Anxiety & Behavioral Challenges: How Rhythm and Percussion May Resolve These Issues

There is something intensely comforting about a steady beat.

Once the mind and body catch the rhythm, it’s as though something mentally slides into place. Playing the beat on a drum of your own seems to organize your internal rhythms: Your head and neck bob, your feet keep time, and your breathing is in synch.

You feel aware, connected, and satisfyingly in the moment.

The science community agrees. There have been numerous studies that corroborate the benefits of drumming for mental and emotional health.

Research shows that through movement and music, rhythm and sound frequency help sharpen focus, improve timing and calm the brain’s stress responses. With those skills enhanced, balanced thinking and emotional control are increased as well.

Because drums and percussion instruments require little previous experience or preparation, they can be used quickly and effectively for addressing issues, like anxiety and behavioral problems, that might take longer with other therapeutic methods.

Drumming and Anxiety

“Patterned, repetitive, rhythmic somatosensory activity… elicits a sensation of safety. Rhythm is regulating. All cultures have some form of patterned, repetitive rhythmic activity as part of their healing and mourning rituals — dancing, drumming, and swaying.”

~Child psychiatrist Dr.Bruce Perry

Anxiety is marked by a tendency to mentally lose focus on the present and what’s really going on, to focus instead on a fear of the future, or regrets of the past. To get a handle on anxiety, it’s important to be able to reign in anxious thoughts and unproductive bodily responses like hyperventilation, trembling, or restlessness.

Percussion and drumming are excellent tools for developing self-awareness, stabilizing breath, and body-mind cooperation. Repetitive rhythm has a mentally and emotionally-calming effect, helping to slow and reveal anxious reactions that have become automatic.

Drumming has also been shown to help kids with social anxiety. Those who participate in group sessions benefit from the ability to develop listening skills, cooperation, and patience with others.

Drumming is an enjoyable, physical activity that allows participants to relieve stress that might exacerbate anxiety. It induces a more relaxed and present mental state, allowing for more interactive, grounded experiences that leave little time to focus on fear or worries.

Percussion and Behavioral Issues

Self-control and healthy emotional expression are key components of productive, cooperative behavior. They are also key lessons in drum or percussion therapy.

Learning to listen and follow a beat, accept guidance from a drum leader or interactive percussion program, and rein in impulses that stray from the rhythm have long-range positive implications for children struggling to control their behavior.

Drumming elicits a sense of cognitive capability and competency that can help combat the frustration and disconnect, impeding healthy coping skills and behavioral control. Percussion work encourages increased attention, improved impulse control, and better decision-making in the following ways:

• Improved ability to focus internally and externally.
• Increased level of self-awareness and self-esteem.
• Better command over breath and physical coordination.
• Improved attention and task completion.
• Better listening, patience, and cooperation.
• Lower levels of frustration and aggression.
• Increased creative, positive energy; decreased negative, destructive energy.
• Develop self-control, patience and cooperation.

Drumming Promotes Improved Self Awareness and Mental Harmony

The challenges of anxiety and behavioral issues are often linked to an inability to connect with what is going on internally. Brain studies reveal drumming helps synchronize the brain’s hemispheres, which often work at different rates.

As brain waves are coordinated and integrated, percussion participants enjoy better insight, communication, and calm.  We have found this to be true for both children and adults who have used inTime and Interactive Metronome.  Better focus, less stress, reduced anxiety and improved concentration are things we all yearn for.

For a child struggling with anxiety and behavioral issues, percussion and drumming methods speak uniquely to the body and mind. They may prove to be extremely beneficial, in both the short and long term.  

Susan Sorensen

The Recipe for Making Changes in Your Brain

Real change requires a real plan.

A recipe for success.

Making changes in your brain is no different.

Brain training is that blue ribbon recipe.

It incorporates a specific mix of interactive and instructional ingredients that support proven methods of successfully improving the way you process, learn, read, or recall information.

