1. Alternating Attention: the ability to shift the focus of attention quickly. 

2. Auditory Processing Speed: the time it takes to perceive relevant auditory stimuli, encode, and interpret it and then make an appropriate response. ( It is the ability of the students to receive, understand and respond back )

3. Central Processing Speed: the time it takes to encode, categorize, and understand the meaning of any sensory stimuli. (The ability of the students to receive and understand the message sent by any of the five senses) 

4. Conceptual Reasoning: includes concept formation, abstraction, deductive logic, and/or inductive logic.( The ability of the student to understand concepts and solve problems)

5. Divided Attention: the capability to recognize and respond to multiple stimuli at the same time.) 

6. Fine Motor Control: the ability to accurately control fine motor movements.( the ability of the student to have coordination among all body movements and having control on the movements)

7. Fine Motor Speed: the time it takes to perform a simple motor response.( the time taken by the student to perform any bodily movement.) 

8. Focused (or Selective) Attention: the ability to screen out distracting stimuli.(The ability of the student to stay undistracted and to stay focused on what is required)  

9. Response Inhibition: the ability to avoid automatically reacting to incorrect stimuli.( The ability of the student to understand quickly what is not important and avoid attention towards it) 

10. Sustained Attention: the ability to maintain vigilance. (The ability of the student to be alert and attentive towards their surroundings.) 

11. Visuospatial Sequencing: the ability to discern the sequential order of visual objects based on a concept or rule.( The ability of the student to categorize things based on what they see i.e. how the things appear) 

12. Visual Perception: the ability to perceive fixed visual objects. (The ability of the student to have fixed vision on moving objects as will as stationary objects.) 

13. Visual Processing Speed: the time it takes to perceive visual stimuli.( The time taken by the student to understand that a object is moving and time taken to perceive it)

14. Visual Scanning: the ability to find a random visual cue. (The ability of the student to understand what they are seeing and pick up the images that are useful to them.) 

15. Visual Tracking: the ability to follow a continuous visual cue.( The ability of the student to understand the cues and perceive similar cues that are useful to them) 

16. Working Memory: the ability to hold task-relevant information while processing it. ( The ability to keep receiving the information from external source and at the same time try to understand what they are receiving)The human brain is a remarkable organ. It consists of hundreds of billions of brain cells (neurons) and thousands of trillions of connections (synapses). Until recently, conventional wisdom held that you were born with all the brain cells you would ever have, and you would lose a significant number of these cells as you age. Hence, these become very important in young age especially among children. 

Every parent asks their children if they have scored good marks or not but rarely parents ask children if they understood what is thought in school. Cognitive abilities are very bases for the student’s education. Hence, parents and teachers should take care to improve the cognitive ability. Little is known about the genetic and environmental etiology of the association between specific cognitive abilities and scholastic achievement during the early school years. It sometimes seems that it is difficult to pick up a current issue without it containing a story about some cognitive characteristic for which it has been found that a gene is responsible. Even aspects of human cognition would feel certain that some are environmentally controlled and some being attributed to be a part of the genes. But genes never act alone: Their effects are always filtered through the environment. Family environment may be related to childhood cognitive abilities either directly through environmental transmission or indirectly through correlations with parental genotypes.  Some of the main reasons for not developing cognitive abilities among students are individuals who grow amid economic insecurity, overcrowded schools, lack of enrichment activities, non parental care, having single parent, social isolation, punishment, non-recognition, not allowing creativity, no balance food, improper hygienic habits, physical disabilities, not having physical activity and violent neighborhoods. Fear and stress can be additional problems. Some scientists and educators suggested that these have long-lasting effects on the child. 

Some of the ways to improve the cognitive abilities among the students are discussed here below. 

1. Keep brain active.

The brain is not a muscle, but regularly "exercising" the brain actually does keep it growing .By developing new mental skills especially complex ones such as learning a new language or learning to play a new musical instrument and challenging your brain with puzzles and games you can keep your brain active and improve its physiological functioning. 

2. Give time to form a memory.

Memories are very fragile in the short-term, and distractions can make you quickly forget something as simple as a phone number. The key to avoid losing memories before you can even form them is to be able to focus on the thing to be remembered for a while without thinking about other things, so when you’re trying to remember something, avoid distractions and complicated tasks for a few minutes. 

3. Love, affection and care.

Show children that you love and appreciate them. Creating a caring environment at home triggers better memory recall, thinking and problem solving skills. By showing care and affection we can facilitate emotional balance in young children which result in positive behavioral outcomes, which, in turn, enhance learning ability.

4. Set high, but realistic goals.

Parents always make a mistake of setting unrealistic goals for children and many a time that leads to frustration in students. Setting unrealistic expectations for children can actually hinder their drive to perform well and can lead to depression, anxiety and a lack of self-esteem and confidence. Hence, always have children in view before setting goals for them. In doing so, parents will help their child achieve a greater level of confidence and academic success. 

5. Organize life.

If you teach the child to be more organized it helps them to concentrate on many other things in life. The habit of being organized should be thought from the childhood it self. Improved organization can help free up student’s powers of concentration so that you can remember less routine things. By being organized helps to improve memory. 

6. Sound sleep each night

To absorb core learning skills such as those required for reading, math and other tasks of memory, students require good sleep. Adequate sleep contributes to several important learning, emotional, behavioral and performance-related functions and children who do not get adequate sleep. Students are expected to sleep at lest 6 to 8 hours every day 

7. Exercise daily

Regular aerobic exercise improves circulation and efficiency throughout the body, including in the brain, and can help ward off the memory loss that comes with aging. Exercise also makes you more alert and relaxed, and can thereby improve student’s cognitive ability allowing them to take better mental balance. 

8. Extra curricular activities

Participation in extracurricular activities has been linked to academic achievement in students by many researchers. Parents should not focus always on academics but allow students to engage themselves in music, games, creative arts, learning new skills and developing hobbies which indirectly help them in improving academic success.  

9. Eating habits

Parents should concentrate on what is good food for children. Never allow students to miss on their food specially breakfast .Children get about one-fourth of their nutrient needs from breakfast, and research shows that skipping breakfast impairs children’s performance in school. Among the effects are decreased attention span and ability to concentrate, restlessness, less energy and enthusiasm, and poor academic achievement There are a lot of herbal supplements in the market that claim to improve children’s abilities. Never go by them. Always pick up what is good for them like vegetables, fruits and cereals which give all the vitamins needed. But always remember never keep the student hungry or never over dose them with too much food. 

Everyone can take steps to improve their cognitive abilities. With time and practice most people can gain the abilities. Scientists believe that by exercising, your brain can create a ‘cognitive reserve’ that will help you stay sharp as you age. 

In these days of competitiveness students are vulnerable to several pressures. Regular exercise, balanced food and allowing some time in the day for extra curricular activities, act as stress bursters. This helps in keeping the mind and body healthy.