If you can’t do your own executive functioning, store-bought is fine.
When I’m teaching, I usually hit the wall around week 11 of the 16-week semester. By week 11, I was stressed out, my grading was piling up, I was slow responding to student emails, I was having trouble staying organized, and I still couldn’t remember my students’ names without peeking at the seating chart. By the time I make it to the end of the semester, get through all the final essays, and enter grades into the system, I’m fully burned out.
I’m not alone; several studies have shown that educators have a relatively high rate of burnout and emotional exhaustion 1.For many people, burnout and emotional exhaustion result in reduced executive function skills. These skills are like the brain’s air traffic control system, according to the Harvard University Center on the Developing Child:
Executive function and self-regulation skills are the mental processes that enable us to plan, focus attention, remember instructions, and juggle multiple tasks successfully. Just as an air traffic control system at a busy airport safely manages the arrivals and departures of many aircraft on multiple runways, the brain needs this skill set to filter distractions, prioritize tasks, set and achieve goals, and control impulses. 2
Individuals experiencing burnout, as well as those with ADHD, autism, depression/anxiety, and other neurodiverse conditions, often face challenges with executive function. These challenges can manifest in difficulties with “planning projects, working independently, remembering details, paying attention, or starting and completing tasks” 3.
Fortunately, whether you’re dealing with burnout and executive dysfunction or trying to preserve your time and energy to avoid it, ChatGPT can provide assistance. It can serve as an additional source of executive function support to help you manage your workload, organize your ideas, and plan out tasks. Think of ChatGPT as a bonus supply of executive function for the days when your own reserves are low. To paraphrase Ina Garten: If you can’t do your own executive functioning, store-bought is fine.
Executive function-preserving uses of ChatGPT
Here are some executive function tasks that you can delegate to ChatGPT:
1. Writing emails
Dealing with email can be time-consuming and draining. ChatGPT can draft an email or a reply to your instructions (although you’ll want to do some editing – as far as I can tell, ChatGPT begins literally every email with “I hope this email finds you well”). Here are some examples:
Use case: Draft an email about a touchy subject
Prompt: “Write an email to my sixth-grade daughter’s school principal regarding a substitute teacher in my daughter’s world history class last week. I don’t know the context for this conversation or why they were on this topic, but my daughter told the sub during a class discussion that she is very worried about climate change. In response the sub told the class that they didn’t need to worry because global warming is a hoax. I’m surprised by and concerned about this incident, and I want to bring it to the principal’s attention so that she can be aware of this when considering scheduling this substitute again.”
Use case: Respond to an email
Prompt: “Here is an email that I sent to a former colleague, Leslie, a university professor: [pasted text of email inviting her to lunch]. I received a response from Leslie which said: [pasted text of email accepting invitation]. Please draft a brief response email inviting her to lunch on Wednesday and inviting her to choose a restaurant near her workplace.”
Use case: Summarize an email and generate a list of action items
Prompt: “Summarize the most important information from this email that was sent to me by a colleague, skipping over any small talk, and make a list of action items: [pasted text of email]”
Bonus example: The lab incident. I’m delighted at how well ChatGPT translated this from a frantic-sounding prompt into a thoughtful-sounding, well-composed email.
2. Meal planning
This is one of my least favorite chores. Consequently, I avoid it, and then I end up either spending too much money on DoorDash or eating instant oatmeal for dinner. ChatGPT is surprisingly good at coming up with meal ideas within the parameters you provide.
Use case: Make a meal plan
Prompt: “Create a meal plan for a family of five (two adults, three teenagers) for five dinners that will require minimal preparation time. Include instructions for how to make each meal as well as instructions for how to prepare many of the week’s ingredients at the beginning of the week. […] Generate a grocery list for the meals.”
Use case: Create a workday lunch strategy
Prompt: “I need help figuring out what to eat for lunch and then remembering to eat. I have ADHD and I work from home. My office is on the third floor of my house, and the kitchen is on the first floor. Often I skip lunch because I get very absorbed in work and don’t realize what time it is, or I’m pushing to meet a deadline and don’t have time to prepare anything, or I just don’t feel like going down two flights of stairs. Please generate some lunch ideas that I can throw together with little or no effort and/or keep in my home office. I can bring a small cooler upstairs if I need to keep things cool during the day.”
3. Breaking down and scheduling tasks
Task initiation is a huge challenge with executive dysfunction, particularly in people with ADHD. Executive dysfunction makes it difficult to envision the completed task, which makes it much harder to know where to start. I often use ChatGPT to break down items on my to-do list into individual steps, prioritize and plan tasks, and create checklists and schedules.
