This article, written by Martha Eddy, CMA, RSMT, Ed.D, is reprinted here with permission. Part 1 today; part 2 on Friday...
"A fully functioning body creates a fully functioning person. I believe that if children do not go through all neuro-motor development patterns then they do not develop their sensory-motor systems completely.When you have gaps in your sensory processing then you cannot make good 'connections' and your actions are inappropriate (i.e. no belly crawling relates to poor horizontal eye tracking and in turn poor eye convergence which lead sto the inability to see letters properly, making it difficult to read well.) Anne Green Gilbert, Dance Educator and founder of BrainDance.
As Green-Gilbert suggests in the quote above, in order to act at all we first need to sense our world (including ourselves), then to "connect to it," and finally to have the capacity to move in response. Somatic awareness is a key to sensing, feeling (connecting), and acting. The connecting comes when we sense ourselves -- it solidifes our knowledge in our body and that prepares us for action. We sense, we register our experience somatically, and then we can decide what we want. We are more equipped to respond accurately and effectively.
Missing the Sixth Sense
The kinesthetic sense (sometimes referred to as the missing 6th sense) is often overlooked even though it is critical in developing the body-mind connection. When we "read" body language we are doing our own subtle assessments of children's integration through their movement. Movement requires sensing both one's body and where we are in space through the proprioceptive sense (the receptors in our joints and muscles that help us feel ourselves). The vestibular system needs to be functioning well for our balance and timing to be "on." This inner ear mechanism is telling us about our relationship to gravity as well as our speed of stopping and starting. Many children with learning difficulties, especially those with attention issues, are not registering this information.
Since our culture does not routinely train us to use this key to self-regulation it isn't even talked about much, swept under the rug. The good news is that people are demaning a more orderly world -- a world that integrates the "hidden" kinesthetic sense (our inero-receptors - proprioception and vestibular awareness) with the more external receptors of vision, hearing, smell, taste and touch.
This body awareness sense of kineshesia is a key to the body-mind connection. The body-mind connection has a long history in Eastern philosophy as the "yoga craze" is teachiing us. What is not as known is that for over one hundred years Westerners have also been investigating critical body-mind brain-psyche connections thrugh this process called somatic education. This body of knowledge uses movement, sensitive touch and skillful dialogue to support learning and personal authority.
The Brain Connection
Programs making great advances with children also emphasize the neurological underpinnings of movement. Educators and therapists trained in somatic practices are using movement and body awareness for academic learning, stress reduction, classroom management, experiential learning, and one-to-one remedial sesions at different points during the extended school day to address cognitive, emotional and physical delays and disabilities. Somatic exploration is revealing clues for how to fill in gaps in neuroological development that leads to big strides amongst children with learning challenges, autism, CP, diverse develomental delays,and hyperactivity. Somatic awareness is also practical for youth contending with the development of scoliosis and other postural and coordination problems.
In the classroom setting, somatic education can be used as the foundation for experiential learning -- for example, allowing stdents to learn anatomy through exploring each system of the body physically -- by touching a body part and moving it. This process is central to one somatic discipline, Body Mind Centering, and kids love it! Moving a math concept is also experiential and gives students a chance to learn math using a different "intelligence." Teachhers can guide the process by asking children how it feels to be shaped like a four; to travel on four limbs; to be attached to four friends supporting a progression from number recognition to basic addition. They can take small quick steps (60) and large slow steps (12) around a clock drawn on the ground with colored chalk to feel the rhythmic and spatial difference between how the minute hand moves and how the hour hand moves.
Somatic Education also addresses sensory processing disorders. Occupational Therapists have sensory gyms that are great for helping to stimlat e myriad of sensory experiences. Education also focuses on the neurological perception of sensations (how we interpret our world) and the perceptions role in the "sensory-motor loop." Somatic activities include carefully selected types of touch to help the child respond to sensation with assisted motor responses (actions) using neuro-motor developmental knowledge. Through the use of set developmental movement sequences (e.g., those important building blocks that foster brain development of babies -- rolling, crawling, sitting, creeping, balancing, standing, that later beconme walking, hopping, skipping and leaping) children have another chance to stimlate neurological pathways. We also use open ended movement explorations to challenge children and to meet their unique nerological demands.
In a classroom setting the process of teaching to diverse learning styles is helped by the neuro-motor system of assessment. Teachers see student's uniqueness as well as find commonality by drawing chldren's attention to the fact that every human has a body. Educational experiences can focus on particular body parts to begin with and then address internal physical sensation as well as our bodies' abilities to perceive our environment. It is our body that leads us to mathematical, analytic, musical, kinesthetic, natural, social and literary modes of inquiry.
Thanks for this blog! It is so critical for parents and teachers to understand the power of movement education in child development. Please visit my blog for related information about motor development.
Stay well and keep moving!
Doreen
Posted by: Doreen Bolhuis | June 17, 2009 at 11:23 AM
P.S. My URL is: http://preventingobesity.wordpress.com/2009/02/06/baby-leah-bounds-ahead/
Doreen
Posted by: Doreen Bolhuis | June 17, 2009 at 11:25 AM