might look like, you know, extended time on tests. That's a really common accommodation, either one and a half times or two times. It may also be taking the test outside of the classroom. So in a like a distraction free environment, it may be having a note taker for you, it may be having extended time on projects, or having the choice of doing a presentation in a different format than what the class is doing there. So it really. That's why it's so important to go in and speak with the professionals in the office, because then they can really help you figure out, like, what would make this universally designed

Brooke Schnittman:

experience? And that's such an important word, universal design.

Hannah Choi:

Yes, it really is. And there's such that there's a movement now, which you know is hopefully getting stronger and stronger, so that that professors learn how to design their courses and their materials in such a way that that they naturally meet everybody's needs and so so you don't, you can choose between writing a paper, doing a presentation, doing a, you know, a portfolio. It's not like you have to go and ask, Hey, you know, I'm not comfortable doing an oral presentation in class. Can I do a written paper instead? So you know that where it's just built into the menu of the class, so that, yeah, so Universal Design for Learning is, you know, a different conversation for a different day and, and I'm not an expert in it, but it is absolutely something that, if, I mean, if you're listening and you are, you. And you are a professor or you are involved in that, please. You know, look into it, because

Brooke Schnittman:

it's to your point. A lot of the students I've been hearing from who we work with, were saying that notes are now being provided at a more rapid scale than before. I remember going to college and undergrad, and I had to buy notes from the store. They were called nitty notes, and I would have to buy these big workbooks of classmates notes to, like, try to fill in the blanks when I was in these huge lecture classes. So I think that's beautiful.

Hannah Choi:

I know technology right has made Oh yeah, yeah. I probably sound like an old lady telling, right? No, yeah, it was, it was, I

Brooke Schnittman:

remember my dad telling me, like, just bring a recorder to class if you can't remember what I said, I think I need exactly

Hannah Choi:

plan record at the same time. I hope no one sees this.

Brooke Schnittman:

Yes, he did buy me one. So what is the most important executive functions, in your opinion that students should strengthen before they go to college?

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, great question. Well, I always start with self regulation. If you want to be able to use your executive function skills well, you need to have some really good, really good tools for getting regulated when you're feeling dysregulated. College has so many opportunities for dysregulation. We are we are overtired, we are stressed from so much work. Maybe we have social social either social anxiety or just social challenges that have come up. There are so many living on your own for the first time, like doing

Brooke Schnittman:

your laundry, writing like who ever taught us yes, yeah,

Hannah Choi:

yes, but you but, but laundry, yes, laundry is huge. So all of these things can really knock us off our ground, our feeling grounded. And so if you do not go off to school with some strategies that you know work for you, some healthy strategies that you know work for you, then that now is really a great time to start those so whether that is as simple as some kind of breathing exercise that comes there reliably for you because you've practiced it, or you know that you just have to be you're a runner, and you just have to keep running. You have to make sure you build that running in, or maybe you, you know, everybody needs good sleep, but maybe you especially need good sleep. So really, getting to learn yourself and your own needs and what helps you stay regulated is going to be a great place to start, and it will just help in so many different areas. Beautiful. Beyond that, yeah. Beyond that, I would say that prioritizing and time management go well, they go, really go together in planning, planning, prioritizing, time management, they really go together. And I think the difference is, is that when you are in high school, we can think of it as like, 80% of the work is done at school in the classroom with guidance, and 20% you're doing on your own. And then when you go to college, it really does flip, and only about 20% is in the classroom, and then then you have about 80% of it. Oh my gosh, yes, and, and, and so it can really, it's such a trap, because when we're in high school, we think, Okay, well, I'm in school from from 730 to 230 and I and then I go to, you know, a sport after school, and then I have my job, and then I go home and I babysit my siblings or whatever, you know, all the home responsibilities, so they feel like they have no free time, and which is kind of true, they're not wrong. And then they go off to college, and it's like, oh gosh, like, I don't even have any classes on

Brooke Schnittman:

do whatever I want. I don't have to do anything.

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, it's free time, and Marc, it's a trap. It is a trap. It's a trap. It is not free time. And that is such a huge difference. And I'll never forget one of my college students. I'm still working with him, he said, I really think I would have been better at managing my time in college if my time wasn't so structured for me by other people when he was in high school, and that wasn't anyone's fault. That's just the reality of the high school students is most high school students have a very structured day, and it's structured by other people. And so of course, they get to school and they have no classes on Wednesdays. Of course they're gonna be like, yeah, it's free time.

