PRACTIONER’S CORNER:
Last week, one of our staff members visited a school for children with special needs. How impressive! Everything was right….the heart beat of the staff, the facility, the parental support, EVERYTHING! In the discussion, as the Director led the Brainjogging staff member through the halls, the subject of iPads surfaced. “We have found that a specific phenotype individual experiences uncontrollable motor responses in the form of tics, increased oppositional defiance, repetitive behaviors such as flapping and jerking and unrelenting abnormal fear.”

Then, we entered an organized and structured classroom. The teacher was in front of the students, holding an iPad. A story was being read aloud via the iPad. There sat a student who was clearly phenotype #1, reacting to this screen media. Oh my! He was jerking and flapping. It was like repetitive involuntary reflexes!! The other two children were fine.

In this phenotype of children, we are finding that it may affect them by promoting what Daniel Goleman defines as an “amygdala hijacking.” It is an immediate and overwhelming response to a perceived threat. The child begins a habitual behavior to address the stimulus.

One thing we know – the TV today’s kids are watching is very different from decades ago. They are digital! Additionally, almost all screens are digital! It is a new type of media for human brains, without transitioning time. It takes decades and centuries to change our brains to adapt to new environmental input. Yet, our children today are seeing their textbooks, casual reading, televisions, computers, billboards, iPods, phones, virtually everything their eyes encounter are digital screens! Got the picutre? For some, it is the onset of tics or epilepsy. For others, parents may see an increase in agitation, angry outbursts, or defiant behavior. If any of these behaviors describe your child’s behavior, begin to chart it!

Parents can now become empowered! Remove the digital media (iPads, TV, video games, Wii, etc.) for two weeks, continuing to chart the behaviors. What information can be concluded from this data?

What can you do to alter these bad habits?

1. Get the technology out of the child’s bedroom. Computers, televisions and phones left in a bedroom are guarantees for disrupted sleep and difficult mornings. Centrally locate the computer so you can monitor your child’s use; have a “curfew” for the phone – 30 minutes before lights out.

2. No longer allow for UNLIMITED ACCESS. Provide technology as currency. Are chores done? Homework completed? Have you Brainjogged? If yes, then allow for some limited screen time. Children need a break from their screens. As a parent, you also have control over when the device is allowed to access wireless Internet connection. Have it turn on and off at a certain hour of the day.

3. Out of sight, out of mind. Cover the TV when it’s off; charge the phones and iPods when not in use. Get your child outside and playing. The more they are involved in physical activity, the more likely they are to be healthy and happy!

These are three easy ways to begin monitoring your child’s screen time. Access a privilege not a right. As a parent, you are caring for your child’s brain! It’s as important as buckling their seatbelt, giving them good food, and tucking them in at night. Your job is to keep them safe, so keep them safe!

Aristotle said, “Anyone can become angry – that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way – this is not easy.”

Dr. Don Deshler, the Director for the Center for Research on Learning at the University of Kansas said:

“Learning is an emotional, visceral, affective experience before it’s a cognitive one.”

Want to increase the odds of your child learning and retaining new information? Then, have fun!!! Yes, research clearly demonstrates the benefits of emotions on every aspect of individual’s entire school day! Want to know more, read Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman. Good news! Their Emotional IQ trumps their Intelligence Quotient! Be certain a happy experience is preceded and followed by learning! If you see an upset coming during homework? Think: HALT! Is (s)he hungry, angry, lonely, or tired? The brain requires its survival needs met first!

Is the emotion connected to a specific subject, like math or writing? Much of what is measured in the process of schooling is the cognitive part – testing, outcomes, and performance in class. But behind every score is an emotional reaction that a student often has to that. When kids encounter failure, there may be a tendency to shut down, act out, or act indifferently.

As we launch into the month of March, often celebrated as Reading Month in schools, and transitioning into the season of spring, you may notice a surge in emotions. Think about adding in an additional Brainjogging Session (remind your child, “your brain has been hibernating and we need to provide it with an extra boost!”), looking for alternative ways to learn information (Learning Ally is great for audio books! Ask us for a discount coupon! Consider hands-on explorations at a nature center or a museum). Parents are reporting using Brainjogging before every practice and the results are very encouraging, MOST IMPROVED PLAYER!!! Linking Brainjogging to their fun is brilliant! Every sport requires good hand-eye coordination and planning! Brainjogging and moving before educational tasks (dancing before school, shooting hoops, or running in the yard before sitting to do homework) pays big dividends!

