These COVID-19 Coronavirus times have certainly turned many of our worlds upside down. We now virtually have a world full of homeschoolers; more parents are at home with their children than at any time in the history of the world. Exceptional times and exceptional circumstances can also result in exceptional opportunities. Many of us are rediscovering and redefining basic things like family, work, school, and our relationship to institutions and society. I would like to talk with you about redefining potential and intellect and how while you are all at home, you have the potential to change the lives of every member of the family.

I would like to share a personal story. I grew up in a family of pioneers in human development. My father, a physician, and my uncle, a physical therapist in the ‘50s, worked with brain injured children and discovered that with the proper stimulation, healthy parts of the brain could learn to carry out the functions of damaged areas of the brain. This was ground breaking work that was originally seen as heretical, but is now after decades universally accepted. Changing perceptions is not an easy task, as I can certainly attest to after fifty years of trying to do it.

When I started studying psychology in the sixties, I had a tremendous advantage over others studying and working in the field. I came to understand that all development was possible through this amazing mechanism called neuroplasticity. If you understood neuroplasticity, development was no longer such a great mystery. The brain changed and developed as a reflection of specific stimulation, not because it just got older. Armed with this understanding, I looked at the brain as dynamic, changing, and most significantly, as changeable.

One area of early interest for me was learning and memory. At that time it was just beginning to be understood that there were various components of memory. Memory was being broken down into short-term memory, working memory, and long-term memory. The focus was on testing it and looking for correlations between these pieces and how people learned and functioned. At that time and for decades, the worlds of psychology and education did not have a perception that you could actually help develop or change memory; and even today, they are not really working to do that. My perception, based on an understanding of neuroplasticity, was that these components of memory didn’t just pop up as adult abilities, but they developed; and what developed changed; and what changed was changeable. I set out to understand all of these pieces and to find ways to change, develop, and accelerate that development.

Decades later I am proud to say that we have developed a great understanding of all of these foundational pieces that we now lump together and refer to as “processing.” Armed with this knowledge and the tools we have developed, we have helped change many thousands of lives. Improving these pieces of auditory and visual short-term memory and working memory is quite simply making people smarter. From our first software that ran on a Commodore Pet computer with a cassette drive in the early eighties, to the Brain Builder software in the nineties, to the present online Simply Smarter program and many dozens of one-to-one activities, we are working to change lives. From brain damaged individuals to those on the autism spectrum, to those with learning and attention issues, to typical children and adults, we can build all of these foundational pieces of memory that literally have the potential to make everyone smarter.

At NACD we work with “whole children,” designing home based comprehensive programs that address everything from a child’s sleep and behavior to how they walk and do algebra, including innovative comprehensive homeschool/home-based educational programs. But there is something that in one way or another is on every child’s program, and that is processing activities.

We are fortunate that we can work via Skype with any family in the world who has Internet access and give them the tools designed to develop and improve their brains. Today everyone doesn’t need to come to NACD to work on their processing. You can take advantage of this expertise and go online and in about fifteen minutes a day put together the pieces that can help you and your children work to become smarter. The tool that is available to you is our Simply Smarter program, a tool that your children can use all by themselves!

Let me help you understand what this all really is and what it can mean for you and your family.

What is “smart?” Can you define it? Do you think you would like your kids to be smarter? How about you?

You can define “smart,” possibly, but even more so, you probably know it when you see it. Smart has to do with being present, being aware, being able to take in and process a lot of information, being able to manipulate that information, think with complexity, put ideas together, focus, and communicate.

Smart doesn’t necessarily mean knowing that the capitol Nevada is Carson City, or that Sir Walter Raleigh was beheaded, or that the First World War ended on November 11, 1918, or what your bile duct does, or that “or” is a conjunction. But smart does mean that you are more likely to find such things interesting and you can learn them more easily than most. Knowing “stuff” doesn’t make you smart. (You are going to actually forget most “stuff” unless you are smart enough to make associations and connections between “stuff” and use it.) And smarter also means that it’s easier to understand and learn everything.

What is the foundation of “smart?”

The foundation of smart is the ability to process and take in a lot of information that you see and hear and to manipulate that information and think.

The more you can process and take in what there is to be heard, the stronger your auditory short-term memory. Your auditory short-term memory provides the fuel for the development of your auditory working memory, which is how many pieces or words you can hold together and manipulate, which equals your complexity of thought, or “smart.” How many pieces of visual information you process from what you see, whether from observation of your world or from reading, relates to your visual short-term memory; and as with auditory processing, your visual short-term memory provides the pieces you use to create your visual working memory and visual-spatial abilities. These fundamental, foundational pieces ultimately determine how much information you take in and use, which translates to how much knowledge you gain and your complexity of thought. All this equals “smart.”

How does processing “smart” develop?

Processing develops primarily from birth to about seven years. The rate and degree it develops is a reflection of the targeted stimulation and opportunities that you receive. In general the more quality one-to-one interaction between a child and an involved adult, the faster and the further it develops. The more enriching the environment, the faster and the further it develops. With specific targeted input designed to build processing skills, processing not only can be accelerated, it can be developed to superior levels.

When does the development of processing abilities stop?

Without specific intervention, the development of processing abilities almost comes to a halt at about seven years of age. From seven into our twenties, it typically develops perhaps another ten to fifteen percent; and after our twenties, without specific intervention it goes into a slow decline. You can continue to learn more, but your ability to do so declines, as does your ability to manipulate the information. As you continue to learn, you can become wiser, but not necessarily smarter, unless you are stretching your processing through complex cognitive activities or actively working to preserve or develop it.

How can you build processing ability and get smarter?

Everyone, from infant to geriatric, with input that is targeted to them, can incrementally build and improve processing ability and get smarter. We at NACD have been developing methodologies and improving processing abilities for the full spectrum of children and adults for over forty years. NACD designs specific processing programs for families who are members of NACD and who wish to utilize comprehensive developmental and educational programs designed so that they can be implemented in the home by parents and caregivers. But as mentioned earlier, NACD also has developed a very comprehensive targeted program for all children five years old and older and for adults up to and including seniors—Simply Smarter.

What is Simply Smarter?

The Simply Smarter program is a dynamic online system that constantly develops and modifies itself, adapting to the individual user to help produce maximum change. Specific activities work progressively to address focus, attention, intensity, auditory and visual short-term and working memory, visualization, conceptualization, and visual-spatial abilities, all of the pieces that help make everyone learn, think, and function better. The program first assesses your baseline and then builds from there, tracking and graphing progress. It has the capability of adjusting from basic levels of a child to levels of incredible function.

What can you do with children under five?

Children at or functioning under five years of age generally need specific one-on-one activities that are designed as part of NACD’s individualized programs. But in addition children from toddlers to five years old can use NACD’s Cognition Coach apps to build processing skills.

How long does it take to get smarter?

With motivation and consistent use, measurable changes can occur in a couple of weeks; and with continued use of Simply Smarter, virtually unlimited improvements are possible. Over the course of the present lockdown, you have the potential to produce a significant change.

Who has used Simply Smarter and what have the results been?