Use case: Spread out a large task over a time period
Prompt: “I have to do some research for work. I have a giant book of about 40 essays and articles, and I need to choose three to four essays to read and annotate. I also need to watch a 2-hour webinar, which is broken down into 22 segments that are each 5-10 minutes long. This is due by the morning of April 24. I’d prefer not to work on this on Saturdays and Sundays, but I can if necessary. How can I manage my time?”
Use case: Break down an overwhelming task into distinct steps
Prompt: “This week I have to deal with my out-of-control laundry situation. I currently have three overflowing baskets of clothes sitting in front of my dresser, blocking access to the drawers. They’re filled with a combination of clean clothes that didn’t get put away after being washed, clothes that were taken out to wear but then rejected, and clothes that have been worn once and may or may not need to be washed. One of the baskets is half full of clothes that I was planning to go through to decide what to keep and what to donate, but those clothes got kind of mixed in with the clean laundry or dumped on the floor. Also, one of the baskets is covered in fur because my cat has been sleeping in it. I also have a pile of dirty laundry sitting in the floor of my closet — I haven’t been able to wash it because I don’t have any empty laundry baskets to carry the clothes to the washer in. Please help me come up with a plan for getting all of my clothes washed, folded, and put away, broken down in manageable steps and spread over the course of a three-day weekend.”
Use case: Create a chore schedule
Prompt: “Make a weekly schedule for keeping my kitchen clean, broken down into daily and weekly tasks.”
4. Tracking your time and energy levels
This isn’t an everyday task you can delegate to ChatGPT as much as it is a way to collect data that will inform how you budget your executive function.
Use case: Charting productivity patterns
Prompt: “I want to create a worksheet or form that I can use to analyze what times of day are the best for me to do different types of tasks. For instance — am I better at creative tasks first thing in the morning but analytical tasks in late afternoon? Do I have more energy for household chores right after lunch? Can you generate (or describe) a worksheet that would help me collect and analyze this information?”
5. Creating a basic exercise schedule
ChatGPT is not a trainer or a physical therapist, so don’t just blithely follow its instructions without checking the information out first. With that big caveat in mind, you can ask ChatGPT to plan out an exercise routine.
Use case: Knee rehab workout plan
Prompt: “Lately, as my lifestyle has become more and more sedentary, when I do a lot of activity I experience pain from arthritis in my left knee. If I walk for more than about 10 minutes at a time, or I do other physical activity that uses my knee, I’m often in significant pain for the rest of the day. Help me create a workout plan to rehab my knee to the point where I can be on my feet for extended periods of time without debilitating pain. I have access to a well-equipped gym. […] Using this basic plan, can you create a workout schedule for two months? I go to the gym two to three times a week.”
6. Pep talks
Sure, ChatGPT isn’t a person, but sometimes you need someone to give you a little motivational boost, and an AI will do.
Use case: ADHD strategies
Prompt: “I have an important deadline this evening, and I am having the worst ADHD day I’ve had in quite a while. I feel like my brain is melting, and I can’t concentrate on anything. I’ve taken my meds, eaten a meal, had some caffeine, gotten out of the house for a bit — but none of that has actually resulted in any boost in productivity or reduction in distractibility. (See, for example, my talking to chatGPT when I should be working.) What are some strategies I can employ to get some work done?”
Use case: Motivational planner quotes
Prompt: “Good morning, ChatGPT. I’m filling out my planner for today and I would like some sort of brief motivational statement that I’ll see when I check my schedule and to-do list. I’m looking for something short, pithy, not too earnest, and kind of unexpected.”
Whether you are experiencing burnout or simply aiming to preserve your time and energy, ChatGPT can be a reliable tool to lean on when your own reserves are running low.
Utilizing ChatGPT for executive function support, in addition to classroom support, can help you reclaim some of the time and mental energy that go into completing tasks.
So embrace this additional support and empower yourself to navigate the challenges of education with greater ease.
Abi Bechtel is a writer, educator, and ChatGPT enthusiast. They have an MFA in Creative Writing from the Northeast Ohio MFA program through the University of Akron, and they just think generative AI is neat.
- Feuerhahn, N., Stamov, R. C., Wolfram, M., Bellingrath, S., & Kudielka, B. M. (2013). Emotional exhaustion and cognitive performance in apparently healthy teachers: A longitudinal multi-source study. Stress & Health: Journal of the International Society for the Investigation of Stress, 29(4), 297–306. https://doi-org.ezproxy.uakron.edu:2443/10.1002/smi.2467
- Koutsimani, P., Montgomery, A., Masoura, E., & Panagopoulou, E. (2021). Burnout and cognitive performance. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(4), 2145. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18042145
- Harvard University Center on the Developing Child. (n.d.). Key concepts: Executive function and self-regulation. Retrieved from https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-concepts/executive-function/