Brooke Schnittman:

I like to say that our parents and our teachers are, are our executive functions in high school, and then we have to, we're just like, thrown to the wolves, and say, okay, like you said, you got to do lunch. You got to do lunch, you got to live in your own you got to manage your schedule. You have to figure out how to build your executive functions. Good luck. And then you have to eat right, exactly. You have to sleep right. And then sometimes you have to make early classes, and sometimes you make late classes, but figure out your circadian rhythm too.

Hannah Choi:

Please. Yes, please. Yes, yes, but yeah, it's a lot. So I kind of start there. I start there when, whenever I'm asked that question, and whenever I start working with a

Brooke Schnittman:

college and to like what you were saying, you were successful. And I find that so many college students who were brilliant in high school, who were really smart who were honor students just fall flat on their face, fail out the first semester, and then look for an executive function coach second semester. So for anyone listening, make sure if you're if you can, I know you have a lot of responsibilities, but try to get your executive function coaching before college, if you can,

Hannah Choi:

I agree. Yeah, so many students I've worked with both just like you. You know, I've worked with students who I've been so lucky to work with them, like in the summer before they go off and then, because I typically don't work with high school students, so sometimes I'll get them in the summer before they go off to school or or either second semester or first semester sophomore year. And there you do see a difference. You really do see a difference that being said, there's not hope is not lost if you are starting out with a coach second semester or your second year. Because so much right, so much growth. So it's really

Brooke Schnittman:

beautiful mention the summer. What can parents do in the summer before freshman year to encourage readiness for their children without over managing?

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, well, first of all, I think the summer before freshman year of college is a great time to start, but an even better time to start is when your kids are really little. So encouraging independence autonomy from a very young age is going to really set your kids up for success, and also it's really hard to do that as parents, because we just need you to get your shoes on, because we just need to get out on the tour so I cannot sit and

Brooke Schnittman:

wait for you to bribe you with candy. Sometimes, I'm sorry, we're gonna do that. Yeah,

Hannah Choi:

yeah. I mean, that's just how it is. But if all of a sudden, it's the summer before freshman year, and you realize I haven't had time to do this until now, there are so many great things that you can do. It is not too late at all. My first thing that I recommend is laundry. Don't send your kid off to school not knowing how to do laundry. There are so many executive function skills that are involved with doing laundry from beginning to end. It is a great way to practice it, and it saves a ton of embarrassment when they get to school and they don't know how to do their laundry, I heard a story. I hope I always feel bad telling the story, because I hope the kid who said this never hears it. But somebody told me once that their client asked if they were supposed to touch the clothes when they move them from the washer to the dryer and like that shows me that that they really, really, really could have benefited from some laundry practice before going, Yeah, and that that was probably stressful for that child, because they they didn't know, am I supposed to touch these clothes? Like And it's funny, we laugh. And, you know, someone said, Oh, you use the tongs actually, but, but, you know, it's like, let's, let's avoid that situation.

Brooke Schnittman:

But it's that, again, is a step right? And that person clearly has, is very literal, but, like, that's a step in all of the sequences to doing your laundry. It

Hannah Choi:

is right? It shows you how many steps there are and how how many skills are, right? Yes, so start with laundry, also another, because they do have to practice those self advocacy skills. I really recommend, like, if you're going to order takeout, don't order it on the app, call and have your child call and order the takeout. I had my kids start doing this when they were, like, 14 and just terrified. We practiced the whole thing. And at my daughter's 16th birthday, I asked her, What do you want to do for food? And she's like, Oh, well, I already called the restaurant and found out how much we need to order when we need to order it. And I was like, Oh, my job is done. So it they, you know, and so that now I don't worry that she's, you know, she's gonna be able to communicate for herself. So that's a really great thing. And I think anything that's low stakes, just practice anything that's low stakes. But if you, but if you keep doing it for your kids, they won't have a chance to learn and then, and then they'll have to, you know, learn in a lot more stressful and understood.

Brooke Schnittman:

And for the student who's on the fence about their readiness so they're not sure if they're ready for college. What's your perspective on gap years or structured transition programs?