The range of those who have used NACD’s processing activities and Simply Smarter is as broad as the population. NACD’s Simply Smarter and other processing programs have been used by thousands of typical and gifted children and adults, those with learning and attention issues, as well as those with significant developmental issues such as autism spectrum disorder, Down syndrome, and brain injuries. Most everyone working on our comprehensive home based programs not only knows about processing, but is actively working on processing every day and understands the correlation between their child’s processing and global function and abilities. We have seen exceptional changes along the path of many thousands of children’s development and are continually heartened as we see their potential being redefined. Processing is a huge key to success and potential.

Please take this opportunity to change your child’s life trajectory. My mission in life has been to help change the perception of potential and to help develop the tools to do it. Today with more parents and children at home than ever before, I see this as a unique chance to change many lives and potentially change the perception of what can be.

To read an incredible testimonial from a couple about Simply Smarter and see what incredible things even a child can do, please read the following article and watch the video.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 33 No. 4, 2020 ©NACD

The post My Greatest Discovery – How to Make Everyone Smarter appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

by Bob Doman

I have introduced you to Coco previously here and here. Coco is now almost five and a half. For those of you who are new to Coco, he was born with a brain injury/cerebral palsy, with a very broad range of issues and a terrible prognosis. Previously I talked about the development of Coco’s processing abilities, which as you will see in the accompanying video, have not only continued to develop, but are now truly exceptional. Coco’s story is much more than a story of superior processing. Coco’s story is one of parents creating a vision of what they felt could be, then working with incredible focus, intensity, and intention to achieve it.

Coco’s father, Razvan, understanding how important these first years are to his son’s future, has put his career aside and moved his family to a new country, with a new language, which offered greater acceptance and future opportunities for his son and focused on the vision. None of this has been easy for the family. They have had to lower their lifestyle, and mom had to go back to school and start a new career and work on weekdays, while dad works on weekends. A year and a half ago, their second child arrived. Baby Ellen (named after my sister, their NACD coach), not to be neglected, has been on a program of her own and is doing great.

The Manole family “gets it.” They have a vision. Recently the doctors, therapists, and social workers who oversee special needs children in the area requested a meeting with the Manoles, who had declined any of their services. Based on communications with the family, the physician, out of concern for Coco, requested the meeting. Having the child’s medical records, the doctor was concerned because Coco was not receiving any of their services, and he felt that the expectations expressed by the Manoles for Coco were unrealistic. One of the sore points was the Manole’s vision that Coco would someday walk. The doctor found such an expectation as unrealistic under the “best” of circumstances, but certainly delusional if Coco was not even receiving the therapies, services, and assistance they were offering.

So the Manoles met with the official team and introduced them to Coco and his program. The net result of the meeting was that the team got the vision and now share the vision that unconventional parents, doing an unconventional program, not only could, but would if they continued do as they were, turn a vision into a reality.

The Manoles communicate with us very regularly (at times daily) and supply us with very regular program implementation videos. This level of communication and interaction has permitted us to continually modify program and program implementation in order to keep us targeted and thus to take the best advantage of neuroplasticity.

Coco’s dad, Razvan, is a man after my own heart—impatient. He’s not going to wait and see what the future will bring for his son. He’s going to create it.

Please watch Coco’s new video below. You will want to see what digit spans of 22 look like!

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 33 No. 1, 2020 ©NACD

Here is Coco’s reaction to seeing the article about him!

The post Coco Does it Again! appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

A lot of folks, particularly in the USA, have a hard time describing where in the world Romania is or are able to tell you much of anything about Romania (which unfortunately speaks to our educational system); but ask about Transylvania and everyone’s interest perks up and they conjure up visions of Dracula.

This last month I spent almost two weeks in the mountains of Transylvania with about 200 of our NACD family members from five different countries. We were practically under the shadow of Bran Castle, or what is widely known as Dracula’s castle.

This event was made possible through the efforts of many folks, but particularly little Tudor’s mom, Andreea Dumitru, and Teodora Pop, our NACD Romanian Coordinator.

Andreea’s efforts resulted in the advertising company Blitz TV sponsoring the event and arranging for free rooms and breakfasts for all of the families at the Cheile Gradistei Resort. Without this help many of the families would not have been able to participate.

There were two primary reasons for orchestrating the Transylvania Experience. The first was to provide a venue for an in-person evaluation for the children in the region, particularly Romania and Bulgaria, and the second was to provide an opportunity for the families to spend time together. To varying degrees families with children with developmental and genetic issues find it difficult to integrate their children into many, if not most, social situations. Getting to spend time with other families with similar issues who understand, permitting them to share support, encouragement, and to just be able to relax, accept, and socialize was a great unique experience. Sadly, Romania and the surrounding countries are often not very accepting of many of our children; so it was particularly important to hold this event in Romania.

Our Romania chapter, which includes many Bulgarian families, is certainly our most proactive NACD chapter, doing everything they can to support each other and to educate other families in their countries about the hope that NACD offers. Our families travel from around the country to participate and share their NACD experience at every possible event that they think might help another family learn about the hope for their children. They understand that NACD’s family-centered approach means that any family in any place in the world is only a call, an email, or a Skype visit away from their coach and evaluator on any day and that they can help their children irrespective of what may or may not exist in their area.

The feedback from the event from the families was outstanding, and everyone wants to repeat it next year, even with the understanding that we may not have funding assistance. At the families request, I have happily committed to coming back again next year (I didn’t have a chance to visit the castle on this trip, so I need another visit to Transylvania) and we will hopefully return to the same spot and show off and share the children’s progress and help generate some new memories to add to those we created this year.

Personally, it was a bit demanding. It took twenty-two hours to get there, arriving in the evening and starting the evaluations first thing the next morning; but it was truly a marvelous experience. These are incredible families! Being able to relax and interact with the families and share meals and a little down time outside of the evaluation process was extremely rewarding. Perhaps some of my greatest memories are of watching the children with issues and all of the typical siblings interacting together as naturally as if they had know each other forever. The typical siblings were amazing to watch. They instinctively knew how and when to help and how to communicate with or just be with a new special needs child they had just met minutes before. Speaking of communication, the majority of the parents spoke English and often an additional language or two, as did the children. I loved all the “Hi Bob”s I heard from so many of the kids who were just learning to talk as they walked in for their evaluations.

We have some hope that other NACD chapters and groups around the country and the world will come together and do more to help build their regional community of NACD families.

Lesson to be learned: We do better as part of a community that shares a common approach, common ambitions, and a belief that the primary responsibility for our children and the best people to help our children are we, the parents. We can make a difference and change the lives and futures of our children.

As always it is an honor and a privilege to be involved with such incredible families and children.

For more photos and a daily journal of Bob’s trip, please visit our Facebook page!

Testimonials from our Romania Attendees

TEODORA POP

I also wanted to write a few words about this experience, but it is so hard to write about everything in a couple of phrases.

