Anna is "moving" developmentally in response to some new elements I've been adding to her Son-Rise® Program, some that I invented, some drawn from the Anat Baniel Method® Neuromovement® (ABMN) approach (I became an ABMN practitioner in May 2017). While actual ABMN requires someone who has been through the training to do physically with someone or directing them physically, lots of elements are about thinking and general awareness (what they call "being present" in the Son-Rise Program) can be incorporated into working with autistic kids or adults by anyone as play therapy goals that require no touch or special touch, which ABM does of course. (See earlier posts where I mentioned teaching body position awareness, balance, and my teaching my child how to brush and wash her hair, for other examples.)
INCREASING SHORT-TERM MEMORY
In a past video I mentioned how I theorized from the data that autistic people have as a cause, result or co-occurring sub-normal short-term memory ability, and have been creating opportunities for my child to use her short term memory in a context where she would be motivated to do so. BTW I've decide to coin a term for this formerly elusive but now to me obvious phenomenon that I've never heard anyone before describe or address, for now, "Autistic Short-Term Memory Deficit" or "ASTMD".
Today's session 06-29-17
For example, drawn from my insight around a year ago that curriculum can/ should come her learning to do everything I do for her, I started working on my child remembering phone numbers as I look for commercial real estate space for my office for ABMN and Option Process® Mentoring. I'm teaching her exactly what I do, which is to repeat the number I see on a sign as I drive past it until I can pull over to write it down or make the initial call (for example at the next light). I remember doing an exercise at the Option Institute's (home of the Son-Rise Program) week long adult programs that involved using our short term memories for an extended period and noticed an improvement in my short term memory that to this day is an asset I can use, an obvious demonstration of neuroplasticity of the adult brain, and that practicing using it would improve this ability. My child gets rewarded with buying whatever she wants with the money, usually toys but sometimes organizational containers, books, etc. for her toys, trading cards, etc.
Also you can see her interrupt me several times while I'm in mid-sentence, which I believe is a combination of lack of awareness that I'm talking and inability to remember (or belief that she will not or cannot remember) long enough to share it after I finish. I'm working on asking her to hold her thought, then say it later, but still refining the goal. I'm thinking now I can have her hold her thought, count to 2, then say it, then increase the counts over time. I still celebrate the urge to share which is an interactive gesture, which is a Son-Rise core technique.
USING ADULT DOT-TO-DOT BOOKS TO TEACH THE MOST FUNDAMENTAL MATH SKILLS
My daughter is still struggling with the most fundamental math skills, and I have to in the end teach them to her because despite people best intentions, all the math she's done so far still doesn't stick or allow her to do most of the most basic things because people don't "get" what's going on autistically, but I do. She never learned incrementing, decrementing and comparison, which is what's doing on in a computer CPU and what's beneath everything we learn mathematically. It's too big a topic to cover here but counting this was is the product of regular and ordered movement done in a consistent way which my child never did, and requires a map of a continuous, regularly stepping number line in her mind's eye. I have taught her regular stepwise counting on her hands involving regular "pumping" of her arm accompanied by lifting a single finger as she counts (using ABMN skills of observation), bought several meter sticks which I use whenever I need her to picture adding or subtracting as moving up or down the meter stick for a visual, and finally, using dot-to-dot books to teach her how to increment, and now how to decrement. In this video you can see how effective these books are because they're fun and the skill is learned while the child is having fun. Making learning fun is a core Son-Rise goal, and I'm always mining what my child loves to do - such as doing dot-to-dots - for what can be learned from them, where in society any piece of any activity she likes can have value and she can make a living with it, and I develop activities with those "motivators" in that direction.
ABMN ELEMENTS
Noticing Distinctions
Anat Baniel, creator of ABMN, always says that a noticing distinctions is THE stuff of learning, so whenever I can offer my child opportunities to notice and expand on observation of distinctions between things I do so. If we're looking at two houses out of the window I start noticing and pointing out distinctions and ask her to notice and name differences too and celebrate as she does, in keeping with the Son-Rise goal to reward flexibility (the child doing what you ask for, mostly). When my child recently started replacing her My Little Pony Ty Beanie Babies with the "sparkle hair" versions, I immediately saw an opportunity to compare then, and offer her $5 to list at least 10 differences between old and new ones. She has to be present and use her "outer sensory loop" (see my prior post about autistic "inner memory loop" over "outer sensory loop") throughout the activity and sees finer distinctions within the whole, thus creating mental refinement as well, that can generalize to other activities such as math or more subtle language.
Anna has come such a long way! This was the child that used to run in the street to see me get upset, and here we were surrounded by something like 6 different roads including 4-lane highway feeder roads, on this little island, and I realized I was trusting her not to do something crazy like that - trusting her with her life! She had found the world made sense and she wanted to be in it, and that I could laugh and she could get the reactions she wanted from me reliably doing other things, now. Her brother, looking like a like secret service agent, is there too, as we walked back from downtown Milwaukee, taking our first ever spontaneous bus adventure trip, which was pretty impressive how cool she was too.
