Coach Bill / Dad, Entrepreneur Special Educator, American Political Scientist, Writer, Musician.

The world is filled with 'good enough' results and 'ok' hearts.  Having an 'ok' heart is far better than having a troubled heart in constant turmoil and rising above the norm of what is expected simply is not required and not needed, in most cases. In fact, we can do less than spectacular on a daily basis and lead lives with healthy measures of happiness and fulfillment which by average standards are acceptable to ourselves and our communities. Just like a computer being programmed with code, our brains get coded from an early age with messages that shape and mold its line of thinking and ultimately our actions. It is quite true that the plasticity in our brain is malleable and that we are free to re-code our thought patterns, how we view ourselves and how we approach the world with our thought process. Brain plasticity means that we become our thoughts and feelings with our actions reinforcing or weakening the power behind these thoughts and feelings.  ...

The idea of creating your own home storytelling theater can serve as a way for young children, especially those with special needs to appreciate different points of view and to even act out those differing outlooks in a safe setting. This metacognitive activity helps one rethink how they approach their thought and the world. Each character acted out has the potential to have a storyline that the puppeteer assumes during the story time. Repetition of an activity like this stays within certain established parameters, yet retains a novelty each time a story is performed in the theater.   My first storytelling theater was fashioned out of plywood. I had painted it over to look like a castle and added a knight to stand guard by the castle draw bridge. Ivy crawled up the castle walls. In my second theater, I may end up doing it out of tempered hardboard and using cloth string as ‘latches,’ to tie the different hardboard sections of the mini theater together. This makes it ...

If everyone is special then everyone is similar and then ‘special’ is not so special anymore. Special denotes a separation, a distinction from the norm. It is not average. With that in mind, are there people who are special? As the seasoned learner knows well, inherent talent and genes, perhaps our socio-economic platform in life all may serve up advantages setting the stage to easing the ability to be ‘specialized’ in something, like a trade, a craft or a unique ability.     Becoming very effective and efficient at something while being able to smoothly adapt to changing ground conditions is a special trait that can be flexed and made muscular according to practice. The more we stick at doing something, especially if we are passionate about it, the more we move into that specialized territory.  Recently, I was perfecting a basic skateboarding ollie (which I managed to do over and over again), yet Brian, who has been practicing street course skating far l...

Breaking your routine and schedule breaks your pace and momentum. The moment you backslide and meander into a change in your routine...watch yourself.  King David left the battle to his Army Chief of Staff, Joab, and found himself with too much time on his hands and made a huge mistake with another man's wife. He should have kept to his routine. He had to be in the battle. Sun Tzu recollects anecdote after anecdote where military leaders left their routines, left their adherence to the guideposts that ensure victory and lost in battle. Just changed jobs..look out! Just got married... look out! Moved to a new house...look out! Starting college....look out! Look out... Look out every time you change your regular schedule... Getting back from vacation...look out! Dropped out of school.... look out! Have a disciplined schedule and it will keep you.  Get back to your regular times that worked so well before. Never arrive. Never tell yourself you have made it and can now rest.... a ...

#POTUS, or the President of the United States of America has the most mentally, physically, and emotionally taxing job on earth. It is no wonder that any occupant of the Oval Office comes in bright-eyed and bushy tailed only to leave looking 25 years older by the end of their term. Politics aside, the ability to orchestrate, manage and direct information is not just the definition of executive function skills, but it happens to be the job of the President. It is a tough job, filled with rigor, criticism, and constant attack from all sides, in every way, shape and form. In this post, I explore the storm that encircles what it means to be POTUS in the context of executive function skills. The constant decision making, the demand on the POTUS's foresight, problem solving, behavior modulation, and goal-directed persistence are enough to put one hundred people in the psychiatric ward, and yet POTUS's must do it day in and day out while in the spotlight or in the privacy o...

Are established autism intervention organizations and centers the best pathway to creating 'successful' development in individuals with autism? What is the mainstream autism intervention approach these days? Why is that te main one? Has that approach 'cornered the market,' as far as providing the MOST successful intervention? Is it possible that a great number of innovative approaches are yet to be discovered? What is the goal with interventions? Do marketing dollars drive in propective families and individuals with autism into these centers, more so than actual success rates ? In an age when the mainstream approach to autism intervention sits squarely on the use of ABA, or applied behavioral analysis, the idea of innovating as a Special Educator working for an established center can, in my professional opinion, hinder the professionalism of the professional. What is more, I posit that professionals, such as Special Educators, or what is known loosely as '...

Success is the ability to go from one failure to another without loss of enthusiasm- Winston Churchill This statement is a mindset which can be used as a framework for the practice of excelling in rapid time towards short/ long-term goals attainment. Here is another mindset that parents, teachers, coaches, and even professors can use. Praise the process, not the end result. This is the crux of the 'growth-oriented mindset.' It is buttressed by two other flanking mindset that I am identifying; how you say what you say, which is the definition of 'paraverbal skills,' and the second minor-mindset, more aptly called a 'parameter mindset' is ...'kids expect what we  inspect.' This means that kids pick up on what you value and is important to you by what you say and by how you act. Churchill's comment is an attitude with a goal. It voices strong conviction, and a goal-directed persistence that well not be stopped. Think about it.... ...

One's executive function skills are located in the prefrontal lobe (your forehead area), and are responsible for the manipulation, orchestration, and self-management of one self, in a goal directed manner. Commonly referred to as the brains CEO, it is responsible for a host of skills that range from the ability to focus and sustain attention, to exercising self-control, or using your foresight to anticipate and predict outcomes. As a Special Educator and an Executive Function Skills Coach, it behooves me to introduce strategies, activities, and tools that are accepted by my students, and readily integrated into their daily life with the support of their parent(s).  Regardless of what their diagnosis is, I divorce my thought processes from any label that may have been placed on a child or adolescent.  I do not work with ADHD kids, or EF skill deficit kids, likewise, I do not work with autistic kids. I hope I never do. I do work with kids who have been diagnosed with ...

Parents and Coaches, Metacognition, an executive function skill, is the ability to think about your thinking. Taking a repeated objective look at the inner decision-making process of how one makes decisions is an abstract process that may seem nebulous at best to many. When used in conjunction with other EF skills, like self-monitoring, long term working memory, and foresight (anticipate/ predict), a person is able to learn, shift, correct, and execute better. But how do you get kids to this intuitively? Well, to a great extent you are already using your metacognitive execuvtive function skill 'muscles.' It is helpful to know where  your child's, or your own particualr deficits/ strengths are, in order to have a plan of action to be laser-focused and rendering results.  Consider this: small mindset, or perspective shifts can have massive implications down the road. Just like a large ship is moved by a small rudder, training our children with ...

Do you feel unproductive in the mornings, even though you have a great deal of work to do? Is it hard to laser-focus on what is most important? How does that impact your sense of accomplishment? What about your sense of self-worth? Metacogniton, or awareness of one's on thinking, is pivotal for a person to be able to modify thinking and behavior patterns. The desire for positive change may be there, but the habituated thinking and doing patterns that pervade everyday life may be very strong, hence, the individual may feel stuck. Well, perception is stronger than reality. A problem may appear big, especially if you focus on its problematic characteristics in detail. This unproductive focus can derail motivation, desire, and leave one feeling dejected. It can actually stall forward-momentum, and 'arrest' potential talent keeping it locked up in your mind to gather mothballs. What is worse is that over time, derailed attempts gather steam, much like a runawa...