For me it was an amazing and different and new experience, even though I am with NACD for 2 years and a half now and I´ve been before to Bucharest to help Bob with translations. This time I also took part in the organisation of the event and it was amazing. Meeting families for the first time, seeing other again and listening to everyone´s story, sharing opinions and advises and being there with Bob during the eval was a HUGE learning experience for me. I am confident that my decision to stay in Romania and dedicate myself to this cause and to the NACD families in Romania was the correct and the best one! I am honored and humbled working with the NACD staff and with all of you here in the Romanian chapter!!!

IOANA GRECU

The experience in Cheile Gradistei was beautiful and full of emotions. We waited eagerly for this moment. We couldn’t wait to meet Bob Doman, and the impression of him is a great one. We feel that he is a very good person and very involved in what he is doing. The kindness with which he is looking at the children makes you trust that what he is saying is good for the little ones. The parents are great, full of hope and positive. We left the place trusting in the NACD program and trusting in ourselves as a family that we took the best decision when we joined the program. The landscape helped us to relax and to spend some family quality time. Even though we had to leave earlier than scheduled, the presence of the other kids and parents made the days feel very short and filled with great moments. Thank you for everything!

IOANA RASPOPA

I need to say that we are grateful for a great weekend. Yes it was beautiful, but meeting with Bob (this time Matei was OK and awake comparing to last year) was a huge reinforcement for us. We also got really useful information from Teo and from other parents that gave us courage to push for more changes for Matei.

RALUCA BUSUIOC

You know what the experience at Cheile Gradistei makes me think at? We are thought that from the 3: frequency, intensity and duration, the most important is the intensity. So this experience was not as much duration as is was high intensity! Exactly like in the NACD activities: high intensity, so that you will want more!!! So that it will be forever in your mind and in your heart!

FELICIA TUSLUC

It was a great experience, both because of meeting people with which we share the same vision of recovery and of the joy in our children’s eyes enjoying the fresh air with us and other children like them. Meeting Bob face to face again revived our hope and trust in the complexity of the program and in our capacity to obtain great results.

PAULA SERBAN

For me this experience was revealing! I saw my child with different eyes and my soul was filled with hope. Meeting the other parents was as important, feeling their support and full understanding. To be able to talk with people that totally understand was something that I wished for for a long time. Besides the NACD family it is very difficult to find so much understanding and good advice. Now I feel that I have recharged ‘my batteries’ and we can keep going with so much hope. Thank you so much NACD!

RALUCA MANEA

It was wonderful seeing Bob again and getting to meet old friends that we have known merely in the on line. The children had a great time and loved to make new friends. It was a great time of connecting and reconnecting.

ALEXANDRA ANGHELINA

For us it was a first on multiple levels. Our first evaluation, first time meeting Bob Doman, first contact with a community of this type, first time seeing how a program looks like. So far we are loving everything that we discovered. We start this road filled with trust and extremely motivated to learn how to implement the program correctly.
The experience of meeting other NACD families was a great and interesting one. I can only bow in front of all this people that I got the chance to meet. They are an example worth following.

Thank you so much for this experience. And we cannot wait to see you all next year!

ANGELA HLATCA

For us, the Hlatca family, this year evaluation was another reason for hope and joy: after one year of vacation we finally were able to start the program again. We were happy to see Mr. Bob Doman again and he encouraged us and gave us new hopes for Tudor. This year´s location was a very beautiful one and we felt great there. The evenings were the best, having the opportunity to meet new NACD families and spend time together, to share experiences and to enjoy our beautiful children with which we played a lot. Mr. Bob Doman spent some time with us in the evenings and he is such a warm and very friendly person. A big thank you also for those who organised this very successful event!

Reprinted by permission NACD Newsletter, July 2019 ©NACD

The post 2019 Transylvania, Romania NACD Event appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

Back in May we introduced you to Coco Manole, the incredible little boy who was developing really fantastic processing abilities. This little brain injured/cerebral palsy four-year-old had developed astonishing digit spans of 10 forward and 9 reverse, which is absolutely phenomenal. Very few adults have short term and working memory at this level. Well, that was then and this is now. He was just getting started.

Just for the sake of perspective, shortly after starting program in July of 2016, Coco was just learning to process very simple one-step directions, such as “touch your nose” and was unable to follow a two-step direction. He was also only was able to say three words and understood no English.

[clear]

Video: One Step Directions

Coco today, not yet even having reached his fifth birthday, is doing much better. Coco’s improved processing has helped him in every aspect of his development. Developing motor skills for a brain injured/cerebral palsy child, from creeping on the hands and knees, to manipulating the hands to pick up food to feed oneself is much easier when they can take direction and think through and mentally manage all of the little pieces required to start learning and performing these apparently simple functions. The difference in developing motor skills in a child with good cognitive abilities vs. one with lower cognitive function is no different than trying to teach quantum mechanics to an individual with strong working memory compared to one without.

Coco is now amazing all of us with his extraordinary processing abilities. His forward digit span is now an amazing 16! His auditory reverse is now an unimaginable 13, and after just a couple of months since starting on visual digit spans, his visual digit span is already a 13!

Video: Auditory Forward 16

Video: Auditory Reverse 13

Video: Visual Digit Span 13

I hope that everyone will be inspired by little Coco. Although the majority of his day and program is dedicated to developing his motor function, we are certainly not ignoring his academic/intellectual development. Coco reads close to 500 words in Romania and English and enjoys reading books in spite of his visual issues, which we are addressing and improving as well. He understands addition and subtraction and identifies and labels literally thousands of items in some detail and is very conversational. In July when I met with the family in London for Coco’s evaluation, I had the privilege of having dinner with the family. Coco was not only totally tuned into our conversations, but was a polite active participant who could have served as a model for some college students I know. He is also perhaps the sweetest and most compassionate child you will ever meet and is doing great as a big brother to his little sister, Ellen.

I firmly believe that we all have the potential to function at incredible levels and our ability to fulfill this potential is only limited by our vision, our commitment, and our knowledge.

Lack of function is not a prognosis of what can be.

Congratulations, team Manole! You are an inspiration for us all.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 32 No. 7, 2019 ©NACD

The post Coco the Wonder Boy – Part 2A appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

First the Vision, Then the Plan, and Then the Implementation

Most real successes begin with a vision, a vision that defines what we want to achieve. One would hope that we are all directed by and driven by a vision of what can be for us as individuals, for our children, and even for our communities, our nation, and the world. Having a vision, a direction, and hopefully a map to help us realize that vision, followed by conscientious implementation of the plan, determines the ultimate outcome.

For many, if not most, parents who have children with developmental issues, the world tends to make it extremely difficult to create an optimistic vision of what can be. Read virtually any psychological report on any child and you discover nothing more than an almost endless list of labeled “diseases,” issues, and problems, a disaster described in minute detail in ten thousand words, that ends without anything concrete that is going to make a difference. It’s difficult for virtually any parent who listens to the experts to believe there is any real hope, let alone a real plan to achieve anything close to an optimistic outcome. Make the diagnosis, attach the label, follow the “plan,” create no vision, and accept the outcome. Forget that your child has never existed before, that you who lives and works with your child every day have never existed before, and that your child’s future cannot nor should not be dictated by historic failures with “similar” children.