Hannah Choi:

I am a huge fan. I wish everybody could do a gap year. I. I wish I did one. I have students who have done them and have benefited so much from them. I think there is pretty much no drawback to them at all. I think they're really great. And there's a lot of opportunities for whether you know, there's programs that are expensive, there are programs that are less expensive, there are you could create your own. I just think it is such a great thing because it gives kids another year for their brains to develop. It gives them another year to learn all these other skills that they can then bring to school with them. And and I have had students say that they worried about being one year older than everybody else, and we haven't seen any of those worries play out. It has just hasn't mattered. And then the other thing that we often talk about is everybody's on their own path. Everybody does their life their way, or at least, should feel confident to be able to do their life their way. And so if anybody is hesitant to do a gap year because they think, Oh, well, it's not what everybody else is doing, or that I'm going to be like a 19 year old freshman. I just think that in the moment it went to get there, it won't matter. You'll just be a little bit more mature than everybody else. Love

Brooke Schnittman:

it. Love it. And then when students go to college, for those who were heavily relying on their parent reminders in high school, what would you say could replicate or modify that accountability in college without creating that dependence on someone else.

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, I really think that if people are able to work with an executive function coach, I think that that is a really fantastic way to help parents who have been more involved, back off a little bit, and it's, it's, it's, it's healthier for the kids. It's healthier for their relationship. It's healthier for the parents. If you you know, if you don't have executive function coaching as an as an option, there are, there on campus, there are so many different services that kids can take advantage of. You know, their their academic advisor is a is a really important person for them to rely on and to and to get in touch with. Also, you know, stay getting to your professors can really make a big difference. And then the the mental health services on campus as well, you know, taking advantage of anything on campus, the writing centers. There are so many services that come with your tuition at the school that I really encourage people to take advantage of. And then a big part of it is just being open to trying new things. And you know, if you are a student who is curious about maybe what kind of planner might work best for them, or what kind of what kind of tracking system, whether it's a planner or, you know, a digital calendar, or just using the school's portal, whatever that is, if you can use that flexible thinking, that cognitive flexibility that gets us so far in life, If you can be really open to trying new ideas and also not be hard on yourself when something doesn't work, I think that that you can do it on your own without, you know, hiring an executive function coach. So I know, unfortunately, not everybody, yeah, get access.

Brooke Schnittman:

Yeah. So with that all being said, Do you think colleges should directly teach executive function skills as part of orientation or freshman seminars?

Hannah Choi:

Yes, absolutely. And many, do many have you know, like pre orientation, you know, programs maybe over the summer, or right before, before school starts, where kids who you know, maybe have been either self identified or identified by the school as someone who might be at risk for struggling. Then maybe they can, you know, attend something like that, or they can just opt into it. And then, you know, some schools will offer tutoring centers that provide EF support. But yes, I think they should be explicitly taught. I had a student who she did not do well her first semester, freshman year, second semester, we worked together and her school, because she was on academic probation, her school enrolled her in a pass, fail one credit class on executive.

Unknown:

Amazing. I know

Hannah Choi:

it was so cool, and she is, she's a senior. Now we don't even need to work together anymore. She is like, Oh, actually, she was on, I brought her on the hypercast podcast. If anybody wants to hear my student, Caroline, speak. She was on the hypercast podcast with me, with Melissa and

Brooke Schnittman:

Brianna. When I used to be a special education teacher, we had a executive function class, and I remember when teaching this, it was a pull out class instead of an elective. And I remember teaching this, and I was like, it's crazy that you need to have an IEP to get this class right. This needs to be universal.

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, one of the divisions of beyond books. Marc is called Brain tracks, and we it's a teacher training program, so we do professional developments for teachers to learn about executive function skills, so that, not so that they can necessarily explicitly teach it to their students, we hope they do, but so that they can build the EF strategies just into their teaching and into their classroom, so it's just more naturally part of it. Yeah, huge. It is.

Brooke Schnittman:

It's, I mean, it's everything, right? So how would you say the preparation strategies that we've spoken about, self advocacy, self regulation, enhancing, time management, prioritization, not just set students up for college, but also for adult life after graduation.

Hannah Choi:

That's one thing I think I love, maybe the most about about working with people on their executive function skills is how generalizable the skills are. Because executive function skills, I like to use the explanation. I can't remember where I heard this from, but they help us execute our days. They just help us get through our days. It's not like they're just for academics or they're just for work or they're just for laundry. You know they're they're for every aspect of our lives. And the tools and strategies that you use in, say, school, can be used just as easily in your adult life when you're out of when you're out of work. So I work, I supported a student. Once he graduated, he was in college, and he graduated, then he went on to his next job, and we just kind of kept using the same tools and strategies. We just now applied them to him. Amazing. It was, it was seamless, yeah, it was really cool. And it, it's true, yeah.

