Inside Moves, Part Two

More ideas about staying sane while staying indoors.  {If the weather at all permits, please, take your children outside to play!}  

A therapy ball is invaluable for a young child who needs a lot of intensity but insists on maintaining control of the activity.  The child can sit and bounce to his heart's content, with the added bonus of strengthening up the intrinsic musculature around the spine and working the eyes.  The correct size allows the child to sit with hips and knees at 90 degree angles.  The therapy ball can used for homework, eating dinner, or sitting while watching television or working on the computer.  The child can play catch and shoot targets from the ball, as well.

A large therapy ball is great for all kinds of play activities at  home.  An excellent activity the child can do independently is to drape himself over it and roll back and forth, landing forward onto his hands and then rolling back onto his feet.  This develops protective extension responses, which are frequently lacking in low tone children.   He can also spin himself around in a circle using his hands and feet on the floor.   Another great game to promote strengthening and vision is to hold the child by the legs while he lays across the ball, have him walk forward on his hands to pick things up and toss them at targets, then walk back.  You can use foam alphabet letters and spell words, or use Handwriting Without Tears wooden pieces and build letters.

Games that require the child to use his body with his head in different positions are very challenging and alerting.  I have children bend over and shoot at targets through their legs, sing "Head Shoulders Knees and Toes", and play Twister.

I have a long tube made out of stretchy fabric, purchased at a fabric store, that the children love to crawl through.  Drape it over sofa cushions for an obstacle course.  Put stuffed animals inside, and have the child rescue them, or have him push a therapy ball through.  Two adults can also pick the child up and swing him back and forth while he's inside.

An indoor tunnel is a great workout, especially for a child who did not crawl.  I  toss toys inside for the child to rescue, or pieces of a puzzle which he can then put together.  You can gently roll the child back in forth inside, or have him roll himself across the room.

Roll the child up in a blanket like a burrito, and then unroll him by holding onto the end and unfurling him.  If he enjoys deep pressure, bury him in sofa cushions while he lies on his belly and then roll the therapy ball on top of him.  This is very calming.

Piggy back rides are as therapeutic as they are fun. This is a great way to improve endurance, strengthen up the child's flexor muscles, and to work on head righting, which is often weak or absent in children with poor balance.  While the child is clinging to your back, put on some music and do a dance, dipping and leaning from side to side.  Shake your hips and spin around in a circle. The child should be able to wrap his arms and legs strongly around you and hold on to  you without assistance.  If he can't, that's something to work on.

 If he is not righting his head and is falling off when you lean over, dance in front of a full length mirror so he can use his reflection to keep his head in midline.  Or another adult can provide a visual target by holding something interesting for the child to look at on the opposite side.  {When you lean to the left, the target is moved to the right, and vice versa.}

Old fashioned calisthenics are great for building strength and endurance, and for turning restless, antsy, oppositional children into exhausted, compliant ones.  {I refer to this tactic as fatiguing them into submission.}  Running and marching in place to music, deep knee bends, jumping jacks, push ups, planks, and sit ups are all great.  If there is room, military style frog crawling under and around an obstacle course of chairs set up around the room is fun and a very good way to improve brain functioning. 

Wrestling is a great, high intensity indoor activity.  Let the child pin you, but make him work for it.  Keep it as low to the ground as possible.  Or I will get on my hands and knees and challenge my friend to do the same and try to knock me over by pushing me steadily or slamming into me with his booty.  This is an excellent activity for a child who constantly squirms around in his chair or doesn't like to wear underwear.

Booty walk: Sit on the floor with your legs straight out in front of you and your arms across your chest.  Walk yourself across the room, keeping your bottom on the floor and your legs straight in front of you, by leaning slightly and using the muscles in your behind.  Race the child across the floor, or start on opposite ends of the room and meet in the middle, then booty-walk backwards.   {Jane Fonda did this in her exercise videos.}

A pair of foam bats can be used for indoor fencing or for sparring.  {The ones in the link are flimsy, and don't last long.  You could probably get a pretty good custom made pair at the local foam or futon shop.}

The child can practice somersaults, go crab walking, and do wheelbarrow walking with you.  

A roller racer is a great way for the child to improve trunk rotation and upper body strength.

Set up a water filled basin with a magnetic fishing game, {easily purchased at the 99 cent store} and have the child lie on his belly with his head over the edge of a bed or coffee table and fish from that position.

Install a chin up bar, and have him get in the habit of hanging and doing chin-ups whenever he walks by.

Many more great ideas here.

To learn more about how movement affects learning and development, I recommend this book.