Consider the five-part mix:

Ingredient 1. Frequency — stimulation of specific and relevant brain functions is applied on a regular basis for appropriate brain training to occur and significant engagement to take place.

Ingredient 2. Intensity — layer training time to target and incorporate brain functions or areas of focus that are blocked and need to be optimized.

Ingredient 3. Duration — provide appropriate and plentiful input so that the brain receives a significant dosage of concentrated training per targeted brain function

Ingredient 4. Consistency — maintain ongoing practice for ongoing benefit. Brain training is not a one-time process. Continual practice must be employed to maintain lifelong gains.

Ingredient 5.  Challenge — adapt challenge and difficulty. Interactive, computerized brain training allows monitored, adaptable training that will keep training going without becoming dull or frustrating.

This brain training recipe is critical for lasting change.

So, how does it apply to you or your child’s specific challenges?

There are a lot of brain training options.

How exactly should you use the five ingredients?

Choosing a  method or technological option should center on your training goals and the brain functions that require improvement.

At Learn2Focus the brain training recipe can be applied in a variety of scientifically proven programs. What diagnosis have you been managing? ADD/ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorder, Apraxia/Dyspraxia, Dyslexia, Auditory and Sensory Processing Disorders?

Are there literacy problems? Would you like to boost focus on the court or on the field?

Discuss the following Learn2Focus options with a clinician, and choose the right brain training method for you. Our programs include:

• Interactive Metronome — IM has an auditory-visual platform that engages the patient like a video game. Sending feedback by the millisecond, it helps synchronize brain timing.  Able to be customized and adjusted for complexity, IM improves cognitive processing, attention and decision-making through rhythms and movement.

• CogMed — CogMed uses 25 online training sessions, each 55 minutes long, to target the different aspects of working memory. Over the course of five weeks, the rigorous, systematic training can conveniently be completed online anywhere.  Additional training protocols are also available for individuals who don't have the time to commit to training 5 days a week.

• FastForWord — FastForWord employs computerized activities to help users identify computer-generated speech sounds. Most participants spend half an hour to 90 minutes daily, five days a week, for 8 - 16 weeks, training through drills to improve temporal processing. It is different from other reading interventions because it strengthens the key pathways in the brain which help students learn - Memory, Attention, Processing, Sequencing.

• InTime — InTime stimulates different brain areas and their coordinating functions during personalized listening schedules, using continuous, escalating rhythm-based training across four frequency zones.

• The Reading Assistant — RA unique technology which targets fluency, allows users to receive real-time comprehension feedback and correction through speech recognition anytime, anywhere, online, and on demand. Readers are able to correct themselves more readily when reading aloud. Reading experts agree that fluency is an important key to unlocking reading comprehension.

• The Listening Program — TLP users listen to evidence-based instrumental soundtracks through bone conduction headphones.  TLP's proprietary ABC (Accommodation-Training-Integration) Modular Design guides the listener through multiple levels of sound training during each session to lower stress and support focus, self-regulation and control, learning, and recall. Students typically use the program 15 to 60 minutes, 5 days per week for 4-6 months, revisiting the program as needed afterward to address specific needs and goals.

• Moyer’s Learning Ears — Learning Ears emphasizes ear-voice training. Music/sound stimulation and audio-vocal training are used to retrain auditory perception and translation, improving accuracy and self-correction. The 20-week program commits students to work 30 minutes, 5 days a week targeting specific skill developments in four phases.

Once your choice is made, you may begin the exciting process of actually retraining the way the brain operates and enjoying the growth you or your child longs for.

Susan Sorensen

How The Listening Program Helps with Sensory Processing Disorder

 

“…more sophisticated research methods and equipment prove that sound does in fact affect our health and healing on a cellular level, and that music can reduce stress and stimulate cognitive processing and memory in measurable, substantive, and lasting ways.”

~ Don Campbell, co-author of “Healing at the Speed of Sound”

Is your child one who dreads the crack of Fourth of July fireworks or cries when thunderstorms pass over?

