Several years ago I reported about people hiring dating coaches to help youngsters communicate in person.  Real interpersonal live social skills are so low people hire coaches to help them be socially present in the physical world.

                  How do you talk to a girl on a date when all you've done is text?  Well, now we've moved this personal functionality problem one step further.  According to a one-page article in the Wall Street  Journal, "the new must-have for overwhelmed kids:  an executive function coach."   

                  These coaches charge anywhere from $125 to $225 per hour to get your middle schooler organized and functional.  Apparently this hits after elementary school, when homework, extracurricular activities, and puberty kick in to overwhelm kids with life's new demands.   

                  These EF (Executive Function) coaches operate on a platform with three categories:  short-term tasking; controlling impulses for immediate pleasure; planning.   The article quotes Brandon Slade, founder of Denver-based Untapped Learning, that "so many students . . . are struggling today with problem-solving and basic executive function tasks like managing procrastination."   

                  You can guess the suggested culprits:  social media, college options, and the plethora of choices facing teens. May I humbly suggest that the real culprit is lack of chores and homestead-type skill development? 

                  Australia has a piece of legislation developing that would ban social media to anyone 16 years old and younger.  When you add in the junk food and chemical-laden food consumed by young people, we have an epidemic of non-functional, brain-inhibited teens. Psychologists also point to overscheduling:  "kids have no time to practice making decisions about how to spend their time." 

                  As I read about this, I couldn't help but think of a different remedy.  It's called gardening, backyard chickens, and child entrepreneurship.  Homesteading.  I'm reminded of a lady I met who grew up in Washington state apple orchard country.  Back in the 1950s and 1960s during the summer the orchards would lease unused school buses, posting a pickup schedule around the city or in the newspaper.  

                  Kids who wanted to earn spending money would get on the bus, go pick apples for the day, and come home with a few dollars in their pockets.  You had to be a certain height to be eligible.  But think about something as simple as picking apples like this to develop executive function.  First, you had to figure out money was your problem, not someone else's.  Then you had to figure out how you were going to earn that money and if you decided to pick apples, you had to find the pick-up schedule and plan your life around that work day.   

                  When the day came, you had to look at the weather, think about the work, pick the right clothes, get to the bus stop, interact physically with other kids--visceral social skills.  Then imagine all the decisions during picking.  I've picked quite a few apples, and every apple requires you to decide how best to get to it.  Placing the ladder in the most expeditious location, working through all the twigs and twisted branches.  Even the act of twisting the apple is an art form.  Then where to place it in your basket and how high to fill the basket before emptying. 

                  The same thing could be said for a thousand homestead activities.  I think instead of hiring executive function coaches, these parents need to invest in a homestead, a backyard garden, flock of chickens, beehive--anything to work together in meaningful, practical ways with foundational life necessities. Self-worth comes from successfully accomplishing meaningful tasks.  So does executive function.  I think we've just discovered a fantastic revenue stream for homesteaders:  charge your city friends and cousins $225 an hour to take their dysfuntional 12-18 year olds and turn them into men and women. 

                  I envision a multi-billion dollar enterprise of franchised farm schools.  The tag line could be "want worry-free kids?  Send them to us."   Mission statement:  to turn adolescents into responsible, servant-leader, confident, enthusiastic, problem-solving, legacy-building adults."  How about that?

                  The homestead tsunami is all about responding to cultural dysfunction.  When does denying children meaningful work, homestead and household chores, and practical skill development become viewed as abuse?  I suggest confining young people to TikTok, basement video games, and child-centric worldviews is far more abusive to their functional development than expecting them to participate in real life responsibilities. 

                  Looking back, what childhood chore do you now appreciate as being critical to your functional adult development?