{And I surrender to the inevitable: there is always the Wii.}

Inside Moves, Part One

I can't urge parents strongly enough to make sure that their children get outside to play every single day.  It's critical to their health and to their neurological development.  A body that is not strong, stable, and healthy does not adequately support the work of the child's brain, eyes, and hands, and can't be counted on to keep him effortlessly upright against gravity.   A weak, unstable body makes it difficult for the child to sit, to be present and alert and able to pay attention, and to learn.


If a child can't sit still, it's because he needs to move. A child with sensory processing or attentional issues especially needs a great deal of gross motor activity, the more intense the better.  Movement is what focuses and organizes the brain and body, and drives development forward.


 Playtime should be outdoors whenever possible.  But when circumstances prevent you from getting the child to the playground, here are some suggestions for providing movement and intensity indoors, in small spaces.  


If the child has difficulty focusing on homework, one of these activities can be used as a quick movement break to increase focus and attention.


All homework should be preceded by intense exercise, a drink of water, and a protein rich snack.

Trampoline:  Jumping is a superb high intensity exercise and a very high quality rebounder is not too expensive.  {Even a medium quality trampoline will take a surprising amount of abuse.}  There are so many fun games to play while jumping.  I use a trampoline a lot in my work and encourage parents to invest in a trampoline for home use.  Children love it.  It is a powerful way to work on joint stability, balance and endurance.   It deepens respiration and promotes lymphatic flow, cleansing and detoxifying the system.  It's also excellent for vision.   Most of the children I work with have weak eye muscles, and jumping while aiming and shooting at targets is a great way to stabilize their eyes.

Some ideas for playing on the trampoline:

1. Put on some lively music and have a jumping/dancing party.

2.  Set up some targets and have the child toss beanbags or little stuffed animals at them.  If the child is able, have him jump while you throw his ammo to him, catch it, then turn and shoot, all while jumping. {If he can't catch, hand him the animals while he jumps.}  I use play bowling pins or cardboard bricks as targets.  You can also use large numbers or letters, a Nerf Hoop, a hula hoop, or make a tic tac toe board out of oaktag and colored tape.

2.  Play catch while jumping.  For a very young child, a big Nerf ball or an OBall are good choices.  For an older child, a large playground ball, like a foursquare ball, is fine.

3. Have the child bounce and catch a ball against the wall while jumping.  This is quite challenging.  You can make it even more challenging by standing behind him while he jumps and having him turn his upper body to toss the ball back at you, then turn to the other side and catch it, then bounce it at the wall again, while he is jumping.  Upper body rotation encourages integration of the two halves of the brain, improves bilateral coordination, and solidifies dominance in children who tend to be indiscriminate in hand use.

4.  Play balloon volleyball while jumping, either with racquets or hands.  This is great for visual tracking.

5.  Blow bubbles to the child as he is jumping and have him pop them.

6.  Play horseshoes while jumping.

7. Have the child copy your movements, like hopping, bending, twisting, waving his arms, jumping from side to side, jumping feet apart and together,  clapping,  while he is jumping.

8.  Do the Freddie.

A Bosu can also be used in similar ways to the trampoline.  There are many videos and articles available on the web that outline exercises and activities that can be done on it.

A Sit n Spin is a great, compact toy for a toddler who needs to spin.  Older children can use an office chair.  Spinning is  very high intensity and is good for children who never seem to tire or get dizzy.

An inexpensive scooter board is fun if there is room inside your home.  The child can lie on it and propel himself around, or you can spin him around in a circle while he holds on to a rope or a hula hoop, or you can spin him around by the legs.    Here are some ideas for games.

{Next week:  even more ideas for indoor fun!}

Twenty Four Reasons Why a Child Can't Sit Still

1.  The child does not get enough exercise.  Children require huge amounts of movement, preferably outside, every single day.  Movement and exercise is as essential as food for children in order to stay organized, develop and  mature their nervous systems, improve their coordination, strength and motor planning, and to be healthy!  So many of us live in cities now and have just forgotten how vital it is for a child's health and development to go outside and play.  Bring the child to the playground for half an hour, or whatever you can manage, before school starts, and let him play on the equipment, or have a game of touch football, statues, or tag.  If this is truly not possible, buy a trampoline or have him play an exercise game on his Wii.  And if his teacher takes away recess as a punishment, you must insist that she find another way to help him manage his behavior.  He is acting out because he needs to move more, not less!

2.  The child has poor postural stability, low muscle tone, and a weak trunk and spine.  This makes sitting physically exhausting, uncomfortable and painful.  Circle time is especially grueling since sitting unsupported is such hard work.

