ADHD, learning disabilities and brain research

 

Parents tend to treat attention and concentration skills, reading and writing, as a natural and understandable to all. Only if the child is diagnosed with attention deficit disorder, learning disabilities or hyperactivity, they examine this premise critically. Reality, however, proves that every child develops differently, and each person has a variety of skills that characterize him. One excels in sports; other in literature and history; math and language are the favorites of the third; and the fourth has a good command of communication and languages, but is weak in logical mathematical skills.

 

This variety of skills brought Professor Howard Gardner, a psychologist at Harvard University, to coin the concept of "multiple intelligences". According to Gardner's theory, every person is equipped with all the intelligences, and most people can develop each intelligence to a reasonable level of performance, if only they'll receive encouragement, support and appropriate training.

 

According to Gardner, a boy that was not born with a specially developed motor intelligence probably will not grow to be a super-athlete, but guidance and care will certainly help him to take part in ball games at school and the neighborhood, and to participate in physical education classes. This is true also for other skills, such as linguistic, logical-mathematical, visual-spatial, interpersonal communication and intra-personal communication skills.

 

According to studies, the various brain functions, like reading, writing or painting, combine the motor system and other brain systems, such as sight and hearing. According to Dr. John Ratey, a neuro-psychiatrist at Harvard University, the motor pathways are the main road through which various kinds of information stream. If there is a developmental gap, delay or failure in that system, the learning will be inevitably difficult and unnatural.

 

 

Infinity Mind's neurocognitive training Components

 

Patients coping with ADHD and hyperactivity disorder tend to struggle when it comes to transitions between different functions and different attention levels. Some of them are even dealing with a phenomenon called "over-focus of attention". They are so focused on what concerns them that they fail to notice stimuli that are at the edge of attention. Others, however, have difficulty only with attention division or restrain their impulsiveness.

 

The latest research knowledge and difficulties that characterize attention deficit disorder patients construct the basis of Infinity Mind's neuro-cognitive training, supplying a comprehensive treatment to all functional brain systems:

 

 

Improving communication between back and front areas of the brain
 

Treatment improves the connection between the motor areas, the visual areas and areas responsible for higher cognitive functioning of the brain. As noted by Dr. Ratey, the motor pathways are the main road of the brain, used by different types of information. For this reason the sensomotoric training patterns are an integral part of the neuro-cognitive training.

 

 

Development of attention and concentration Skills, while maintaining sensomotoric pattern.
 

During the training the level of attention tasks required is increased and emphasis is placed on the distribution of attention, quickly switch between different functions, multi-tasking, focus of attention on one element out of two, visual attention, auditory attention and kinesthetic attention (attention that raises awareness of the body). The practice increases the functional flexibility and the intellectual flexibly alike.

 

Sensomotoric, attentional and cognitive training combined

As the treatment progresses, thinking skills practice is introduced, such as sequential thinking, visual memory, auditory memory, working memory, direction perception, phonological processing, spatial perception, logical mathematical conception, organization and order, and other higher order thinking skills. Thanks to the fact that the patient had already acquired a certain degree of mobility, sensory and attentional skills, he manages to preserve them, in spite of the strenuous thinking he is required to do.

 

Interpersonal communication - behavioral changes

Young patients have a tendency to absorb a lot of their surroundings. If they feel parents, teachers and other children think they are not good kids it's very easy for them to adopt this point of view and grow with it.

 

We, at Infinity Mind, do not teach communication but we are working on components that allow the patient to develop good communication with himself and his environment. Self-awareness and communication Skills are based on regulation and control capabilities, the ability to restrain impulsiveness, to remember the events of the past and to learn from them. When children with learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder enhance these capabilities, their communication skills improve too.

 

Treatment's results

 

Hyperactive children, coping with ADHD tend to express their feelings, thoughts and frustrations by actions, such as shouting, temper tantrum or other aggressive actions. Non-violent child, with ADHD, investing a lot of effort to listen to the teacher, may respond by pushing or screaming to stimuli which interrupt his concentration. Why is he doing this? Not because he is violent or bad, but simply because he has self-regulation difficulties. The correct way to adapt the child to respond as he knows he has to respond is not by talking or explanations, but through the development of neurological vital infrastructure for learning. Only the infrastructure can reduce the immense effort he is required to spend to get the necessary attention and concentration, and allow him to respond proportionately to stimuli that interrupt him. It will also endow him with a functional flexibility: Now he is able to focus attention and move from one thing to another without losing attention on the way.

 

 

Infinity Mind's neuro-cognitive therapy yields a number of most significant changes:

 

• The patient becomes more concentrated, and develops a better regulation ability and an improved memory

• As the treatment goes along, the patient's reading speed, comprehension and memory improve, and the necessary efforts diminish. Thus the patient is approaching the so-called "natural and flowing learning".

• The daily and systematic work process on the neurological infrastructure of Learning makes the patient feel that what was very difficult before becomes a little easier now. As a result, his motivation to deal with the difficulties still facing him strengthens.

• A good therapy does not aim to lead the patient to improve his skills. Rather it aims to lead him to penetrate his inner beliefs and modify them. In other words, a good treatment strengthens the patient's belief in his power to change his life. This peak is not always within reach during treatment, but one must always strive to change the patient's system of beliefs about himself. Michael Jordan once said: "everyone can fly. Some of them fly higher, that's all". His statement could be used as a key to reflect on life.

 

 

Who is the training for?

 

Infinity Mind's neuro-cognitive attention and learning disabilities training is suitable as a developmental preparation for young children's learning (age 5) and students in elementary, high school, colleges and universities. Treatment addresses the entire spectrum of learning disabilities or attention disorders and supports rehabilitation after traumatic brain injury:

 

• Dyslexia : Reading Difficulties

• Dysgraphia: Writing Difficulties

• General organization skills

• Tension Management: Exams anxiety and studying anxiety

• Dyspraxia: Developmental coordination disorder        

• Dyscalculia: Mathematics difficulties

• Memory training: short-term and long-term memory

• ADHD

• Spatial orientation

• Time organization

• Improving memory functions in adults, over the age of 40

• Improving conditions resulting from trauma and brain damage
   

 

Treatment is particular and tailored to the patient's individual needs.