Interpret the thing that we see on the surface as what it is! Be sensitive to the emotional part of the learning process that the students are encountering, and make sure they know you are on their team – supporting them and cheering them on!

Brainjogging reduces much of the anxiety because eye movement builds new neurons! Success breeds success…great Motivator! Success makes them WANT to go back. Just ask a fellow Brainjogging Parent and veteran teacher, “How is YOUR child succeeding with Brainjogging?!” Yesterday the answer was, “It is definitely working! He took two Accelerated Reader tests and made 100% plus he took the practice spelling test and made 100%! This is a first for us!”

What do you do when your child breaks his/her leg? Surely you don’t think, “I’ll just buy him/her a new pair of tennis shoes!” Of course not! The doctor MUST set the leg with proper alignment and perhaps prescribe a little physical therapy. Then, in no time, your child will walk and run happily again!

The same is true of the growing brain! What happens when those parts aren’t processing efficiently? You study alongside him/her and realize, the grades on the report card are not a reflection of the days the two of you studied leading up to the test! Did you know you may have more control than you may have realized! The best ways to keep our brains healthy are:

Physical exercise: Researchers have found the areas of the brain associated with learning and memory are stimulated by exercising! Let’s run!
Lifelong Learning: Build excitement and challenge into learning! “How fast can you highlight all the words on this Word Search page?” Learning over time enhances memory and the survival of new brain cells.
Social Interaction: Strong social ties have been associated with lower blood pressure and longer life expectancies. “Let’s invite a new friend over Friday!”
Sleep and Nap: Eight to 10 hours of sleep a night works magic on school performance! When children get their full 8 to 10 hours of sleep, they will experience 5 REM. That is when information transfers from short term to long term memory located in the hippocampus. New learning is consolidated in long term memory only during those five rapid eye movements!
Manage Your Stress: Scientists believe people exposed to chronic stress tend to have elevated levels of cortisol. High cortisol levels are dangerous to the brain.
Laugh: Norman Cousins cured his cancer with laughter! It also improves memory. Create teachable moments with a joyful spirit!
Eat well: Dr. Andrew Weil stated, “Every obese person I know skips breakfast!” Wake your child earlier to have time for breakfast. Throw in a few blueberries and improve short-term intellectual performance, learning and memory!

Build a better brain by Brainjogging each day! Simple mental exercise for a healthy, happy brain! So many of the wonderful recommendations take place each and every time your child works with a Brainjogging instructor – they experience learning, laughter, singing, movement, stress reduction, mental stimulation and – of course – new learning each and every session!

Did you know that the same brain system that controls our muscles also helps us to remember music? Most of us would have assumed that it was the area of our brain responsible for hearing.

For years, parents have reported that their children know the words to every song! Absolutely! That’s why at Brainjogging, we use songs to teach the parts of speech, history and world geography! Students learn in record time and love learning as they are moving and singing to the beat!

Dr. Josef Rauschecker, from Georgetown University Laboratory of Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition, discovered from brain scans of volunteers listening to a series of musical notes that motor areas became active when people were hearing something new. These same areas (motor) were relatively quiet when they heard familiar musical notes. The area of the brain responsible for hearing was more active when participants heard familiar notes.

Why do we care about this finding? Because if you have ever seen a Brainjogging instructor work with a student, the FIRST thing you notice is motor movement! Practicing new information, singing songs and reciting poetry is a part of each and every session. It helps children learn! And, if they forget a section of the recitation, it usually takes one hand gesture or facial expression from the teacher to get them back on track.

Rauschecker also discovered that motor memory can rescue auditory memory when pieces of information are lost. Starting over and working through the sequence brings the information back.

Remember, when children are learning new things the motor cortex of the brain is actively involved. Work with your child by bouncing a ball, clapping hands, moving the body, and they will be more likely to recall that information! Keep Brainjogging and it will come to them like MUSIC to their ears!