3.  The child's chair/desk at school does not fit.  I can't tell you how many times I've walked into classrooms and seen children whose desks literally come up to their necks while their chairs are so high that their feet are dangling on the floor.  Could you sit and do your work like that?

4.  The child is tactile defensive and his clothing bothers him. Or he is sitting in too close proximity to others and his alarm system is clanging away, instructing him to flee.

5. The child is sitting with his back exposed and people are walking behind him, again setting off alarm bells.  He should be sitting with his back to the wall, preferably in a corner.

6.  The child is auditory defensive and his ears hurt.  A child who can manage in a quiet, low stimulation atmosphere but can't control his behavior in a noisy environment is probably suffering mightily in all of the chaos.  Or he may not understand the teacher's instructions if she is talking over many chattering voices.  A good clue about auditory defensiveness:  a child who runs around the perimeter of the classroom, acts out, and can't engage in any goal oriented behavior when the room is noisy.

 7.  The child is a poor breather.  Shallow breathing sets up the body for fight or flight, and it's very hard to sit still when every cell in your body is urging you to get up and check for predators.


8.The child has undetected visual problems.  It's exhausting and frustrating to try to attend to close work if you can't see what you're doing.  His eyes may be so unstable that he is seeing double, or seeing floaters, or visual images are shimmering.  Or the light in his classroom might be bothering him.  In Manhattan many children are expected to sit all day long in inside classrooms with no natural light or outside ventilation.  I get headaches just thinking about it.

9.  The child's inner ear is not functioning well.  The inner ear tells us how alert/upright or at ease we should be in response to movement.  {Roller coaster: very alert and upright! Hammock: very drowsy and relaxed.}  If the child's inner ear is not registering movement very well, it's not telling the body to sit up and attend.  The child is driven to move in order to provide the intensity he needs to stay upright and aroused.

10.  The child's nervous system has not matured along with his chronological age.  This means that primitive movement patterns, which should be dormant, are instead active and present, dominating the way the child responds to his environment.  Primitive reflex patterns lower the child's muscle tone automatically when he turns his head and body in certain positions. This interferes with, among many other things, his balance, equilibrium, and vision. Or things that would not even register to us, like a dog barking in the distance, can throw the child's system into a startle, making it hard for him to stay grounded.

11.  The child's metabolic processes are not functioning well.  Does the child have undetected food allergies, difficulty sleeping, leaky gut syndrome, candida, heartburn?  Is the child constipated?  Is he subsisting on a diet of refined carbs, sweets, and processed food, and so is inadequately nourished?  Children need lots of high quality protein and complex carbs to fuel their bodies for learning and attention.

12.  The child does not get enough sleep, or the sleep that he does get is not resting him properly.  Can he transition well to bedtime?  Does he get ten or eleven hours every night?  Is there good ventilation in his bedroom?  Are the lights off in his room?

13. The child may be too young or too immature to be in a classroom.  In my clinical opinion, most three year old boys would be much better off waiting another year or two before starting school.  They simply don't have the emotional or neurological maturity to be handle all of the rules and expectations of the classroom.

14.  The expectations of the classroom are too much, and the  child feels lost, inadequate, and confused.  Four year olds should not be expected to learn to write.  They simply don't have the internal stability, attention span, or visual discrimination required for such high level work yet.  Let them wait until they are developmentally ready.  One of the very best schools in Manhattan, the Rudolph Steiner School, does not start the children writing until they are seven. Their children have beautiful handwriting and are exceptional scholars.

15.  The child is hungry, thirsty, tired, or has to go to the bathroom.

16.  The child is over scheduled.  Children need lots of down time to recharge their batteries and connect with their creativity.  A child who has two or three activities every day after school and on the weekend is expected to be "on" way too much.  Cut back to just an activity or two a week and use the time instead to take him outside to play.

17.  The child is spending too much time in front of screens.  This is especially true if the child can't transition well to sleep after spending time on a computer.  Is the child watching or playing games with excessively violent content?   Strictly limit time spent in front of televisions and computers and use the time instead for creative pursuits {crafts, painting, writing stories, playing a musical instrument, dancing, etc.}.  Turn off the computer a minimum of two hours before bedtime, or, better yet, allow the child just an hour or two on the weekend.  It's just not realistic to allow a child to spend all day Saturday and Sunday watching TV, playing video games, and eating frozen waffles, and then expect him to be alert, relaxed, grounded, able to sit still for hours at a time, and ready to learn on Monday.  Don't you feel more clearheaded and able to manage at work after you've taken a brisk walk?