Limited or pessimistic visions of what can be are by no means limited to the special needs community. Virtually our entire educational system ignores the very tenants of neuroplasticity and the ability to build processing power—short term memory, working memory, executive function, and neurological/cognitive efficiency. The educational system functions like a NASCAR racing team given a stock engine who does nothing to actually build the horsepower of that engine, yet feels they are doing their job if they just run their car around the track. They certainly would consistently finish last, except for the fact that they would have been laughed off the track. But “education” continues to almost universally ignore the science and attempts to pour information into children’s brains without doing anything to really develop the brain. The reality is that it’s easier to increase a child’s horsepower than it is a Ford’s.

Realizing that it’s difficult for any parent to create and maintain a vision that is strong enough to sustain daily adherence to a plan and provide the strength of intention to keep moving forward, it’s fortunate that we have families like the Manoles to show us what can be. In a previous newsletter you read about Razvan and Christiana Manole, who had a vision for what they could be and how through dedicated use of our Simply Smarter program dramatically developed their processing skills. Their newfound processing skills helped them formulate a new vision and implement a drastic plan for their son Cosmin, aka Coco. This family, realizing the limited opportunities and prejudices that existed in their ancestral country of Romania toward children with developmental problems, formulated a new bold vision and moved to Ireland, a new country with a new language.

The Manole’s vision and plan for Coco is being realized. Razvan’s story and Coco’s video should be an inspiration for parents of children with disabilities and typical children alike.

Where any of us ultimately functions is not predetermined by what we were born with, but by the stimulation and opportunities that are afforded to us. Those opportunities are in large part dictated by the vision. Limit the vision, limit the perception of what can be, and we limit our expectations, the opportunities, and our futures.

Create a new vision of what could be, what should be, and what will be.

If you watch the video accompanying the following article and are not inspired, please watch it again.

Note: For those new to NACD who may not be aware of processing, short-term and working memory, forward digit spans are a simple measurement of short-term memory and reverse digit spans of working memory, which is now appropriately being called the new IQ. Forward digit spans for a typical four year old are 3-4 digits and reverse 2 digits. A typical adult has forward digit spans that are about a 7 on average and 5 reverse. These processing skills determine how much you take in of what you see and hear and the complexity of your ability to think- your cognitive function. It is very important.

Coco the Wonder Boy – Raising the Bar

by Razvan Manole

I would like to share a little story with you, hoping to encourage you or motivate you a little bit!

At this point, Coco processes 10 digits on auditory and visual forward and 9 reverse. I’m sure everyone in NACD knows what that means and how great this accomplishment is. How is it possible that a child with brain damage, at four and a half years old, has gotten this far? The answer is NACD and a lot of work.

Before we started the program, in 2016, Cosmin was more of a body at almost two years of age. He could process zero. After two weeks of the program, he could follow one step directions. That was at the end of July. In November he could process 3-4 directions. From there we focused on mobility and tactility as well as fine motor skills and vision. NACD works with the whole child so as these various functions and pieces are ready to improve, we work to improve them.

Probably like many of you, I have all kinds of questions like, “When will he walk, or when will he speak? When he will go to school alone? Can he do that?”

My biggest concern is about mobility. I have to work so hard for something most kids have without any effort and no one at all even appreciates it! In the desire to understand what is happening in my child’s head, I studied and studied all that is related to the brain. Last year I discovered a brain researcher’s story and it really helped me understand my son’s situation. After having had a stroke, this scientist practically lost all of her processing and became a body, processing zero. While she sat on a couch without moving, salivating and not understanding anything that was happening around her, she was happy and did not care. After reading the book she wrote, I realized that our children do not have our desires or our passions, our ideals and our goals. They don’t function with our goals or desire achievements that we want for them. This is all because they do not think with complexity until their processing is higher.

Then I said, “There is no point for me to want my son to walk if he does not want it! And how is it possible for him to want that? It’s not something that he had and lost. He never walked and does not feel the lack of walking, as I do not feel the lack of artistic skating. I’m not skating, I have no passion for that. I do not want to skate. Do you think I have a chance to become a skater?” And then I realized I should teach him to love to walk, to teach him what it means to walk, and what benefits he would have to be able to move independently. To understand my plan for him, he needed to be very smart. Last year, I believe it was in February, I started to be aggressive with the cognitive part of the program. From 4-5 auditory forward, we have reached 8 and 6-7 reverse. Now he is so aware. He understands what I am requesting of him, speaks Romanian and English, socializes, does not have tantrums. He is grateful, happy all the time. Walking is not easy to accomplish. There are many steps, but with much work and patience, we will get there too.

Probably you are not far away from us and you are struck by the distrust of family, friends, specialists, neighbors. No one has ever seen potential in my child except for NACD and us, his parents. It’s hard to keep a clear vision when you have unbelieving people around you. That’s why I wanted to write to you today! Keep your trust. My baby was just a body 3 years ago that could process zero. Slowly, together with Mr. Bob and Ms. Ellen, we woke him up and raised him way over the children of his age. If Coco can do it, all the children can! Trust yourself and your children! Good luck!

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 32 No. 5, 2019 ©NACD

The post Coco the Wonder Boy – Raising the Bar appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

Perhaps the only thing that feels better for us at NACD than having parents who really get it is seeing the results of them having gotten it.

It’s an incredible honor and privilege to be in a position to help change lives, and it’s so much fun and very fulfilling when we can see the results. You are about to read a mother’s story, sharing about the things she implemented and about being able to enjoy the fruits of her labor. You will be reading about Aidia Brennan, who is on her way to realizing her dreams. In Aidia’s case her dreams largely revolved around her love of singing. As I look at how Aidia is proceeding on her journey and reaching toward her dreams, it reminds me of one of my other “kids,” Jennifer Lindsay.

You might want to read about Jennifer, another one of our home-educated NACD kids, see where she started, and hear her inspiring story. I am delighted to report on where she is today. Jennifer had a really rough beginning, but she developed many talents and created many opportunities for herself, from her work creating the new generation of GPS systems, to her concert violin, to her singing. Jennifer ultimately decided that her real passion was singing opera, and as she has done throughout her life, she applied her superior processing power, focus, will, and the power and influence of her wonderful parents, and has excelled in her chosen vocation. I’m am very happy and proud to announce that Jennifer Lindsay has signed a contract with the Metropolitan Opera Company and will be performing in their upcoming production of the George Gershwin opera Porgy and Bess. I’m sure she will wow the audience, as she has during her performances around the country. Congratulations, Jen! My goal for our children is to help parents put together the pieces so that their children can function well—very well—but also to provide the children with the opportunity to discover their talents and passions and provide the means for their successful pursuit.

Just yesterday I did a Skype evaluation with Aliya, Aidia’s younger sister, who is doing great as a teen and is herself developing her neuro-developmental, educational, and personal pieces and is exploring and discovering her own talents and passions. Fortunately, Aidia was home in Canada for spring break from her college in England, and I had an opportunity to speak with her and catch up a bit.

Speaking with Aidia was a real delight; she is an amazing, mature, well-spoken, confident, respectful, and lovely young lady. Oh, and very talented as well! She really is the epitome of what we would all hope to see in our children as they pursue their goals and aspirations.