Brooke Schnittman:

And with that, what's the most common misconception about executive function skills that you run into?

Hannah Choi:

I think it's that they are only for academics. Yeah, I think so, and which is a shame, because adults also can practice their executive function skills and then have a better life experience.

Brooke Schnittman:

I know how I would answer this, but I'm curious on what you tell parents the difference between executive function coaching is and tutoring.

Hannah Choi:

Yeah, so tutoring, the way that I explain it, is that tutoring is someone who you would bring in when you are working on one specific topic, maybe it's math or writing, and yes, there are a lot of executive function skills involved with math and writing, but the skills that you're going to learn from that tutor are specific to that topic, and some may be generalizable to other areas of study, but most of them are not going to Be, and they're going to be more for just that. And then an executive function coach could help somebody in all of the areas without actually knowing the topic, which is pretty crazy, like I have helped kids who are doing math, and you do not want me to do math, because we work on the planning, the time management, the self regulation around doing math. I'm not actually helping them with the math later, but I'm getting them set up to be successful

Brooke Schnittman:

with Yes. And even with the math too, you can work on step of processes, right? So breaking down each step in algebra, we know it's not just one step and having that little sheet, yes, yeah,

Hannah Choi:

or teach it to me like I've done these things before. I remember them, but, I mean, I don't remember how to do them, but I know if I'm taught them again, they'll come back to me. So let's go through it step by step. How can we figure this out? Or if we're stuck, how can we problem solve to get out of it, whatever that problem solving

Brooke Schnittman:

looks like. Yeah, yeah. So you mentioned procrastination and task initiation. So what would you say is one strategy that you could share that makes the biggest impact quickly?

Hannah Choi:

It Yeah, everybody is different. I just had a conversation with one of my college students the other day and and in he was saying that he he's getting his work done, but he is in a cycle where he is kind of finishing everything right before it's due, and he's trying to break out of that. And I and I was telling him about how once I had learned about I was interested in learning how to run faster. I'm a runner, but I'm kind of a slow runner, and I wanted to learn how to run faster and and one of the recommendations was, well, just run faster. Which, which sounds very silly and too simplistic, but if you think about it, it is, it is one thing that you have to do to run faster is you have to run faster. And, yeah, and so I said, I feel like we can apply the same lesson to if you want to get your stuff done earlier, you have to do it earlier. Start earlier. You just have to do it earlier. I'm not saying it's easy to do that, but that kind of is what you need to do. And so once we have identified starting earlier as a strategy that will work, then. And we can support it with, how are we going to remind you to start earlier? How are you going to engage with the material more is that so that you're more interested in starting earlier? How are you going to find the meaning in it and why you should start earlier?

Brooke Schnittman:

So it's working backwards. You know, the goal is to start earlier. So how can we get to that goal? Yeah, by asking those deliberate questions. Yeah, okay, here's a tough one that I would love for you to answer, because I know that a lot of parents are listening here defiance. So parents often confused with can't, with, won't, right. How can families distinguish between a child who lacks executive function skills and one who's being defiant.

Hannah Choi:

Well, this reminds me of a webinar that we held recently, and we called it your kids not lazy, and I dared everybody who is attending to to try to beat me in an argument about that, because I know I've heard people say that my kid is lazy and and I will always push back and and say that as humans, I don't think we are lazy, laziness, defiance. That's going to be something that you, I guess, would see in every single aspect of someone's life. And I guarantee you that there are things that that child is not defiant about, and I guarantee you that there are things that kids are not lazy about. And so it looks like laziness, it looks like defiance. I would argue it's executive function skill gaps, yeah, and I will argue that till the very end, Oh, yeah. We humans want to do well. We kids do well when they have what they have to do. Well, yeah, yeah. And I feel like when we label them as lazy, when we label them as defiant, we are already setting them up for having a harder time. I was

Brooke Schnittman:

talking to a dad yesterday about his son who is repeating a certain grade. I'm not going to be too specific here. He's tried everything under the sun that he's he knows he can. He rewards, then he took away. He took away one of his favorite sports. And I said, Your child must be really depressed right now. I mean, he has nothing to look forward to, nothing. And I said, Do you really think that he's being defiant, or do you think there's something else that we just don't see here? He has a 504 plan, and he's getting D's and F's. Well, have you looked at an IEP? Have you asked for a full battery of assessments? The dad tells me that he himself had a reading disability. I said, Do you think that also it might be aligned with your child. So it's to your point. There's a reason why the behavior is being caused. If that behavior is not universal,