18.  His parents are going through a hard time, or don't get along.  Strife at home will upset any child's equilibrium.  If parents are stressed out,  rarely home, argue a lot, or are going through their own issues, it will show up in the child's behavior.

19. The child's parents don't teach him to respond to adult redirection, so he thinks that obeying grownups is optional.


20.  The adults who care for the child spend inordinate amounts of time on their electronic devices during their time together, or otherwise ignore him.

21.  The child is expected to sit still for too long.  I have so very often observed classrooms where very young children were expected to sit for long periods without getting up, being given a drink of water, or anything to eat.  And if the child has endured a long bus ride to school, he is at a disadvantage before he even walks into the building.

22.  The child is bored.  Many reasons why this could be  -- the grownups don't have a realistic idea about the child's attention span, the activity is too difficult or too easy, or the child expects everything to be like television or the computer: loud, lots of chatter and images quickly passing by, lots of novelty.

23.  The child has sustained structural damage due to a fall or other accident, poor handling, or birth trauma which affects cranial nerve function and would benefit from manual therapy.

24.  The child may have issues with body/brain chemistry.

Thinking Outside the XBox {An Old Curmudgeon's Guide to Holiday Shopping}

Why don't I think electronic toys are a great choice for holiday gifts?  Let me count the ways...

Electronic toys are addictive, violent, and don't require or encourage creativity.

Children don't acquire critical skills like depth perception, hand eye coordination, problem solving, motor planning, joint stability, or balance while playing video games.

Electronic toys encourage isolation, not socialization.  They don't require making conversation or eye contact.  They don't teach social skills like turn taking, patience, or sportsmanship, they don't require the child to plan and strategize against a human opponent, and they require nothing in the way of negotiation or compromise.

Video games encourage hyperfocusing instead of fostering the development of flexible attention.  Flexible attention, the ability to concentrate on one thing while maintaining awareness of, and selectively responding to, everything else, is absolutely essential for success at school, the workplace, and in social situations.

Children who spend all their time sitting indoors playing on electronic toys are at risk for delays in their neurological development.  In order for a child to acquire a strong, stable, vigorous, healthy body with reliable balance and good vision and perception, he has to freely explore and interact with his physical environment, not sit staring at a screen for hours on end.  He needs  constant opportunities to move and use his body in all kinds of ways.  To be physically healthy and mentally and emotionally sane, he needs a great deal of regular activity out of doors so that he can breathe fresh air,  absorb the sunshine, and have contact with the natural world.

Why is this necessary?  An immature, inefficient nervous system that does not allow the child to respond to his world in a strong, healthy, flexible manner has a profound negative influence on learning and behavior, and sets the child up for being at risk for learning and behavioral problems.  A sedentary child is at risk for all kinds of health problems including obesity, and, later down the road, diabetes.

Recently, the mother of a little boy I have been treating decided to put away all of his electronic toys and to spend the time with him outside instead.  In combination with the work we are doing in the clinic to help him catch up neurologically, the change in his behavior and his ability to function in school was immediate and profound:  he went from being a serious behavior problem to being a class leader.

The best toys are ones that are open ended and encourage creativity and artistic expression, have problems to solve, and allow the child to develop and refine fine motor coordination by manipulating materials in three dimensions.

Some suggestions:

Art supplies are always a big hit with small children. Suggestions include but are not limited to rubber stamps, colored pencils, paint, sequins, glitter, feathers, pipe cleaners, stickers, construction paper, scissors that cut scalloped edges, modeling clay, Sculpey or Fimo, beads for stringing, scrapbooking supplies, a chalkboard easel with lots of colored chalk.

Crafts:  weaving potholders, woodworking, leather lacing, coppertooling, beading, perler beads, tessel tiles, suncatchers, kits for sewing your own puppet or stuffed animal.  For an older child, an introductory kit that teaches knitting or crocheting, or a little frame loom, can be an introduction to a meaningful pursuit that will last across the child's life span.

Games:  I particularly like Jenga, Connect Four, Operation, Tier Auf Tier, Scrabble, Boggle, and Monopoly for teaching social skills and fine motor coordination.

Musical Instruments:  Harmonicas, whistles, recorders, kazoos, drums, bells.  Toy stores or music stores usually have a great selection of inexpensive instruments.

Cooking:  A little chef's kit or set of children's baking ware can be a wonderful way to get a child interested in eating good food and cooking.

Outdoor fun:  The possibilities are infinite:  balls, skates, jump ropes, a scooter, a telescope for looking at the stars at night, some camping equipment and a promise to use it when it gets warm.