Liana and Gary Brennan, proud parents of Aidia and Aliya, congratulations!

Go team Brennan!

[kad_youtube url=”https://youtu.be/1JRFMBkx59w” width=”960″ height=”540″ maxwidth=”1200″]

[space size=”40px”]

NACD Instilling Independence
by Liana Brennan

NACD has been in our lives for years and in the past, I’ve said that our lives and children’s lives would be quite different without NACD! I appreciate the significance that NACD places on addressing the whole child and the child within the family. Our youngest daughter, Aliya, was first on the program when she was 4 years old and later, we brought our eldest daughter, Aidia, home from the public school and began a program with her in the sixth grade. We continued program and home educating Aidia until her graduation last May. Our NACD journey has been long and we’ve had some trying years but when the successes are achieved it makes it all worth it!

We are part of a large homeschool community with the same activities and opportunities afforded to them as the public schools. Our girls are able to participate in sports activities, yearbook committees, father-daughter dances, prom, and graduation. It is a large formal graduation and Aidia was selected to address the graduating class! One of the major points of her speech was to seize opportunities as they present themselves, embrace the unknown and break out of comfort zones. At this point she was already following her own advice. During her junior year, she began the university decision process and expressed her desire to study overseas.

This from a girl that dislikes change but realizes that in order to grow and succeed change is inevitable.

As parents it’s our responsibility and mission to raise children that are self-sufficient that will make a positive impact on society. As we sent off Aidia to university in England we prayed that we had equipped her with the needed life skills to thrive, not just survive. Thankfully she has adjusted well as she is living her dream! Technology has made it very easy for us to connect daily, either through FaceTime or text. Recently during one of our FaceTime sessions, Aidia thanked me for being strict and having her complete chores! I snickered because her interpretation of strict differs greatly from mine. I also wished I had a tape recorder handy to preserve her comment. Apparently, most of the other students are not self-sufficient which is causing them a multitude of stressors and health issues on top of the rigors of university. In November she shared that most the students had already depleted their student loan funds that were to sustain them through December. Huge contributing factors are the inability to cook or prepare meals, laundry and manage their personal finances. There are no meal plans in the United Kingdom like there are at most American Universities. They were eating out most nights and then with the realization that their funds were dwindling they begin to eat inexpensive fast food that was not sustaining them and they were falling ill. Aidia was cooking one night for one of the girls in an attempt to teach her some cooking skills. Aidia asked if her parents had not been interested or willing to teach her how to cook. The student shared her mother had attempted but she was more absorbed with her phone and her mother would get frustrated and end up preparing the whole meal. Aidia’s reply, “yeah, that wouldn’t fly in our home.” Aidia has the title of “mom” as she’s the one they turn to for life skills advice. Most days when we are on FaceTime there is a knock at her door with someone needing some assistance or advice.

During one of our FaceTime sessions Aidia said that she thought she would miss us more than she did and as I was recovering from her comment and from having the wind knocked out of me, thankfully she elaborated. She stated that she did miss us because we have fun; we enjoy each other’s company and our family game nights. A majority of the other students were homesick but not because they missed spending time with the family but for what their parents could and would do for them which is very sad.

We began instilling life skills and independence at a young age. When the girls were quite young, I designated two lower cabinets in the kitchen for plastic bowls, plates, cups and wooden tongs. Plus, all the snack and breakfast items that they could prepare themselves. I also kept a low stool in the kitchen to assist them in reaching the sink. I stored homemade granola in a small container with a flip-top lid and a scoop. It was much easier to handle than a large container. I kept the dairy-free milk and in a small container on the lower shelf in the refrigerator. This way they could prepare their breakfast themselves by placing a couple of scoops of granola in a bowl, wash up some blueberries and top it off with dairy-free milk. Using smaller containers made it easier to handle and if there was an “accident” there was a lot less clean up. I also placed items in the fridge on the lower shelves. To protect them from burns I purchased wooden tongs to use if they toasted some gluten-free bread. They were so happy they could make themselves breakfast and snacks and it promoted independence and confidence.

Both girls had “chores” on their programs. During an evaluation early on, Bob reviewed our chore chart and stated that their chores were a little “light” and we needed to increase their responsibility. I was excited that I had Bob’s encouragement to ramp up their chores. As they matured, we required more from them. It takes patience and a little extra time but the payoff is worth it. We have lots of memories and laughs as we recall eggs rolling off the counter (which happened more than once), or too much of an ingredient like salt or a spice as a recipe was miss read or the ingredient came out too fast, or an omission of an ingredient altogether! Some things that we included on their chore charts as they matured was preparing the family meal twice a week – planning – cooking and clean up, loading and unloading dishwasher, being responsible for their own laundry, feeding, walking and cleaning up after the dog, making their bed daily and maintaining their own room, cleaning bathrooms, dusting and vacuuming to name a few.

Their chores were their own responsibility and they needed to own them, and I did not want to hound or remind them daily. To remove myself from monitoring their chores I placed a chore chart for each girl in an acetate sleeve. Each chart was pushed pinned to a cork board on the kitchen wall with a dry erase marker (washable dry erase marker when younger). They passed the charts daily and it was up to them to check off the chores that were complete. They walked by the chart every time they entered and exited the kitchen so there was visual of what was complete and what still outstanding. If the chores were not complete there were consequences. At the beginning of the next week the acetate was wiped down and the new week began. This system worked wonderfully.

Aidia recently displayed her independence and willingness to jump all over the fear of the unknown and submit for a wonderful opportunity that produced a once in a lifetime experience! Aidia is pursuing a BA honors degree in Musical Theatre and has been inspired by Ramin Karimloo, a Musical Theatre performer, since she was eleven. Ramin has been performing on Broadway and West End for years and has portrayed Phantom in Phantom of the Opera, Jean Val Jean in Les Misérables and Anastasia to name a few. In July, he announced his UK tour. When not performing on Broadway or West End he travels with his band and performs songs from his musicals and other songs that he puts his own “spin” on. Aidia was so excited to hear that Ramin would be performing in Shrewsbury, England where is attending University! Right then and there she purchased a ticket. It didn’t concern her that she would be attending on her own, she was ecstatic that she would see him live! Unfortunately, she has not had the opportunity to see him perform live so this was a fantastic opportunity.

Aidia follows Ramin on social media and on Christmas day he posted that he would like to showcase local talent at the venues on his tour and if interested, and local to the venue, to submit media showcasing their talent. Aidia jumped on the opportunity and Christmas night she sent in various videos of her singing and playing guitar. When she headed back to Shrewsbury after Christmas early on the Jan 3^rd Aidia had not had a response so assumed she wasn’t selected. Upon landing on one of her layovers she checked her email and there was a personal email from Ramin informing her she was selected to open for him! We were so thrilled and excited for her! Ramin even introduced her!! Not many folks are able to say that they have met their inspiration let alone open for them! We were so proud of her and her performance.