First Homework
Anna's FIRST HOMEWORK EVER happened in the assignment of this activity, and by "homework" I mean assigned thinking work done when she was on her own. She will sometimes vacuum or clean things on her own, but NEVER done assigned "thinking" work on her own before. She had this activity twice before with two other prior ponies she upgraded so I thought this was a pattern she could feel confident doing on her own. I set up the activity in one of our life curriculum books and asked her to go ahead and do the contrast while I was out. After suggesting this sort of "on-your own" activity before - again, that I have done almost every time I've ever left the house, so at this point hundreds or thousands of times - AMAZINGLY she did!! She didn't get all the way to 10 elements but had listed something like 3-5 additional elements, after my first 1-2 examples I had gone through with her before leaving. She was eager to show me several times when I returned that night, which I celebrated with her (substantially inwardly as Anat recommends, which percolates through to positive attitude, which is what Son-Rise advocates, although with some outward praise in keeping with Son-Rise).
Don't force - be easy with the child's timeline
Note that she did this first homework when she felt sufficiently comfortable with the pattern of activity expected and confidence in her ability that it demanded. This is similar to Son-Rise and ABMN totally accepting the child's timeline and not forcing it; we offer opportunities but not punishment if they are not ready, without judging that timeline. Anat always says the brain is a quantum system and that as long as there is any change, that's all that matters, no matter how small. Every outward change in behavior reflects a change in the brain, and we never know whether the small change is the first, middle or last snowflake to a dramatic quantum shift. So have faith that the step the child just took is necessary on their path to recovery from autism and don't believe you can force the speed to increase. A core ABMN principle (see 9 essentials from any of Anat's books) is doing things "slow", which means the slowest speed that system can see the distinctions, and when the child feels they can go at their slowest necessary speed that's when greater learning happens.
Don't strain newly acquired abilities or connections in the brain
In keeping with ABMN, I didn't ask her to "finish" the activity, although I would been tempted to - seeing that she is so close to her goal - prior to getting the ABMN training. Forcing someone to keep going when they have had an initial success, Anat says, may destroy or limit the progress that day or in the future. Instead I celebrated my daughter's success and let her feel good about it and leave the next step until the next day, facilitating her to integrate it into long-term memory.
ABMN's "Slow" concept helps us work on the Son-Rise Goal of sensing & articulating the desire for breaks
Incidentally, our Stage 3 Son-Rise Developmental Model goal "appropriately communicates when she wants to change or stop an activity" - probably not accidentally the only one from stage 3 we didn't complete. I'm finding lots of opportunities to work on with her in implementing her desire to take breaks to integrate her new learnings. Anat teaches us not to force someone to learn or do something they are just learning past where they naturally want to stop after initial success, anyway. It's only after they have been successful, let it drop, and return when they're ready, that the ease and pleasure around mastery really takes root, and she suggests "drilling" is less effective than the "declare victory and leave the field" approach. Forcing continuation of something when they feel done makes it feel unpleasant and a person's brain wants to avoid it, and this will make the person NOT keep that route, due to the unpleasant outcome, I'm guessing.
One of our longer-term Son-Rise program participants, Brandi, at her yoga studio "Zen Gen" grand opening with Anna. She had participated since 2014 while in business school to accomplish this goal and will only be an alternate now. She's one of 3 yoga instructors we have had in our program, since many principles of yoga are well suited to Son-Rise. I just offered her to write up a post on how yoga and Son-Rise mesh and I will post all or parts in a separate post, in exchange for publishing more links and info for her business, which would be a win-win.
ABOUT ME
Skills for sale!
I continue to use both systems of thought to help myself now with my own high functioning autism. I'm setting up a practice to do Anat Baniel Method Neuromovement Lessons and Option Process Dialogue sessions in person in Milwaukee WI, and am finalizing customizing an online scheduling web app that will allow me to do phone sessions as well as be at platform for other Option Process Mentors to be open to getting sessions through the Power of Clarity® LLC, which is my new company name under which I offer both services (ABMN and Option Process). I will post about it once it's open for registration.
Son-Rise + Anat Baniel Method Neuromovement: Invaluable, possibly necessary for full recovery from Autism
Option Institute / Son-Rise training, classes and "Option Process Dialogues" helped me choose and have more conscious control over my emotional reactions to things which used to overwhelm and stop me as an autistic person before, and have the "why not?" attitude toward going for what I wanted as well as determination to persist at it. However ABMN training allowed me to see challenges, which used to always look like mountains, rapidly and effortlessly crumble into doable pieces that make momentum toward whatever I'm doing increase. Both were and are invaluable to my recovery from autism which is nearly complete. I am just trying to share what I know before I decide to move forward, so email me at [email protected] for more information or call 800-800-0321 between 9:30am-9:30pm central time (US) to discuss; leave a message if I am unable to answer.
CONCLUSION
Good luck using these techniques at home. The Son-Rise® Program and the Anat Baniel Method® Neuromovement® are the best things I've found to help with people of any age with autism improve dramatically and lastingly, including myself!
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