Indoor fun:  A little trampoline, a Sit N Spin, a Zoomball, a hula hoop.

What was your favorite book as a child?  Chances are the children in your life will enjoy it just as much, especially if you read it to them.

{Here is last year's post, with more suggestions.}

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Therapist, Verse Four

This series is divided into four parts.  The first, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Therapist, suggests that instead of automatically shielding children from the inevitable obstacles, failures, and disappointments that they will face in their lives, we instead teach them to be strong, resilient, and able to handle adversity.  The first step in this process is basing our actions and expectations  on the understanding that children are starting from a position of strength, not weakness. 


The second part, How to Achieve Planned Obsolescence, outlines strategies for teaching children how to be strong, resilient, flexible, independent, responsible, creative, and resourceful, think for themselves, and solve their own problems.  


The third part, Becoming Obsolete, Part II, discusses the value of a solid academic education, with an emphasis on the basics.  The rules of penmanship, arithmetic, spelling, phonics, punctuation, and grammar provide a stable foundation for everything that follows.  The rules of reading, writing and arithmetic are the academic equivalent of playing scales, and, like scales, should be practiced and drilled until they are completely automatic.  They ground the child's brain and body in order and logic. With this  secure base of skills and knowledge underlying and supporting his thought processes, the child's intellect is then free to to soar, unencumbered.


When a child can swiftly read and comprehend what is written in a book or on a blackboard, write rapidly and legibly, construct a grammatically correct sentence, and effortlessly add, subtract, divide, and multiply numbers without a calculator, he can freely and easily recall and formulate an opinion about what he reads, organize and express his thoughts and ideas elegantly and articulately in writing, and tackle complex math problems with zest and confidence.  


This last section is about providing the child with structure.  For a child to develop a strong, solid internal structure, from which springs his sense of discipline, his motivation to achieve and succeed, and his moral compass, his parents and teachers have to initially provide an external structure, composed of predictable rules and routine, which consistently contains him and forces him to consider how his actions affect those around him. 


Battle Hymn of the Tiger Therapist, Verse Four:

Act like a grownup.  You, the parent, are in charge. A family with small children should not be run as a democracy, but as a benevolent dictatorship.  Not everyone gets an equal say in the decision making; that is the privilege and the responsibility of the adults, who after all, are older, wiser, more experienced, have better judgment, and pay the bills.

Don't ask his permission to be the grownup.   Don't ask "OK?" at the end of the sentence when you tell him to do something or correct his behavior.  This undermines your authority.  Don't ask him if he "wants" to do something when he doesn't really have a choice.  Save yourself from arguments and oppositional behavior by just telling the child "It's time to brush your teeth" instead of asking him, "Do you want to brush your teeth?".

The adults lead, the children follow. Don't habitually make your child the center of attention.  The grownups should be the ones who make the rules and family decisions on behalf of everyone, and have the final say. Don't constantly seek the child's input about where to go on family outings, what to have for dinner, what to buy while you are shopping, etc.  Small children feel insecure when the grownups solicit their opinions before making decisions.  It makes them wonder why the adults can't manage.  They would prefer to play and let the grownups do the heavy lifting.

When the family's decision making continually revolves around the child's wishes, it conditions him to think that his wants and needs should always come first, before anyone else's.  This is not a healthy attitude to bring into mature relationships, and it won't get him very far in the world.

Have clear expectations, firm limits and high standards, and expect your child to adhere to them. Small children thrive with strong boundaries and clear expectations.  They want and need the grown ups to contain them, and to teach them, by rule and example, how to comport themselves.  Want to raise a strong, wise, compassionate leader?  Be a strong, wise, compassionate leader, and the child will model himself after you.  

Maintain control of your emotions.   Be mindful about what you do and do not respond to when a child is trying to wind you up.  Stay cool. Children instinctively understand that grownups who can't contain themselves can't contain them. For a child to feel secure, he needs to know that the grownups are calm, strong and in control of themselves.  Then he knows that the grown ups are stronger than he is and can keep him safe.

This book is very helpful if you are easily triggered and engage in unhealthy communication patterns with your child.

 Be an alpha dog. Lead your pack and command respect. Be "S/he Who Must Be Obeyed."  Don't allow your child to interrupt you when you're speaking, order you around, forget to say please or thank you, insist on getting his own way, or speak to you disrespectfully.   By being a person to whom respect must be shown, you are establishing a hierarchy and ensuring that the child's world is in its proper order.  This allows him to feel secure.