Is it difficult to eat out or at relatives’ homes because the textures of unfamiliar foods can lead to a meltdown at the table?

Does your child’s teacher ask for more after-school meetings to discuss how to deal with your son’s or daughter’s “disruptive” movements, responses, and short attention span in class?

Then you know Sensory Processing Disorder and you need a program that works.

Children with these types of sensitivities to sound, texture, touch, or any sensation, wrestle with how to navigate life when they either crave more sensation or crave a way to dilute all the sensations pouring in.

The filter that regulates sensation is unreliable and kids need a therapeutic intervention that will help create a healthier and more productive relationship with sound.

Why sound? Because active listening isn’t just a function of the ears or auditory system.

Listening is a whole brain activity and whole body function.

Training the brain through sound-based intervention has the ability to improve cognitive performance, soothe sensory upset, and provide a sense of comfort that will ease behavioral responses to SPD.

The Listening Program (TLP) gets it.

The home based intervention is essentially scientifically-proven music therapy.

The training program developed by Advanced Brain Technologies, uses acoustically modified classical music combined with bone conduction through a unique Waves multi-sensory audio system to promote strong, healthy connections in the brain. Connections that can better manage incoming sensation, discern meaning, and generate an appropriate response.  TLP reduces stress, improves focus, learning, self-regulation, memory, and more.

How?

TLP music sounds like beautiful classical music, but it’s actually specifically designed with frequencies proven to support more productive neural connections.

Research shows that sound and music are deeply connected to movement.

Participation in TLP both calms and connects the user to his or her own body and environment.

Most people who complete TLP show marked improvements in the ability to select what they want to hear and pay attention to. There is a longer duration of attention and higher tolerance for external background “static” or “cafeteria” noise.

TLP’s musical program is purposefully designed for optimal results.

Even the special multi-sensory sound system designed for the program elevates the benefits of listening training. The Waves™ headphones support SPD sufferers by delivering the music in such a way that:

1. the “fight or flight” response is regulated, allowing for a state of calm and relaxed/alertness of particular help for those managing sensory sensitivities.
2. two listening modes assist sensory awareness, supporting the brain functions responsible for balance, muscle movement, and coordination.
3. employing The Listening Program, with the combined bone and air conduction listening modes, provides the type of sound stimulation which heightens vocal awareness,  language refinement, and communication skills.

The Listening Program engages children with music for 15 to 60 minutes daily so that the ability to discriminate and tolerate the infused frequencies becomes more natural and acceptable.

This strengthens and supports the participant’s ability to accurately receive and respond to auditory information and sensory information through sound, associated movement, awareness, and response. Many parents note that even after an active listening phase ends, progress tends to continue for up to nine months afterward.  Most families choose to do continuous listening year long, shifting protocols based on individual goals and need.

TPL children continue to feel more in tune with and confident about the sounds and stimuli at school and at home. All without drugs, in the safety and comfort of their own homes.

Susan Sorensen

How Can Metronome Rhythm Training Help Your Child?

Dyslexia. ADHD. Autism. SPD.

Your child has a diagnosis and now needs an intervention.

One that truly makes a difference, measurably and systematically.

Recent studies investigating methods to improve mental functioning show that through a coordinated, research-based plan, you can take measures to help retrain your child’s brain, and reduce the negative impact of many common learning disabilities and developmental conditions.

The plan showing significant amounts of promise– and real results– is metronome rhythm training.

Results without drugs

“The Interactive Metronome is spectacularly helpful. It is one of the most promising developments with non-medication of ADHD that’s come along in a long while… This is a really solid, extremely helpful non-medication (intervention) not only for ADHD but for mental functioning in general.”

~Edward Hallowell MD, author of Driven to Distraction, leading clinician and speaker on ADHD

Metronome training is a unique technology program that employs interactive activities and exercises, without medication. Using auditory and visual guidance systems, your child’s rhythm and timing are measured and improved, using computer software in dedicated therapy settings and at home. Naturally and intentionally, your child will learn to process information more successfully.