Another way that NACD has impacted Aidia’s life is through the Simply Smarter program. Recently an industry leader came in to do a workshop with the students. One of the activities was a series of patterns. I may not have the activity exactly correct but the idea was that they were to stand in a circle and each student had a series of tasks to do simultaneously with the other students. They were to pass a ball to a certain student, speak a word or phrase, then walk to another student to pass the ball, speak another word and continue this pattern while everyone else was doing their own pattern. It was apparently quite chaotic and yet Aidia was able to remember her pattern and in some cases had to retrieve the ball from the student she was receiving it from because they were confused or forgot the pattern. At the end of the session the instructor inquired if Aidia had done this activity before because he had never had anyone complete the pattern successfully before and assumed she must be familiar with the activity. When she stated she had not he was amazed that she had managed to remember the patterns. Her response, “NACD’s Simply Smarter!” This was a great example of how higher processing can build memory assisting in academic and career growth. Aidia is often required to learn songs and dances in short periods of time. Higher processing will be a huge asset in her chosen field.

Through the years many of our days have been long and exhausting. On some of these days it would have been easy to allow the chores to slip, to address the laundry and cooking ourselves in order to shorten our day but at what expense? I can remember a particularly exhausting day when Aliya had pushed back and been defiant and argumentative. It was dinnertime and we had just completed program. Her father had just arrived home as Aliya began her chores. She proceeded to Swiffer the living room and saw her Dad on the sofa and stated, “I don’t know why I have to sweep when Dad is over there having the time of his life.” As you can imagine after a long day that remark just about sent me over the edge. After reprimanding her for her comment I explained that her situation was a result of the choices she made during the day, which meant she was now having to complete chores well into the evening. Thankfully these days are a thing of the past, but had we not persevered we would still be living these days. Currently, Aliya accomplishes her chores without complaint and enjoys meal preparation.

We recently relocated internationally and Aliya has adjusted well. She experienced some anxiety but with the tools she learned through NACD she has settled in fine. Aliya is meeting new people and is playing drums for her youth band at church. The church recently had a big event in which she played for the evening and afterward families sought her out to tell her what a great job she did and that they loved that she was a female drummer. She continues to take lessons and is progressing well. I believe that Simply Smarter has been a contributing factor to her progress.

We are so thankful to NACD and their desire to provide us with the instruction to allow our children to reach their full potential. As parents, we must be willing to let our children experience life but equip them with the tools to be independent and successful so they may pursue their dreams without any additional stressors.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 32 No. 4, 2019 ©NACD

[kad_youtube url=”https://youtu.be/gLKoJfnTqwk” width=”960″ height=”540″ maxwidth=”1200″]

[kad_youtube url=”https://youtu.be/_7xvMSbUZzw” width=”960″ height=”540″ maxwidth=”1200″]

The post NACD Instilling Independence appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

Back in the ‘80s I traveled around the country, lecturing to parents and professionals. On many of these occasions I spoke to them about the importance of understanding and utilizing neuroplasticity, which with rare exception none of them had ever heard of. I also spoke about how the model of providing therapeutic intervention on a weekly or biweekly basis was contrary to what was needed to really utilize neuroplasticity. I also emphasized the importance of working with the whole child, understanding the whole child, and coordinating efforts based on the whole child.

 When I refer to the whole child I mean exactly that, not just “important” or “broken” pieces, not just what is obviously relevant to gross motor (physical therapy), fine motor (occupational therapy), speech (speech therapy), behavior (psychology), reading or math (education), or those pieces that are the specialty of everyone else from the neurologist to the ENT to the dentist.

Working with the whole child requires working closely with the parents, the people who know their whole child best, and gathering the information about the entire child. This includes their developmental and medical history, health, diet, sleep, self-help skills, sense of responsibility, chores, daycare, academic function and interests, schools, baby sitters or caregivers. Also important are the specifics regarding therapies and therapeutic approaches; interests, from playing with cause and effect toys to video games; activities, from church groups to horseback riding; sports, behavior at home and away, and their daily schedule. And then there are the specifics relative to how they see, hear, feel, and how they perceive what they should taste and smell; gross and fine motor function; how they swallow, drink, chew, articulate, and communicate, as well as all aspects of cognition which provides a global overview of where they are and should be functioning. Every piece is significant to the whole; and combined, the sum is greater than the collection of pieces. This defines what is referred to as the “gestalt.” If children are not viewed as whole and unique, they tend to be viewed as disassociated pieces and labels, not as unique individuals. This is only one of many significant pieces that underscore the importance of understanding the whole child.

The more issues a child has, typically the more pieces the child is broken up into, and the more people are involved in addressing those pieces individually, mostly in isolation.

Back very early in my career in the mid ‘70s, I was the Educational Director for the Center for Neurological Rehabilitation outside of Philadelphia. In many respects I was doing what our staff and I are still doing today, except with a much smaller toolbox, which is designing comprehensive targeted home-based programs for a wide range of children. Back then part of our team included neurologists and neurosurgeons, headed by the brilliant pediatric neurosurgeon Eugene Spitz M.D., who amongst other things was the developer of the shunt for hydrocephalic children. The structure back then was that the evaluators would each meet with our respective families and their child and conduct the evaluation so that we could create a profile/picture of the child. The profile was the foundation for creating their individualized program. The majority of the children would then go through a battery of tests that had been ordered by Dr. Spitz and his team, which were all carried out onsite and included everything from comprehensive blood work to CAT scans, EEGs, and cerebral blood flow studies. Following the testing Dr. Spitz would then meet with me and discuss the results of my evaluation and the testing that had been done. He would then call in the family so that he could make his recommendations, following which I would create their neurodevelopmental/educational program. This process was incredibly educational for me and for Dr. Spitz as well.

Being in a position not only to re-evaluate the children every 3-4 months as we did, but also to compare what I was seeing functionally to what Dr. Spitz saw with his testing, was invaluable. The tests and the EEGs were no longer these isolated pieces of data; they were part of a complete picture. One example of many of what turned out to be learning experiences for both Dr. Spitz and me was the observation I made that when kids were having dental issues, their EEGs were worse, often substantially worse, and that those kids who were prone to seizures often had more seizures. After observing this a few times, I very tentatively mentioned to Dr. Spitz that I was seeing this correlation. He listened to me, and he acknowledged that not only did it make sense, but he realized if it had not been for my knowledge of the broader issues, he would not have thought to ask the family about such issues. This piece of information affected how he adjusted medications and opened the door to our making other associations between health related issues-triggers and what he saw on EEGs and how the children were or were not medicated.

There are many examples of how a view of the whole child can have an impact on medical treatment. One of the more glaring issues that I have written about before is the effect of chronic middle ear fluid and its impact on the development of auditory processing and language. Another piece of this is that some speech therapists will make the recommendation to teach a child to sign, rather than working at getting the child to speak, not understanding the effect and ramifications of the child’s middle ear fluid, and not understanding that the child’s auditory and visual processing (short-term and working memory) determines their global level of function, not their chronological age

Well-meaning teachers generally perceive children with developmental issues as their chronological age, rather than where they are really functioning as reflected in processing ability and global neurological maturity. A six-year-old who is neurodevelopmentally three should not be expected to do the same work as their neuro-typical peers. If the educational input is not targeted to the developmental and educational level of the child, it is going to be ineffective at best. Inclusion is great, I fought for it for many decades; but if the instruction is not targeted to the individual, it really is only pretend education.