Don't give in to every whim and demand, and don't be afraid to stand your ground, set limits and to say no. There is a big difference between wanting to delight your child and give him pleasure with an occasional indulgence, and acceding to his every wish because you don't want to rock the boat, can't deal with a temper tantrum, or are afraid he won't love you when you say no. In the long run, he'll like you much better if you do say no. Children don't feel comfortable when their parents are too permissive.  It makes them feel neglected and insecure.  They  want to know that the grownups who are responsible for them are strong, know what's best, and can make appropriate decisions on their behalf and keep them from harm.

Love your child like crazy, but don't always be so easy to impress.  Don't continually tell a child he's smart, or special, or wonderful, and don't praise him for every little thing. That gets you less than nowhere.

Have regular bedtimes, mealtimes, and homework times.  Make your child's schedule as predictable as possible so that he is not using up his emotional reserves on coping with unexpected changes in his routine.  This is especially important if you have a sensory defensive child who has a tough time transitioning between activities.  {And I feel compelled to say it here, again: strictly limit computer and television time and keep your child active and out of doors.}

Insist on good manners.  People who exhibit good manners are well liked and get along with others.  People who lack social graces are operating at a disadvantage.   It's in your child's best interest for you to enforce good table manners, insist that thank you notes be written, and make sure that the child says please, thank you, and excuse me, does not interrupt when others are speaking, and can wait his turn.

If you have a special needs child, you must still set limits, insist on good behavior and good manners, and have high standards for achievement and comportment.  Always assume that your special needs child is strong, not weak.  Believe in him relentlessly, and he may surprise you. My young clients still amaze me all the time.

Teach a special needs child to lead with his strengths instead of focusing on his weaknesses.  Find a way to help him develop  the internal resources to meet a challenge thinking "I can!" instead of "I can't."  {Your child's OT can be very helpful here.}

If your child has a physical disability and must depend on others for his basic care, it is absolutely essential that he learn good manners.  When I lived in Berkeley, a city with a huge population of people  who live independently despite severe disabilities, I had many acquaintances and friends who used wheelchairs, and could not dress or toilet or feed themselves without total assistance.  Some were so lovely to be with, and had such exquisite manners, helping them felt more like a social call than work.  They had warm relationships with the people whom they hired to assist them at home with their personal care, and could count on them to stay for years.  Others were not so charming, and they had a difficult time being independent because they couldn't attract or maintain a high quality, reliable staff.  Manners in this case can make or break your child's ability to manage his care when you're not around.

Always, in the back of your mind, plan for the day when you're not around. 

Becoming Obsolete, Part II

Strategies for helping your child be independent and resourceful, and to maximize his ability to learn and to think critically.

The ability to learn and to think is grounded in movement.  As a baby begins to move through, and to explore, his environment, he develops his understanding of the world based on his physical relationship to everything and everyone around him.  Around the age of six, this understanding of the physical world deepens into reasoning and abstract thought.

In order to think critically and logically and to be available for learning, a child must have an organized body with a stable, reliable relationship with gravity, a mature, organized nervous system that allows the child to observe and respond to his world in a calm, flexible, reasoned, manner, and an organized brain that takes in and processes sensory information accurately.  The adults can help by making sure that he gets enough exercise and fresh air, sleeps well, eats a nutritious diet, and is accustomed to solving problems.

The child also must have a strong grounding in the basics of math, grammar, penmanship, and all of those other boring, old fashioned, outmoded necessities that modern education has decided to dispense with, having deemed them useless for the 21st century.  I vehemently disagree with discarding the basics.  They constitute the underpinnings of education, and without them, the acquisition of knowledge, and the ability to reason and think critically and logically, is compromised.

Think of learning to play an instrument.  To be able to make the most beautiful music, you have to spend a long time preparing.  You have to learn to sit and hold your body and instrument just so; you must practice hours and hours and hours of scales and fingering exercises with a metronome; learn to read and play musical notation fluently; follow time and key signatures; and translate the composers' instructions, which are traditionally in Italian. Only then will you be have the skills to get the music "up and off the notes."  If these technical abilities are not effortlessly in place when you play, you won't be able to express your musical ideas.  You will still be struggling with the mechanics.

Being a successful scholar requires the same preparation of the mind and the body to think, solve problems, and be creative.  To write the most elegant, articulate, persuasive essays and to be able to successfully tackle the most complex math problems, you have to have a strong, sturdy, healthy body to support the workings of your brain, your eyes, and your hands.  You have to have mastered and internalized the foundational rules of grammar, spelling, handwriting, and arithmetic so that they are securely  organizing and supporting your thought processes.  Without them, you can't easily solve problems, and you can't really fully formulate or express your ideas.

