Two Steps to Avoid Disruptions During Study Time

Written By Tera Sumpter

We all face disruptors to overcome on the way to our goals. You want to eat healthier, but at the moment, that cookie just looks too good to resist. You decide to read a book, but suddenly it’s midnight and you’ve been watching YouTube for four hours. Succeeding at a task despite disruptions can be difficult for adults. It is extra hard for kids. And it is exponentially more difficult for kids whose executive function isn’t working optimally. A disruptor can completely derail a good moment or a good day. 

As a less-than-desirable task, studying is vulnerable to disruptors. Fortunately, there are ways to make study time disruption-proof. You can make a plan to save your current self from your future, disrupted self. I’m going to repeat that phrase because it can be a little confusing at first: you can make a plan to save your current self from your future self. In other words, there are things you can do now, just as you are today, to prepare for who you’ll be when a disruptor shows up in your life.

A girl at a classroom desk gazes distractedly at a pencil.

Saving Your Current Self From Your Future Self

I liked this phrase so much, I’m borrowing it from David Eagleman. I love him. I highly recommend his book LiveWired: Inside the Story of the Ever-Changing Brain to learn more about how the brain works. (Sign up for my email list to get my top 10 book recommendations later this month.) He’s brilliant, and his work is really accessible. He used the idea of saving your current self in an episode of his Inner Cosmos podcast called, “What does eating that cookie have to do with the hero of the Trojan War?” 

Eagleman illustrated his point with a story about Odysseus from the classic Greek poem, The Odyssey, about a war hero sailing home from the Trojan War. Odysseus encountered the Sirens on his journey. The Sirens had irresistible singing voices. Anyone who heard them would go mad trying to get to them. The Sirens used their voices to lure sailors to their deaths. 

Odysseus knew there was no way home that didn’t pass by the Sirens. He ordered his sailors to plug their ears with beeswax. However, being the adventurer that he was, he wanted to have the experience of hearing the legendary song of the Sirens for himself. How could he hear them but still prevent himself from going mad and diving to his death in the rough waters? Odysseus knew he could not count on his future self to make good decisions under the influence of the Sirens. He had to make a plan in the present while he was level-headed. He needed to decide now what he would do later when he was distracted before the distraction carried him to his death. 

So, Odysseus told his crew to tie him to the mast of the ship. He instructed them not to untie him at any cost, no matter what he said. When they got in range of the Sirens’ voices, he ranted and raved and begged to be untied, just as he knew he would. He remained tied to the mast until they were out of danger, and his plan saved him. His past self saved him from the Odysseus who wanted to follow the Sirens’ voices at any cost.

Of course, Eagleman applies this concept to something we’re all familiar with–tempting treats. If you make a plan for what to do when you encounter a batch of homemade cookies in the break room or at a party, you’re much less likely to indulge when you actually encounter them. If you don’t plan for disruptions, your distracted self takes control. Anticipating potential disruptors and making a plan for dealing with them helps us take control of our performance.

This is a great tip for all of us. But it’s especially helpful for children, whether they are still learning how to focus their attention or they struggle to do so consistently. Present-day Collin has the wherewithal to help future Collin when future Collin doesn’t want to study. Present-day Alice can make a plan for when she sits down at her computer to do homework and hears the Siren song of YouTube calling her away from it.

This is an executive function issue. Executive function is the boss of the brain. It tells the other parts of the brain what to do: what to pay attention to, what to remember, what to focus on. We all get distracted. Executive function helps us get back on track. When we make a plan, we strengthen our executive function. When it comes to planning for distractions, two steps are important:

  1. Anticipate specific disruptors you’re likely to encounter.

  2. Make a plan for the disruptors.

Step 1: Anticipate Specific Disruptors You’re Likely to Encounter

Planning is one technique I use to support all kinds of executive function skills. I teach about it in my online education community and on Instagram. There are many different kinds of plans, but one thing is critical to all of them: specificity. The more specific and detailed the plan, the more successful it is likely to be.

It’s not enough to have a vague idea in your head that you may encounter disruptions . I’m sure Odysseus started his epic journey with the thought that he might encounter issues . He may have determined in his heart that he would ignore all distractions and get home as quickly as possible to his long-suffering wife, Penelope. But that vague determination didn’t help him with most of the disruptions he encountered during his ten-year journey home. That’s because just having the intention to do well is not nearly as powerful as taking the step to plan for specific disruptions .

Perhaps if Odysseus had planned for other disruptions ahead of time as he did for the Sirens, he would have made it home sooner. Dealing with a Cyclops? Make a plan with the crew for tricking him. Passing by fields of hallucinatory lotus? Keep the crew on the boat at that stop, for sure. Okay, so Homer wouldn’t have had much of a story to tell if Odysseus had been a better planner. But Odysseus would have saved his family and crew a lot of grief if he’d known to save his present self from his future self with more planning. 