The group of people with their fingers in the pie that exists for most special needs children is presented as a team; but that is very rarely, if ever, true. A team implies a group working together in a coordinated fashion. Most therapists work in relative isolation from every other therapist who is working with the child. Each therapist establishes their own priorities, even though when viewed from the perspective of the whole child many of their “priorities” would not reach the level of even being significant. Some would define this as fine; however when viewing the total child, it is important that priorities be the whole child’s hierarchical priorities so that time, focus, and energy can be directed when and where it is needed most. There are only so many hours in the day, and we can only ask so much of a child in a day if we are going to maintain any respectable level of intensity. For a child with a developmental problem, we are always fighting time. They can ill afford to be directing minutes, if not hours, working ineffectively in the wrong direction.

Historically the educational, therapeutic, and medical treatment of children with developmental issues has become more and more compartmentalized. The net result is that vital information is often not shared between players, and the various people involved remain ignorant of significant correlative information. Furthermore, it is impossible to target, prioritize, and coordinate efforts and to raise and meet higher expectations without the direct involvement of parents and coordinated efforts focused around the whole, intact, total, and complete child.

Effectively and efficiently helping any child reach their potential requires targeted coordinated intervention that is not only mindful of the whole child, but that is led by an understanding of the gestalt. The child is more than just the sum of their pieces.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 32 No. 3, 2019 ©NACD

The post The Whole, Intact, Total, and Complete Child appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

On January 26th I was given the honor of providing the keynote address for the Winter Home School Conference in Layton, Utah. The conference was a great success with a couple thousand in attendance.

As I was preparing for the conference, I realized that I needed to address an underlying systemic issue with homeschool, which was simply that the majority of homeschool families were simply replicating school, the very thing they were trying to replace. Just a couple of nights before the address, I realized that the key to this problem had been staring me right in the face. The foundation of the problem was, in fact, the very term “homeschool.”

I titled my speech “Targeted Home Education-T.H.E. Way Forward.” My presentation was aimed at helping parents understand all of the underlying problems and issues associated with turning their homes into mini institutions/schools. I helped them understand how building home education on the foundation of a curriculum, which is an anathema to everything we know about learning and children, was taking them in the wrong direction.

Home education provides an opportunity to individualize education, to build the foundation of learning, short-term memory, working memory, and executive function, the pieces that permit all of us to learn, think, and function in the world; and they are the pieces that can make all of our children smarter, much smarter. Home-based education should permit us to work with the “whole child” and help our children discover themselves, learn how to learn and to love learning, to pursue their passions, and become happy, successful adults with a sense of independence, service, and values. If we target what we are doing with home-based education, we can do so much better and even do it in less time than with a curriculum-based approach.

All of our NACD staff who were present and I were pleased with all the folks coming up to us throughout the afternoon and evening and announcing:

“We’re home educators, not homeschoolers; and we want to do it better and smarter.”

NACD Newsletter, February 2019 ©NACD

I wrote an article expanding on these concepts if you are interested in learning more:

T.H.E. Targeted Home Education:
Homeschool Renamed, Re-envisioned, and Given a New Way Forward
by Bob Doman

The post Targeted Home Education – T.H.E. Way Forward appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

What is the purpose of your program? Many of you approach your program as if the goal were to check off a lot of boxes. That’s not the goal. The goal is to produce change. It’s easy to lose track of where we are going and to get lost in the process. As you are looking at your one thing, think about goals. Think about those important things that we are trying to change or develop and focus and work with intention.

Intention is working with a targeted mental focus for the purpose of producing a specific future change.

One of the most glaring things I see when reviewing program videos are folks obviously working without intention, which results in very slow progress. I wouldn’t want to count all the processing videos I have watched that made me want to scream. As most of you know, developing processing skills is rather foundational and really important. You should also know that even an incremental change in processing results in wonderful things, like better understanding, increased language, increase in global maturity, improved behavior, and better cognition-global change! Understanding this importance, many families justly prioritize their processing activities; but what I often see are parents doing the activities without a lot of intensity, which means they are doing it without intention. I often have to pay very close attention to the videos to determine if the child is getting the sequences right or wrong because watching the feedback from the parent or helper, there wasn’t much difference in the response, whether the sequence was done correctly or not. Without quality feedback and reinforcement your child isn’t even going to know what the goal is and certainly is not going to be working with intention.

To digress a tad, on my last trip to our Cincinnati chapter, where I work out of a hotel that sits on the Kentucky side of the Ohio River, just across from the city of Cincinnati, I renewed my perspective on intention and intensity. Often on these trips I take a little walk along the river after I have my dinner and before I go back to my room to address more emails. Looking across the river I can see both the Cincinnati football and baseball stadiums. The Ohio River is a big river, and although the stadiums sit close to the river’s edge, they are still quite a way away. During the baseball season the Cincinnati Reds play, and during the football season the Cincinnati Bengals play. If I happen to be out in the evening and a game is being played, there is absolutely no question if someone gets a hit or a homerun or a team scores a touchdown. On this last trip, I was walking and looking out at the stadium when a touchdown was scored by the Bengals. The roar of the crowd from where I was across the river was almost deafening, and then the sky lit up with fireworks. The intention is to win the game, and it is understood that to win the game you need to get hits or advance the ball on the football field. The fans react with intensity to each of these events. There is no question of the intention of the players or the fans. It is also not surprising that teams in cities with good fans who help generate intensity and keep the players focused on the intention do well.

The goal of working on processing is to raise the processing level, preferably quickly. Watching these videos, it becomes blatantly obvious that more often than not the intention is to complete the activity and check off the box. I’m sure as the parent pushes themselves and their child through the activity, they think that they just need to do this another few hundred or thousand times and their child will move forward and ultimately, they probably will. But if we address not only processing activities, but also everything we do with our kids with intention, we can meet our goals faster, and generally much, much faster.

As an example of how we can create intention, I will at times do processing activities with criteria. What this means is that rather than doing a processing activity for a specific duration, such as a minute or two, we do the activity with a target. For example, if we are just starting to get auditory digit spans of five, working with criteria we will let the child know that the goal of the session is to get a five. As soon as they get a five, we have a party and the session ends. Their intention is no longer just to cooperate, to try or pretend that they are trying; it is to get a five! And our intention is no longer to check off a box, it is to get a five. It can be amazing to see how much faster we can move forward when the intention is clearly defined, and the child is receiving good feedback.

One of keys to focus and intention is data and attention to detail. If you are working on teaching your child to identify pictures, read words, recognize numbers, or complete a math process, you can only work with intention if you know where you are and where you are going. For example, if you are trying to develop your child’s sight word vocabulary you need to know what they know. Perhaps you have shown them 50 new words over a month or so. How many do they know? If I were flashing them the words, I would periodically stop on a word and ask them what it was or start a review session by testing a few words. I would mentally keep track of how many of the words they know, about what percentage they know, and even what types of words. Armed with some data we can do a number of things. If you provide your coach and evaluator with the data, they can make recommendations to do everything from change frequencies and durations, to how many new words are being introduced, to what kinds of words to introduce, or even to putting it away for a while. If the data is simply that we have checked off x number of boxes over these weeks, that doesn’t really help us reach our goal. The intention of every session should be to succeed, to teach your child to read more words; and to do that within each session, you need to be gathering data and work with intention.