Results through structure, repetition, and goal setting

“Attention, learning and problem solving depend in part on the ability to plan and sequence actions and ideas. The Interactive Metronome helps individuals systematically exercise and often improve basic motor planning and sequencing capacities.”

~Stanley Greenspan, MD, noted child psychiatrist, former head of the NIMH, Chairman of IM’s Scientific Advisory Board

Your child would be given the opportunity to engage in a series of synchronized hand/foot exercises coordinated with very precise computer-generated tones. Listening through headphones, he or she will try to keep time using prearranged, repetitive motor actions.

As the program progresses, your child’s focus and attention will increase for longer durations.  Physical stamina will improve, and the ability to filter out irrelevant distractions (internally and externally) will expand, as well as the ability to keep track of his or her own mental and bodily actions. As these skills progress, so will your child’s overall performance.

Results geared toward mind/body harmony

“Most all human behavior involves a brain clock system to coordinate microsecond-based signals in the brain. Interventions that fine tune the brain clock can improve human performance from student school learning to adults recovering from a stroke.”

~Dr. Kevin McGrew, PhD., Director of Science and Research Interactive Metronome Director of the Institute for Applied Psychometrics (IAP)

Interactive metronome therapy is unique in its approach to your child’s general functioning. Instead of addressing symptoms piecemeal, it seeks to improve “domain-general mechanisms.” That is, the internal timing mechanism that supports sleep cycles, speech patterns, attention span, and the general efficiency of communication between the left and right hemispheres of the brain will be addressed.

Research indicates that a variety of conditions, much like the challenges your child faces, could be compromised deficiencies in temporal processing, or problems with timing in the brain.

Merging whole body movement and cognitive activity has been shown to provide the best results for helping your child achieve the necessary neuro-timing.

Interactive metronome therapy helps harmonize thinking and physical action together in a fun, organized way. It provides real-time feedback, and puts your child on a path to synchronizing his or her “internal clock.”

Essentially, your child’s distracting or racing thoughts, difficulties with social and cognitive expression, troubles with physical coordination, and more are improved due to efforts to improve the functional networks in his or her brain.

Through metronome rhythm training, your child’s mental processing can be enhanced, and he or she can enjoy a life more “in sync” with the world.

Susan Sorensen

Learn 2 Focus Introduces Moyers Learning Ears

Gayle Moyers is the pioneering force behind Moyers Learning Systems, a program designed to help students overcome poor listening, reading, spelling, or other academic struggles with the skills they need to be successful in the classroom.

Moyers has over three decades of experience supporting and teaching children to develop key mental tools that will be vital to retraining your child’s brain for improved auditory processing.

Moyers saw the need for a program that could address the lagging self-confidence and self-image that often accompany poor auditory processing skills. So, she built a system that could positively teach the necessary skills through intensive training, daily practice, and one-on-one encouragement…ensuring the type of successes every struggling learner and his or her parents hope for.

Can Learning Ears help my child’s specific learning issues?

Have you tried for years to find the right academic formula or instructional balance to help your child manage

• language delays
• attention deficits
• dyslexia
• learning disabilities
• processing disorders
• and more?

Learning difficulties are generally tied to problems with listening to, interpreting, and recalling heard or read information. To be a successful learner, kids need to master the basics. Reading and listening are fundamental skills that launch a student’s achievement and confidence in any learning environment.

LEARNING EARS helps children overcome these difficulties in a matter of months. The system is unique and proven, providing the fundamentals for classroom improvement and learning goal attainment many families believed was previously out of reach.

Clients who have committed to the program have reported phenomenal success.

LEARNING EARS fosters growth in the following areas:

• attentiveness to auditory input
• heightened ability to locate and recognize sound
• awareness and sharpened focus
• stronger physical coordination and muscle tone
• improved left/right discrimination and sense of the body
• noticeable improvement in verbal control
• improved ability to interpret, organize, and utilize language
• refined phonemic awareness
• boosted recall and memory
• better employment of creativity and problem solving
• higher level of reading comprehension

How is the LEARNING EARS program administered?

