At a Glance

• Working memory is a basic mental skill. It’s important for both learning and doing many everyday tasks.
• Working memory allows the brain to briefly hold new information while it’s needed in the short term. It may then help to transfer it into long-term memory.
• Most kids with learning and attention issues have trouble with working memory.

Working memory is an ability that allows us to work with information. It helps us learn and perform even basic tasks. Most kids with learning and attention issues have trouble with this vital function. That’s especially true of kids with executive functioning issuesand ADHD.

Here’s what you need to know about this key ability, and how it affects learning.

What Working Memory Is

Working memory is one of the brain’s executive functions. It’s the ability to hold on to new information so we can turn around and use it in some way. Working memory allows us to hold information without losing track of what we’re doing.

Kids need this ability to perform well in school. Consider this scenario:

Your child’s math teacher asks the class to add 21 and 13 in their head, and then subtract 6 from the sum.

Working memory enables your child to hold on to and visualize the numbers the teacher has called out. It also allows her to remember what the sum of 21 and 13 is, so she can then take away 6.

Your child might not remember any of these numbers by the next class or even 10 minutes later. And that’s OK. Working memory has done its short-term job and allowed her to tackle the task at hand.

Source unknown