One day a parent consulted with us prior to bringing her son for cognitive processing ability testing. She explained that her “other” son was very bright. Unlike Franklin, he read at five years old and entered the gifted class in second grade. He was a champion chess player and spoke with eloquence! “Am I wrong to compare Franklin to Jason? Franklin has difficulty following directions, doesn’t understand what he has read and hardly speaks! I work with him every day for hours and it just doesn’t seem to matter the next day. His father and I are thinking that we are expecting too much of him.”

“Are you serious? Jason better hold on to his hat! Franklin will build a better brain here! Not only that, but he will soon realize the strengths he possesses as a result of his learning challenges!”

Testing revealed that this student displayed characteristics commonly seen in a language processing disorder. Some teachers reported him displaying a low self-esteem. Yet, his parents stated that he had a great sense of humor! He could be a real “clown” some days at home. But, maybe school was not his forte. He achieved low scores in reading comprehension, had difficulty with punctuation, and reportedly displayed “learn forget syndrome.” For example, his mother studied with him four days to achieve an “A” on his weekly spelling test. Yet, he misspelled the same words two weeks later.

As always, the examiner stated, “Within every disability is a phenomenal ABILITY!” For example, his love of sports and tremendous ability he displays represents the typical “ABILITY” students may exhibit who are diagnosed with a language processing disorder. They are great dancers, ball players and swimmers! They seem to do well in math, too! To Franklin she stated, “Young man, I have a friend I want you to meet!”

That afternoon, she took him to an elderly man who does upholstery. He had several professional ball players’ pictures displayed on his walls. She said, “See all those professional ball players? Well, Charlie told every one of them that he just KNEW they would be!” Then she turned to Charlie and asked, “What do you see Franklin becoming one day?” He looked Franklin up and down and said, “Franklin? Whoa! Now that’s a name for a PRESIDENT! One day you are going to be a PRESIDENT!” Several days later, Franklin returned for sessions. He asked afterwards, “Do you think I could be a president some day?” Sure you could!

Today, he is president of two companies!

Expectations are tricky. You don’t want to set the bar too high, you may be disappointed; don’t want to set it too low, you may be right!

In 1964, a Harvard professor conducted a study in an elementary school near San Francisco. He wanted to find out what would happen if teachers were told that certain students in their classrooms were “destined to succeed.” After the students were administered a standardized IQ test (with a different cover that read “Harvard Test of Inflected Acquisition”), several students were chosen randomly and identified as kids who were about to experience a dramatic growth in their IQ.

What he found over the next two years was that teacher expectations actually affected a student’s growth. The teachers gave those specific students a longer response time after asking them a question, more specific feedback, approving nods, and encouraging smiles. And guess what? Their IQs did increase! To see more of the story, you can visit NPR.

The best way to get our children working toward their goals is to hold them to the great expectations! Believe in them. Work with them. Stick with them. Stay strong!

Brainjogging is that tool that can make it easier to keep those expectations to higher level. The brain is working smarter, and as a parent you are giving your child the leg-up he/she needs to meet the challenge! Keep it up!

And remember, while others lower the bar so our kids can step over it, we RAISE the bar so our kids learn to SOAR!

Have you looked at your recent copy of Journal of Neurology? No need! We are going to bring that good information and research to you – in language that makes sense.

Researchers at the University of Southern California have developed a new screening method for detecting neurological disorders by studying the eye movements of individuals. Participants in this study were instructed to watch and enjoy clips from television shows for a period of twenty minutes. During this time, researchers recorded their eye movements. These eye movement patterns were then used to determine brain function or dysfunction. At the conclusion of this study, researchers were able to identify individuals with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, and/or Parkinson’s Disease – simply by their ocular control and attention dysfunctions.

This research is significant, because “for the first time, we can actually decode a person’s neurological state from their everyday behavior, without having to subject them to difficult or time-consuming tests,” Professor Laurent Itti said. See this link to read the entire article.

We are thrilled about this new information because it continues to validate our methods! Brainjogging trains the eyes to move efficiently and thoroughly from left to right, taking in all visual stimuli, particularly stimuli in the peripheral fields of vision. This increased efficiency yields a more comprehensive visual stimulus for the brain to process. Brainjogging is a preventative and corrective tool. By identifying the root of the learning difficulty early, we can begin reversing the difficulties.

Allow Brainjogging to work for you! Let it be your learning tool! It works if you work it, but you have to work it every day!!!

(with contributions from Katie Cyphers, M.S.Ed., Academics Plus Atlanta)