Hannah Choi:

yeah, yeah. I really love that. Saying that behavior is a message, and it's up to us as the adults to to take the message and then to figure out how to interpret it, yeah, and that that's hard. It's hard. It takes effort. And it takes, no, it isn't I mean, I mean, even with our own kids, I'm sure you know, it's like, I mean, I do this for a living, and yet I can, I still struggle. Oh yeah,

Brooke Schnittman:

kids, oh yes. My two stepsons both have ADHD, and I had one of my coaches work with one of them because, you know, it's too much of an internal battle. And, yeah, I mean, that's why we exist, right? Okay, so how can family is built an executive function friendly home environment without turning it into a boot camp

Hannah Choi:

slowly, if you're, if you're making a switch, do it slowly. You know that analogy, you cannot, you can run a marathon, but you can't do it tomorrow. So, yes, slowly. I think, I think a really big part of it is collaboration, if you impose change, and if you impose rules, if you impose systems on people, they are a lot less likely to use them. I mean, one of the things we always say at beyond booksmart is we meet people where they are, and so you'll really need to figure out, like, where are your kids? Where? Where is the rest of your family? Maybe it's your partner, maybe, you know, maybe it's yourself. You know, where is everybody in the in their readiness to make a change and their readiness to adopt a new system? And I think that collaboration together, so that everyone has a voice in the decisions that are being made is is really the way to start, and you will soon see who is kind of really ready for this change, and who is more struggling with it. And it's funny, we did this a few years ago in our family. I was really having a hard time managing everybody's schedules, and then something, something was missed, and then it was your fault, like blamed on me. It was my fault, except that it wasn't even my event. So that. And so then I thought, okay, we need to institute family meetings. And so now we on Sundays, we have family planning meetings. Amazing, but there was a ton of grumbling in the beginning about it. And you know who did the grumbling? You Me, I didn't want to have to do a family meeting. I didn't want to have to remember

Brooke Schnittman:

it. So it takes a lot of executive function on your part to plan, to plan, yeah, but the payoffs are priceless

Hannah Choi:

now, oh, my God, it's just like a literal game changer. Yeah, yeah.

Brooke Schnittman:

All right, so now I have some rapid fire, quick hate questions, okay? Planner or digital calendar, both, I agree.

Hannah Choi:

I use digital for work, and I use and all the things I definitely can't forget, and then I use paper planner for all the personal me

Brooke Schnittman:

too. Biggest myth about ADHD and executive function that we

Hannah Choi:

that that just trying harder will, you know, then you can do it if you just try harder. Yeah, just do it.

Brooke Schnittman:

The one tool every student should learn before graduating high school. I know we talked about laundry,

Hannah Choi:

but some kind of calendar, something I don't care what it looks like, whether it's a piece of paper that you write down what you have coming up, or a wall calendar, or your phone, your digital calendar on your phone, some kind of place, so that you can put in assignments that are coming up and see what's coming.

Brooke Schnittman:

Love it. Thank you so much, Hannah, for being on if you were to just share one thing that you want everyone to walk away with on today's call, what would it be?

Hannah Choi:

Yes, it's it's something that I learned from Ellen Galinsky, who is one of my favorite writers and researchers on executive function skills in kids, and also Dr Kenneth Ginsburg, who wrote the book Lighthouse parenting, who is amazing. They both said, and many other people too have said this, and I completely agree, is it's never too late. It is never too late to try to make a change, either with yourself or with your kids, and don't let fear of being too late or feeling like you're too late stop you from changing

Brooke Schnittman:

something like that. Thank you so much for your time. And where can people find you or beyond booksmart if they are looking for help.

Hannah Choi:

So beyond book smart is easy to find beyond booksmart.com and then the podcast is called focus forward, and that's on any podcast platform. And then you can always look me up on LinkedIn. It's just Hannah Choi, wonderful.

Brooke Schnittman:

We'll put that in the show notes as well. Have a wonderful day, and remember to start at any point, it's never too late, as Hannah said,

Hannah Choi:

Yes, yeah. Thank you so much, Brooke for having me on being on

Brooke Schnittman:

thanks for listening to this episode of successful with ADHD. I hope it helps you on your journey, and if you need any additional support for you or a loved one with ADHD, feel free to reach out to us at coaching with brooke.com, and all social media platforms at coaching with Brooke, and remember, it's Brooke with an E. Thanks again for listening. See you next time you.

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Brooke Schnittman MA, PCC, BCC

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