Over the course of 20 weeks, Moyer’s Learning Ears will engage your child in 4 phases of skill development.

He or she will  experience an individualized program, set up to addresses your child’s specific issues. The customized learning consultations require a commitment of just 30-minutes a day, 5 days per week to see measurable results — results your child may have had to wait years to enjoy with more traditional methods.

As your LEARNING EARS instructor tracks and fine-tunes the system to your child every week, your child will benefit from the innovation inherent to training in the clinic and at home. Careful attention will be paid to helping you and your child carry over what you learn with the practitioner to the home training.

The 4 phases of skill development will be easy to follow and will target a host of coordinated skills.

Phase one concentrates on assessment and goal setting.

The skills targeted include:

• Listening and attentiveness
• Focus
• Spacial awareness
• Physical coordination

Phase two assists your child’s manipulation of language. Skills focus includes:

• Phonemic awareness
• Recall
• Speech quality and articulation
• Auditory comprehension
• Expression of thoughts and ideas

Phase three motivates your child to establish more productive reading habits.

Abilities expanded include:

• Reading accuracy and fluency
• Self correction
• Vocabulary expansion
• Communication and social behavior
• Improved motivation
• Self-Confidence

Phase four synthesizes and solidifies your child’s knowledge and provides tools for successfully using the home program only. The final phase targets the following:

• Increased academic success
• Independent  learning
• Elevated motivation and confidence

This program is innovative and proven.

Choose LEARNING EARS to help your child train his or her brain for significant advancement, academic success, and lasting self confidence.

Susan Sorensen

Virtual Training: 10 Reasons Why Training From Home Benefits Your Child

rev·o·lu·tion

revəˈlo͞oSH(ə)n

noun; and according to Google Search:

1. a major change in ideas or methods in favor of a new system; a “game changer”

2. a complete turn made by something moving around a fixed point; an “about-face”

Why try virtual brain training?

Because you need a revolution, a system that will give your child the confidence and ability to turn away from an old way of thinking, and move toward a new order in his or her own mind.

You need a learning game change, and a behavioral about-face.

Virtual training programs like Interactive Metronome, Cogmed, FastforWord and more offer your child a learning revolution.

Is it untraditional? ….Sure! But that’s a good thing. Through online training, you have the opportunity to revolutionize your child’s thinking through a familiar and kid-friendly medium (your computer) in a comfortable environment (your home).

Still unsure? Consider the list of benefits below:

1. Saved money makes cents.  You need a cost-effective way to obtain quality of treatment. Online training saves money by:
   • reducing multiple, costly office visits every week
   • limiting gas and transportation expenses
   • recognizing that time is money. Virtual training reduces time spent wrestling with behavioral issues, homework monitoring, and repeating instructions, etc.
2. Long-term intervention. If your child requires lengthy or ongoing treatment, at-home training  is completely supportive and invested in seeing your child consistently reach new goals, and improve his or her abilities.
3. Shareable skill-building. Once you have the software, you are free to share the information with those who will benefit. Multiple family members can learn and address similar issues together. A family activity that pays dividends individually and relationally.
4. Treatment transparency. Often, parents must stand by and watch a physician work when their children are sick. Or wait for a teacher’s progress report card to understand a child’s academic struggles. Virtual training is different. Parental coaching provides the clarity you seek firsthand, as you witness your child’s strengths and weaknesses, and track improvement.
5. You’re a team. Parent-child bonding is a good thing, wherever you can find it. Brain-training at home is teamwork. You’ll be there, coaching your child as he or she works through challenges, and high-fiving each other as the rewards for his or her hard work materialize.
6. Training time on your time. The less time spent working and reworking the family calendar to accommodate office visits, scheduling conflicts, or cancelled appointments, the better. Virtual training allows you and your child to train when the timing is right.
7. Train on the move. You can take brain training wherever you go. A laptop or tablet becomes an invaluable teacher. Virtual training is able to capitalize on mobile technology, and convenience, like no other treatment can.
8. Virtual training prevents “brain drain.”  Downtime can be enhanced at home, another family member’s home, or in a hotel room at a resort. The software gives you options, without sacrificing quality of treatment, or quality vacation time.
9. Ease “chauffeur fatigue.” Kids have a lot going on: swim practice, Little League, piano lessons, and more. And parents are the designated drivers, and sideline spectators, for much of it.  Take the opportunity to provide invaluable brain training without all the travel.
10. Your child deserves excellence and expertise. Learn2Focus is experienced in remote monitoring and program development. Pioneers in Hawaii, we provide highly effective virtual training solutions. L2F was the first IM provider in Hawaii for IM-Home and has more IM-Home clients on all Hawaiian Islands, South Pacific and Asia.