In order to make the most of his education and to function within both the academic world and the world outside, the child must have the basic rules of arithmetic solidly internalized and instantly accessible to him.  He should know his multiplication tables backwards and forwards, be able to add and subtract small numbers without a pencil and paper, do long division, add, subtract, multiply, and divide fractions, understand decimals, and be able to calculate percentages.  He should know how many feet are in a mile and how many ounces are in a quart.  Ideally the child should be as comfortable with metric measurements as well as Imperial.

If the child's school does not drill in the basics, like addition, subtraction, division, multiplication, fractions, decimals, spelling, punctuation, grammar, and handwriting, you'll either have to do it yourself or get the PTA to insist that the curriculum be revamped.  These skills are vitally important, no matter what the current educational philosophy dictates, and don't let anyone tell you anything different.  They discipline and organize the mind. They arm the child with the principles and rules he needs to rely on for knowing how to spell, write grammatically correct sentences, and for being sure that his numbers will always do what he tells them to do.

  The rules for grammar, spelling, punctuation and arithmetical computation are the building blocks for learning. If the child does not have the basics, combined with legible, rapid penmanship, {which also has its own rules that should be learned} solidly in place, his ability to understand higher level concepts, think critically, manipulate numbers reliably, and to fully express his ideas in writing will be severely diminished.  Disciplined, organized, logical work can only come from a disciplined, organized, logically trained mind.

There are so many articles flying around the web these days about handwriting.  Some people advocate for it to be dropped  completely from the educational curriculum and others insist that it still matters.

I am solidly in the latter camp.  I still use handwriting every single day of my life, and most people do too.  Today, for instance, I had half a dozen telephone conversations and took notes while I spoke during all of them, jotting down addresses, telephone numbers, dates of birth, license numbers, etc.  

Handwriting is essential to humans who live in a civilized world.  A child who cannot write down his thoughts, organize his work on the page, or express himself fluently in writing is at a serious disadvantage at school.  Handwriting trains the brain and is essential to developing hand-eye coordination.  Make sure your child has legible handwriting.  If your school does not teach it, buy the materials to do it at home, or hire a handwriting specialist to help you. 

Read to your child regularly.

See that your child knows how to use the library.

Teach your child how to tie his shoes and to tell time on an analog clock.

Homework:  frankly, I'm not a fan of homework.  From what I see at the clinic, there is far too much of it, and a lot of it is just busywork.  I was thrilled to hear that a very prestigious, very rigorous, very expensive prep school in New York had made it a policy to reduce homework for the lower grades.  

If your child has difficulty focusing, make sure that his homework time is preceded by vigorous exercise outdoors, a big drink of water, and a protein rich snack.  Break up the time into small, manageable segments and give him a quick movement break in between each one. 

 If your child has a hard time doing his homework by himself, by all means have him sit at the kitchen table and work while you are cooking dinner.  

More detailed suggestions about structuring homework here.

Not academic, but worthwhile:

Help your child find a hobby or pastime that involves solving problems, like woodworking, knitting, crochet, sewing, cooking, putting together wooden models, etc.

Send the child to camp in the summer where he will learn outdoor survival skills like swimming, hiking, building a fire, cooking over an open flame,  paddling a kayak or a canoe, archery,  setting up and tearing down a tent, tying knots, and foraging.

Give your child plenty of opportunities to prove to himself that he is smart, strong, flexible, and capable, by challenging him, keeping him active, providing him with problems to solve, not automatically removing every obstacle from his path, giving him responsibilities, and setting high standards.

How to Achieve Planned Obsolesence

My job as a therapist  and a teacher is to make myself obsolete, and so is a parent's.  We know we have succeeded when those who have depended on us for guidance, support, and help no longer need us, because we have provided them with the tools to be able to manage without us.


If you are a habitual reader of  advice columns, you have undoubtedly come across the same letter over and over again: aging parents whose children are still dependent on them long after they should have left the nest, draining them of their money, energy, and privacy. When I read those letters, I always wonder what the parents did to make their children so helpless. I suppose it's some combination of  overprotecting them and neglecting them.


It's a bittersweet reality that parents should start planning, from the moment the child is born, for the day that their child no longer needs them, and doing their best to make sure that it comes.


In order to survive and thrive in the world as a mature, responsible adult, a child has to develop sufficient inner resources to be able to handle himself at school and in the workplace, nurture his relationships, manage his money, and make sound choices about what he chooses to eat and drink and how he spends his leisure time.  This requires the adults to perform a constant balancing act between wanting to protect their child from pain, disappointment, and failure, and allowing the child to learn from his experience.