The best ways to get specific with your plan for potential disruptors are to imagine future scenarios and reflect on experiences in detail.

Imagining Potential Disruptors in the Future

Do an imagination exercise with your child, client, or student who is preparing for future study time. Prompt them, be specific with your questions, and ask them to be specific with their descriptions. Here are some things you might say:

  • “What homework assignments do you think or know you’ll have tomorrow? Okay, let’s pick one of those and make a plan.”

  • “Imagine you’re getting ready to do your spelling homework. Where will you do your homework? What will you need to do it?” (Example responses: “I’ll do my homework at my desk in my room. I need my spelling pages and a pencil.”)

  • “Imagine getting ready to do your homework. Engage your senses. Can you tell me what you see, hear, and feel? What might distract you from doing it?” (Some example responses: the smell of dinner, the feeling of the dog wanting to play, the sight of a sibling playing a game.)

As the imagined scenario becomes more vivid, we engage our executive function skills more and more, internalizing the desired outcome. This sets us up for success.

Reflecting on Disruptors in the Past

Another technique I teach to improve executive function is reflexive questioning. I call it that because it prompts kids to reflect in their own minds and expand their own thoughts, rather than trying to impose my thoughts and ideas on them. I am putting together some new resources on reflexive questioning, so make sure you subscribe to my email list to learn more. For now, it’s enough to know that your role is to help a child recall her own experiences and learn from them. You’re not telling the child how to plan for distractions, you’re prompting her to reflect on her past and use that information to project into the future. You ask reflexive questions that help her make her own observations to inform her plan.

Here are some reflexive questions to ask about spelling homework:

  • “Think back to the last time you did your spelling homework? Did it go well? Why or why not? Were there any disruptors that got in the way of you doing it?”

  • “Do you think you’re likely to encounter those same disruptors the next time you do your spelling homework?”

  • “What could you do differently next time?”

That takes us to the next step….

Step 2: Make a Plan for the Disruptors 

You’ve helped your child/client/student identify potential future disruptions. Now it’s time to help them make a plan. Just like with step one, specificity is very important. It wouldn’t have helped Odysseus much to just identify that the Sirens would be a problem. He had to think through what would be effective and take specific precautions. Here are some examples of plans my clients have come up with to help them avoid distractions during study time:

  • Give your phone to your parents or roommate. You cannot get it back until homework is complete or until the parent quizzes you for the test.

  • Use an app like Forest that locks apps on your phone for a certain period of time.

  • Go to a location to study where you won’t be disturbed, like the library.

  • If you’re tempted to click on YouTube or another fun app on your computer, don’t study using your computer. Print material to study.

Lengthy tasks present a special set of challenges. These may require planning how to complete the task before identifying potential distractions along the way. Here are some examples of planning out larger assignments:

  • Reading a book by a certain date: Plan when to get the book, how many pages to read a day.

  • Writing a book report: Plan for reading the book, then outlining, then writing, then editing, then turning it in.

  • Completing a research project: Plan your steps, 1. Picking a topic 2. Researching 3. Outlining 4. Writing/creating project 5. Editing it 6. Turning it in

  • Studying for a test: Decide when to start studying and for how long each day. Decide how to study. (Don’t forget to incorporate expressive and receptive study methods. See my previous blog post for more details: How to Study Effectively: It’s Not Just About Information Input.)

Example: New Assignment Plan

  1. Write down the assignment.

  2. Plan out steps to complete it.

  3. Step by step, identify potential disruptors that might prevent you from completing the new assignment. 

  4. Add steps to your plan for dealing with disruptors.

  5. Review each step to determine how long it will take to complete.

  6. Schedule the steps on a calendar or planner.

Example: Plan for Writing a Paragraph

Here’s an initial plan for writing a paragraph. Once it’s done, walk your kid or client through the steps, and help them imagine potential disruptors. Incorporate steps for dealing with those distractions into the plan:

1. Outline the story with the main idea and details.

  • Write the main idea.

  • Write the details (2-4 words).

  • Number the details.

2. Write a rough draft using your outline.

  • Say each sentence out loud 2 times (not always needed).

  • Say a word, then write the word (not always needed).

3. Edit the draft for:

  • Word choice.

  • Grammar. 

  • Punctuation. 

  • Capitalization. 

  • Spelling. 

4. Write the final draft. 

  • Read each sentence, then rewrite, if necessary. 

  • When finished, reread for mistakes.

Putting together plans with our kids and clients is something we discuss and practice in my online education community. If you’re already a member, check out the Member-Made Plans library for real-life examples. If you’re not a member yet, consider joining!

I hope you’ve found this post helpful. If you have, please share it with friends, colleagues, and even family! The more everyone understands how important executive function is to our everyday thriving, the better off we will all be.

WANT TO LEARN MORE?

Tera Sumpter
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