Brad and I share his story at the National IM conference... what an honor! 

Cognitive Flexibility

Cognitive Flexibility is the ability to shift gears, a foundation human process that plays a role in an individual's ability to succeed. IM dramatically improves cognitive flexibility at all levels of functioning. Here are three video clips about this mental process.

A dad shares about how improved cognitive flexibility seen during IM training positively impacted his son's behavior.
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A teen in an elite private school. This video begins with some higher level IM tasks and then you'll hear the student and parent talk about the behavioral ramifications of improved cognitive flexibility.

Research is now being done on elite managers and what's happening in their brains that allows for top end cognitive flexibility that makes them the world's innovators. 

Functional Neurology

A new name for IM training, at least functionally this is what is happening during IM training. If you watch this trailer, you will see one of the therapies being used is indeed IM. A must see video for all my parents.

Hope Restored: Functional Neurology Serves Humanity from Unseen Line Films on Vimeo.

Primitive Reflexes and Neurodevelopmental Spectrum Disorders

Dr. Martin Rukeyser speaks about primitive reflexes and how a failure of proper neural development can impact children with Neurodevelopmental disorders such as Autism, ADD, ADHD, Dyslexia, and Asperger syndrome. 

New IM research published

Here   you can read about how IM helps students with ADD, the theory behind what's happening to help them focus. I'll take the time to blog on it sometime, right now, I'll just link to the research.

Addicted to video games?

Today, Sammy (named changed) came to IM playing his hand held video game in the car on the way to IM. He did not have a very good day at IM. He could not get engaged in the IM activities. Upon leaving IM, he's focus immediately went to getting that hand held game back into his hands. Mom took it and kept it. Thank you mom.

ADHD Presentation

This presentation is a great overall view of ADD. Each point Dr. Steven Hinshaw makesis backed by research. One piece that was extremely significant was that if the parent of a child with ADHD has even mild depression, outcomes for the child are significantly less positive. We need to help our parents where by indeed we help our children.  Watch the presentation here - Jan 12th 2011 presentation by Dr. Hinshaw.  He advocates a very structured but warm school environment with some adjustments in homework requirements to meet the students needs. Children with ADHD need rewards as well. Teachers and teaching environments make a difference.

Along these lines - I believe the book The Kazdin Method for Parenting the Defiant Child  is a great resource for parents of all children, especially any child that is struggling.  It teaches specific steps in positive reinforcement of good behavior and very researched techniques to help the child succeed.

Infant Reflexes

Another great link about retained infant reflexes - something I believe to be significant for many of the students I see. The poorer an individual scores in IM, the more likely I am to see these retained infant reflexes in their movements.  There's a relationship here.

ANTs - Automatic Negative Thoughts

Dr. Amen talks about ANTs in this video.  This is the seventh video of his speech, you need to go about 1:07 seconds into video to get to the ANTs part. Great video series! Watch it!

My Child is constantly making noises.

Last week I saw a student who's mom reported that her son is constantly making noises.

Exploring Time: The Brain's Basal Ganglia

Using an MRI, a Team from Duke University is studying timing and the basal ganglia lights up. This set of nuclei is responsible for monitoring ALL of the brain. The basal ganglia is our timing center, our brain's conductor. See this short clip from the Science Channel here. 

Dealing with finicky eaters

I found this slide show today... pretty good I think, for all finicky eaters, not just Aspies.

Living On Thin Air: How to Get Your Asperger Kid to Eat a Healthy Diet

View more presentations from Nancy Mucklow.

Brain Balance

Dr. Melillo has recently published an excellent book called Disconnected Kids.  His website  has a couple of wonderful videos on the right side of his website. I strongly encourage parents to make an effort to watch the second one, Dr. Melillo on Everyday with Marcus and Lisa.  Dr. Melillo covers key aspects of brain imbalance on this video.  As you watch the first video, KCAL9 Features Brain Balance,  you will notice that part of the brain balance program seems to implement Interactive Metronome.  At IM Focused, brain balance has for years been a focus of  IM training in addition to connecting various pathways and improving the timing and synchrony of the neuronal activity in each pathway.

Pesticides linked to ADHD

 A report, published in the June 2010 issue of Pediatrics, suggests that the use of organophosphates, pesticides found on many of our fruit and vegetables, could be related to rising rates of ADHD.  Many experts suggest choosing organic or locally grown foods for those items known to have the highest levels of contamination. Read more here.  

Weak Right Hemisphere or NLD

Your child's brain is marvelous, fascinating and has TWO hemispheres - both hugely important. Some times I will notice weakness in one or the other hemisphere during IM training. Extreme right brain hemisphere weakness can sometimes be seen in attention issues, understanding the big picture, and what is often referred to as non verbal learning difficulties. Here you'll find one of the best descriptions I've found of what this looks like in a child.  A must read if I've said your child has a weak right hemisphere. Note - not all children will have all of these symptoms - some may have very few, but typically the right hemisphere is in charge of these mental processes.

Overflow movements in ADHD

I will often see students using overflow movements during IM tasks and associate this with an immature neurological system. This paper identifies this characteristic in our ADHD population as well. Read more here.

Flame Retardants linked to ADD and Autism

Numerous studies and agencies, including the National Toxicology Program and the California Environmental Protection Agency, have linked halogenated chemicals (a common flame retardant found in furniture, mattresses, homes) to cancer, thyroid disease, reproductive problems, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, child autism and a long list of other ailments.

ATNR Activities

Many students that I see have atypical movement patterns. One particular atypical pattern is frequently seen:  The child makes his or her circles backwards (claps downward). Modified versions of this might be that the child arches back and forth on the single handed hits, or they flatten the circles.  There is a very strong correlation between these atypical movement patterns and the retained infant reflex, ATNR (Asymmetric Tonic Neck Reflex.) ATNR retention is often associated with ADD.

IM helps PDD patient focus.

This new case study about a child with PDD is posted on the national IM website.  For complete case study, click here. “Aiden” is an 11 year old boy diagnosed with Pervasive  Developmental Disorder (PDD), high functioning. He is friendly, bright and talkative but has difficulty staying focused and following instructions. While talking he will sometimes insert random comments irrelevant to the topic.

Positive Negative IM Gains

On occasion, a student may start 'getting in trouble' at school post IM. Why is this? You would expect just the opposite. This usually has a lot to do with the child feeling more empowered, less willing to accept being bullied, or more confident, all positive mental gains.  But the children do not know how to behave more empowered, deal appropriately with bullies, or be assertive in a positive way. Therefore their behavior may be seen as aggressive, fighting for a new position in the class rank, standing up for themselves, but inappropriately so.  This is the time to re-teach assertiveness skills. These are positive negative responses to IM.