Some suggestions for helping a child become strong, self sufficient, and resilient:

Minimize the use of the stroller and let the child walk, or carry him on your hip.  Strollers promote passivity and isolation, and don't allow the child to develop trunk stability, dynamic balance, and head righting.  These are the essential physical underpinnings for vision, attention and learning.  Carrying a child on your hip allows you to talk to him while you carry him.  These conversations are crucial for the development of receptive and expressive language and social interaction skills. Put away your cell phone when you are with him and give him your undivided attention.

Never imprison a child in a playpen.  Playpens prevent children from developing and maturing their nervous systems and their intellects through movement and exploration.  Movement is the means by which a child develops his understanding about the world.  If a child is prevented from moving, he is also prevented from developing his ability to learn.

Always assume that your child is operating from a position of strength.  I can't tell you how many times I have started working with a child whom I privately thought was so impaired that I couldn't be of much assistance, only to be proven, yet again, that when it comes to young humans and their remarkable capacity for growth and change, no one can predict a thing.  Children possess resilience, intelligence, and energy in limitless abundance.  They are programmed in their DNA to achieve, and most of them will do whatever it takes, as long as they are not prevented from doing so, to drive their development forward.  When the adults work from this understanding, miracles happen.  Truly, there is nothing more motivating to a child than to be in the presence of a respected adult who sees greatness in him and demands it of him.

{If your child seems poorly motivated, he might benefit from occupational therapy  -- sensory integration therapists are specially trained to tap into a child's inner drive.}

Teach your child how to tolerate frustration.  Try not to step in every time a child gets frustrated or upset when he can't do something or can't manage his emotions.  Intervene only when absolutely necessary.  Be empathic and supportive, but encourage the child to solve his own problems. Being able self regulate and to struggle and stick with difficult tasks until they are mastered are essential life skills.   Without them, your child's chances of succeeding at school and work, and in his relationships, are compromised.  The most successful people are the ones whose temperaments allow them stay cool under pressure and to welcome a challenge.

Let your child fail.  This is hard, but necessary.  We all have to learn to cope with failure and to understand the limits of our abilities.  The late novelist Laurie Colwin wrote that in order to know true rapture, one must first earn it by having also experienced its opposite.  Failure and disappointment is an inevitable part of life. The child should know how to cope with it, and then be able to move on and look forward to, and appreciate, better times.

Don't micromanage the child's social interactions.  If you constantly intervene before he has a chance to work things out for himself, he won't be able to advocate for himself when you're not around.  Let children argue, lose their tempers with each other, call each other names, fight over toys, and vie with each other for dominance.  Stay out of it unless they ask you to mediate, and then help them come to consensus. Otherwise, restrain yourself from interfering unless you see that someone is about to get hurt or there is obvious bullying.

 Don't enable irresponsible behavior.  If your child doesn't do his homework, or forgets his lunch or his schoolbooks, let him sweat it out.  He'll have to deal with the consequences and will know better next time.

 Let him handle his own problems at school. Unless your child is being bullied or has an obviously incompetent teacher, or specifically asks for your help, let him manage his own affairs.  If he was assigned a bad grade, chances are he deserved it.  Instead of harassing his teacher to change his grade, help him come up with strategies to improve his performance.

Don't remove every obstacle from his path.  If you do, he won't be able to manage on his own. The more you can teach a child how to handle adversity, the stronger, more resilient, and better equipped he will be to face life's inevitable stumbling blocks.

Strictly limit recreational screen time.  A couple of hours on the weekend for TV and computer use is plenty.   Children should not be spending much time in front of screens.   Reading, making crafts, helping prepare meals and doing chores, playing games that promote eye hand coordination and improve social interaction skills, or riding a bicycle and playing outside with friends, are infinitely preferable to passively staring at a television or computer.

Have dinner together as a family. Ask the child about his day, and guide him to his own solutions for issues that come up at school and in his social life.

Assign chores and responsibilities so that your child understands about work, running a household, and what it means to have others depend on his contribution.

Teach your child how to manage his money.   It's never too early to learn to save, budget, and to think of others who are less fortunate.


Teach your child how to cook.  What better life skill could a young adult have than to be able to prepare healthy food for himself?  And who doesn't love a good cook?  This is an especially good strategy for picky eaters, who are more likely to eat food that they have helped prepare.

Next week I will outline some strategies and suggestions for academic achievement.