 We believe we have the right selection of products and programs to be effective “game changers” in your child’s life. Give us the opportunity to help turn things around.

Susan Sorensen

Auditory Processing Disorder: Can Improving Temporal Order Help Your Child?

Did you know that there is a way to directly address that “out of synch” quality your APD child seems to exhibit?

Recent research reveals that improving temporal order could be a worthwhile focus for children with auditory processing disorder.

“Temporal order” is simply the arrangement of events in time. Research shows that APD sufferers seem to experience a disruption in the ability to properly process the order and rate of auditory information, also referred to as “temporal (timed) processing.”

That’s right, APD might just be a timing problem. Not a hearing, vision, or intelligence problem.

Basically, your child is experiencing a brain-timing delay that keeps him or her a beat behind, when perceiving and understanding heard information. His or her brain needs more time to process what was heard, before attempting a response. Even then, that timing difference allows for distortion and distraction, which further complicate understanding.

It makes sense then, that by enhancing your child’s capacity to process auditory stimulus, in the appropriate amount of time, he or she could produce better language skills and comprehension.

Programs, like Interactive Metronome and Fast ForWord, strive to do just that. Through these methods, temporal order improvement in APD children can help achieve the following ends:

1. New pathways in the brain can be built. This concept employs what scientists call neuroplasticity. Your child’s learning is NOT set in stone. He or she can participate in brain training, and retraining, that allows him or her to practice a new way of perceiving auditory input. Processing what is heard, recognized, and remembered can be amended through the retrained brain.

A 2007 study published in Current Directions in Psychological Science indicates that improved mental timing effectively enhances the brain’s ability to “process information in the speech stream” more efficiently. This, in turn, leads to the appropriate skill development required for auditory comprehension, reading and writing.

Fast ForWord was actually created around the concept that temporal processing deficits are a core obstacle for children with APD, and that neural plasticity, new ways of learning, occur through repetition.

2. Your child can finally “synch up” with his or her surroundings. Studies indicate that APD is likely occurring due to a split-second delay in auditory processing, not a physical problem with ears or eyes. The usual 25 milliseconds required for processing basic speech sounds in most people take up to 300 milliseconds in people with learning disorders.

Computerized programs focused on temporal order can help compensate for this difference, and teach your child to keep pace with the world around him or her.

Interactive Metronome (IM) training teaches this foundational skill through an organized sequence of exercises. Once grasped, you and your child will see other learning and social improvements that rely upon time perception.

3. Your child will begin to “hear what he/she feels.” Those of us without APD don’t know what it’s like to feel continually disconnected from the rhythms of the environments, people, and events of the world around us. It feels natural. Not so for people with APD, who are continually struggling to tune in, and track what’s happening, amid the rapid changes in sound and speech. That lack of capacity negatively impacts language recognition and comprehension, as well as muscle coordination.

The beauty of improved temporal order, through a program like IM, is that by moving or tapping to a beat, your child’s brain receives the necessary stimulus for retraining his or her “brain clock.” Over time, listening and temporal (or timed) information become better linked, and auditory processing is enhanced.

Susan Sorensen