Intention is every bit as important for every other aspect of program, whether we are teaching a child to walk properly, to track better, or to love looking at pictures. With absolutely every activity we do, we need to be mindful of what we are trying to achieve; and we need to be observant and constantly adjusting, modifying, and gathering data. Our intention is to produce new function, new abilities and to change your child’s life one piece, one step at a time.

I find intention to be a fascinating neurological phenomenon. You can consciously start doing something with intention, but then your brain appears to learn to apply it without conscious effort. As an example, through the years I have had children read short non-fiction articles as part of their program, primarily to improve reading comprehension. Generally, it would appear to the parent who was working with the child during the day that the child was engaged, and since we were working to develop reading comprehension, that they were actually reading to learn. I would on occasion have the parents do an experiment. The experiment was quite simple: at dinner after everyone had sat at the table, but before anyone was allowed to start eating, I would have the child’s father ask them what the story they had read earlier was about. Many parents were shocked when they discovered that their child couldn’t even remember the subject, let alone any of the content. A common answer from children to the question, “What did you learn at school today?” is “Nothing.” If the family repeated this for a few days, the child would start remembering more and more about the story; and if the parents randomly asked the dinner question, the child would usually maintain their new intention, which was not just to read the story, listen to the story, and answer specific questions immediately after reading the story, but to learn and try to retain the information. After the first couple of days I’m sure the child, when they sat down to do their story, was not consciously thinking, “I need to remember this because Dad is going to ask me about it at dinner.” The child’s brain had changed and was applying greater intensity to recalling the information on an ongoing basis. Your brain adapts and changes and even generalizes intention. Very cool!

One Final Note on Intention

Parents generally work with a child with better intention than anyone who is paid. As a parent there are a lot of things you could do with your day rather than work with your child. You don’t do it because you’re getting paid; and actually, many of you could be out doing things for pay if you weren’t home working with your child. You do what you do because your intention is to help your child. Even for you it can be tough keeping your focus and working each activity with the needed intention.

If you are having people help with program implementation or even sending your child to school or therapy, the issue of intention becomes significantly greater. If working with a child or children is a job, often the job is defined as implementing specific methods as best you can. Not a bad objective, but it’s not the right objective. The intention should be to produce results—good results and fast results. One of the frustrations I face every day of my life is educators, therapists, and even physicians applying the same methodologies day after day and week after week and year after year, in spite of that fact that they haven’t worked or haven’t worked well or worked fast enough. It is easy for people to get stuck in the rut of “this is what we do and how we do it and so be it,” regardless of the results or lack of.

Sorry for the little digression—back to program helpers. It is more difficult for people getting paid to help with program to achieve and maintain the proper intention than it is even for parents. As parents and bosses and supervisors, part of your job is to train your helpers well, clearly define the intention, quiz them on the data, and tie their efforts to achievement of the intended results, not checking off boxes. You might find it interesting to note that historically volunteers do a better job maintaining intention than people who are paid, and often the more people are paid, the poorer job they do of program implementation and working with intention. Obviously there are exceptions, but if you are not getting paid or if the pay is minimal, it is more likely that the primary goal it to help the child.

On occasions where we have had siblings help with program, we encourage good intention not by paying the kids or even rewarding them for their time, but for results. It has been fun watching how fast things can change if we do something like, “When Johnny can do two 5s in row, we are all going to go out for dinner and to a movie.” Everyone’s intention is tied to their successfully hitting the target.

Fifty years ago, when I started doing this work, I heard comments such as, “You must be a very patient person,” or, “You need a lot of patience to work with handicapped children.”

I’m not a patient person. To the contrary, I’m quite impatient, which is why I am constantly creating and looking for better ways to do everything. My intention is, and your intention needs to be, to be impatient, to work with intention, and to make it right, make it better, and to improve your child’s life. With our joint focus and intention and, yes, some impatience, we can do it.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 32 No. 1, 2019 ©NACD

The post Intention: Let’s Do This Smarter, Improving Results appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.

One of the most common words children hear is the word “no.” I have heard parents spew it out like bullets being fired from machine guns at the same frequency and with what often sounds like similar intent.

Working with parents and their children educationally and developmentally can be challenging, but not much makes this tougher than an out of control child or a child who just will not listen to their parents.

The vast majority of behavior/compliance issues revolve around the lack of parental credibility. How do parents lose credibility? The easiest and most common way parents lose their credibility is using the word “no” and not properly defining it.

How do you think most children, be they six months old or sixteen years old, define “no” as spoken by a parent? It could mean Mom or Dad is saying, “Stop it for now,” “I don’t like it,” or perhaps, “later,” or that it is just the noise that they make when they’re in a bad mood. It rarely is defined as, “Don’t do that! Period. As in, never!” The word “no” is defined for a child by the consequences, or lack of such, that follow its use. Imagine that two parents sitting and having a conversation while their children are bickering and arguing. The parents feel that it is their responsibility to stop or intervene in their children’s inappropriate behavior, so they interrupt their conversation every few seconds to say or yell, “No” or “Cut it out” or “If you don’t stop I’m going to….” Even if there is ultimately a consequence, which probably doesn’t happen because the kids just ultimately stop on their own accord and move on to something else, the consequence is non-effective. And, unfortunately, if there is a consequence, it is actually perceived by the child as being unfair. Why? Because, in a variety of ways you told your child “no” without an action or consequence. Each time you use “no” in one of its versions without a consequence, the children are defining it as essentially meaningless, so they perceive your ultimate response as unfair! You are not following the definition as you have actually defined the word for them. In reality their brains have interpreted your lack of reaction or consequence as the definition (you don’t like it, but so what; or you have been ignoring me and now I have your attention), and your inconsistent reaction does not fit the definition, and thus it’s unfair. And they are correct.

Never say “no”, unless you are going to physically stop the offending behavior or deliver a consequence.

In the previous example the parents would have been much better off and maintained some credibility if they had just simply ignored what the kids were doing. Or they could have said “no” once, as they intervened and/or provided some immediate consequence.

Many parents are on a quest to find bigger and better punishments because “nothing works.” The truth is that inconsistency doesn’t work. So the issue isn’t that you are using the wrong consequence. You simply are being inconsistent. Sadly, after you have successfully taught your children not to believe you and you have lost your credibility and have tried many different “unfair” consequences, you may need to use consistent, big consequences for them to understand that the game has changed. But if you need those big consequences, don’t blame the children; blame yourself.

Parents: If you are consistent, you don’t need Teddy Roosevelt’s proverbial “big stick.” Your consistency becomes that big stick. It is, however, a good idea to speak softly and let your actions, not your tone, define your meaning.

Reprinted by permission of The NACD Foundation, Volume 31 No. 7, 2018 ©NACD

The post Never Say “No” to Your Child appeared first on NACD International | The National Association for Child Development.