Movement quality gives important insight into mental processing!

Awesome new study that links MOVEMENT quality in mental processing issues, especially the ASD spectrum behavior! When I ask your child to 'make circles' I've always known how they make these circles  is important. Here's an article to help you the parent know that too! Micromovements hold hidden information about severity of autism,

Attentional Control to Self Awareness, to Self Compassion, to Other Compassion

I wrote a note to a mom this morning about her 10 yr old son who ended up in tears during a task today. Great family with wonderful children. Yet, he ended up in tears, overwhelmed by his own thoughts (ANTs - automatic negative thoughts). He quietly kept clapping and trying to hide his emotion, hoping no one would notice the tears, but internally he was beating himself up, feeling HORRIBLE. Here's the post I wrote to this mom. I thought it was worth sharing with others.

Emma' Story - IM with toddlers

IM with very young children. Given the right circumstance, IM is very much an option for the very young. Here's one story.

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. 

Teacher, not Occupational Therapist

I am an educator, not an occupational therapist.

So why's that important to you?

Session 14 and not yet in the teens! Panic!

For completion of basic IM, I set a soft goal of getting every child in the teens on at least one task of over 1000 reps for 3 days in a row. Why? Read this mental processing post and this emotional response post.  But, obviously, not all children reach this goal in 15 sessions. This does not mean your child did not gain from IM, nor that your child is deficient is some way, nor that you or I didn't put enough carrots in front of them. IM trainnig is simply a process and every child walks their own path at their own pace to get there.

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.

IM Parents must watch video.

This is what IM is all about - changing and building neuronal networks with in the entire brain and particularly in the cerebellum. This 12 minutes is worth your time. You may appreciate the scientific nature of the video but mostly it will change the firing of neuronal networks with in your own brain so you can understand IM more thoroughly. Please watch.

Extra Days of IM

On occasion, I'll offer to do a couple of extra sessions for an individual or child.  Some break points are better than others in my opinion.  

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.

Can my 3rd grader come after school?

I get many families that would prefer their younger child do IM after school.  I do not allow this for a couple of very important reasons. I am very cognizant of the hardship this makes on the teachers and family, but the children are the most important piece of this equation.

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.

Sensory Diet Link for Squirrelly Behavior

Can you give me a general idea of “squirrelly” ? Extreme silliness maybe? Emotional?  During IM, a good percentage of students have a day or two of 'squirrelly behavior, some times a week or two, worse case senario, the entire IM training, but this fades in a few weeks after IM is over.

My child has above average timing, now what?

Would you recommend IM if my son scored in the above average or superior range on his IM pretest?

Though it is true that the child's general timing is above average it's important to note that IM impacts more than timing. Quality of movement, connectivity in different brain regions, distractibility, and stamina are a few of the other significant factors to consider.

ANTs - Automatic Negative Thoughts

During IM training, I use the term ANTs alot. Automatic Negative Thoughts - ANTs. I borrowed the concept from Dr. Daniel Amen's book, Making a Good Brain Great. As many as 75% of the individuals I see, both children and adults, have atleast one day of some ANTs.

A neuro-typical 12 yr old male - what does 'typical' look like?

One of the greatest blessings of my career in IM is the wide variety of individuals that I have an opportunity to see. People do not need to go to the doctor, have a diagnosis, or even struggle to go through IM with me. As a result, I see many neuro-typical (NT) people, both children and adults, and of all ages.

What do I mean by neuro-typical (NT)? I mean average, typical, having no neuro-developmental delays/disorders, no diagnosis ... just solid, healthy, typically functioning people. Most of the NT individuals that I see are family members of a child I saw for developmental delays. NT students move differently than the children with neuro-developmental delays. This video of one NT student I trained shows typical movement patterns.

20 Milleseconds - Can your child score this low?

Dan Feldman, from the UC Berkley,  recently discovered that rats brains synchronize for optimal learning at about 20 milliseconds.  Early in my IM career, I discovered that when students work the ms average down to about 20 milliseconds (ms), magic occurs.  Not real magic of course, just mental processing becomes extremely efficient, high quality, in the elite range on the IM charts and most of all, it feels great! People love to get into the teens in IM.

IM Media Coverage

A Neuropsychologist talks about IM for children and adults.

IM at Notre Dame

IM and Stuttering:

IM and Learning Disabilities:

IM and ADHD

A Web MD video link

IM and the younger child - 6 yr old. Also 16 yr old. IM and Motor control.

IM and APD

IM and College Law Student

Brad's Early IM Gains

For those who don't know me, I am doing IM because my son, Brad, found so much success with the IM program. Recently I pulled out old notes about my son's IM training in 2002. If you are interested in what I saw back then, here's the document.

What do you do at assessment?

What do you do at the assessment? 

Assessment for the older child is usually done in the group, for the child under 10, individually.