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WHICH IS WHICH and FOR WHAT?

This month I will be briefly introducing to you the different therapies available, specifically the ones that work hand-in-hand with play therapy.

I understand how overwhelming it can be to have your child attend one type, let alone two. Just remember the specialities are different and different techniques and mediums are used. Therefore each therapy addresses a different need and therefore seeing the child as a whole.

Play Therapy: Play is the child‰Ûªs natural way of communication and a medium by which to sort out his world and make sense of it. While playing, the child can project his situation, express his feelings and bring it to the surface where he can acknowledge, experience and master it. Children who benefit from play therapy:

• Children who need to adapt to change in their situation, like moving to a new house, going to a new school, divorce of parents or receiving a sibling.
• Children who have trouble handling a traumatic experience.
• Children with unresolved grief after the loss of a family member, friend or pet.
• Children who have trouble making friends, who are shy and withdrawn in group situations.
• Children experiencing anxiety and stress.
• Children being the victim of being bullied or the bully themselves.
• Children with aggressive or disagreeable behaviour.
• Children, who bite their nails, suck their thumbs or wet or soil their beds or clothing.
• Children with psychosomatic symptoms (stomach-aches or headaches without a medical reason).
• Abused or molested children.
• Hyperactive children.

Occupational Therapy: Occupational Therapists use scientifically chosen meaningful activities to assist diverse clients with a range of problems to maximise their functioning. This empowers them to be as independent as possible and to experience dignity and quality of life at work, at home and at play. (OT Council, 2001)

Children who benefit from occupational therapy:

• Children whose development is behind, eg. not reaching milestones within reasonable time.
• Children whose gross motor co-ordination is weak ‰ÛÒ they may find it difficult to do simple activities, like buttoning a coat, cutting or their hand writing may be untidy or slow.
• Children who have sensory or concentration issues ‰ÛÒ these children may appear fussy or find it difficult to focus.
• Children with poor visual perceptual skills have, for example, difficulty with reading, spelling or mathematics and often reverse letters.

Speech Therapy: Speech Therapists assess, diagnose and treat communication related disorders. Specialized tests are used to diagnose the nature and extent of impairment and to record and analyse speech, language and auditory perception problems. All impairments are addressed through development of an individualised treatment plan, tailored to each child‰Ûªs needs. Children with the following problems may benefit from speech therapy:

• Delayed receptive and expressive language development. These children may exhibit inadequate development of vocabulary and grammar required to express and understand thoughts and ideas. Older children may have difficulty in understanding written language and communicating what they have learned.
• Auditory perception problems and inadequate listening skills. These children may have problems in following age appropriate instructions and learning to read and spell.
• Articulation and phonological process disorders. Children with these problems may replace or omit sounds in their speech resulting in poor intelligibility.
• Stuttering is characterised by the inability to produce words fluently. This may include sound, syllable or word repetitions, pauses and sound prolongations.

Neurotherapy: Neurotherapy is biofeedback for the brain. Brainwaves can be monitored by placing sensors on the scalp, which registers the electrical signals happening inside the brain. Brainwaves carry messages to and from all parts of the body through the nervous system. During Neurotherapy nothing is put into the brain, the sensors merely monitor the brain‰Ûªs activity and the client is then given visual and auditory feedback with specially designed computer programs. Children and adults who experience the following will benefit from Neurotherapy:

• ADD/ADHD
• Depression
• Anxiety Disorders
• Anger and Rage
• Traumatic Brain Injury, Stroke
• Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
• Reactive Attachment Disorder
• Learning Disabilities
• Bipolar Disorder
• Panic Attacks
• Sleep Disorders
• Migraines and Headaches

Herewith a more in-depth look into Neurotherapy:

I hope you find this informative.

The beginning of the year! How have you all managed?

Still uncertain about some things: roster, subjects, extra-mural activities, stationery, uniform, parent‰Ûªs evenings‰Û_ (I suppose very much like the headless chicken running around as in the previous newsletter).

How have the children managed?

Apprehensive, excited, teary, clingy, confident, insecure, nervous, happy‰Û_?

If you are the parent of the child that cries and screams when being dropped off at school and is being torn (‰ÛÏtaken away‰Û) from you. You probably feel like a terrible mom or dad that is leaving your crying and insecure child in someone-else‰Ûªs care. You don‰Ûªt know whether to stay or go or say one more last good-bye.

You can see it coming when you notice the posters on the door that say: ‰ÛÏto avoid the tears, say your cheers‰Û or ‰ÛÏkeep it brief, say goodbye, so they don‰Ûªt cry‰Û. And you put on your brave face and tone of voice and hopefully show no signs of weakness, but as you draw nearer and have to let go- the water starts running and the vice starts getting tighter and the waterfall and wailer begin. The teacher rips the Velcro child apart from its‰Ûª mother; its‰Ûª sustenance, its‰Ûª host. You are waved by the teacher to go, like shooing a fly.

You walk away feeling embarrassed, flustered, salty from tears, hair gone through a whirlwind and torn inside for leaving your child in a new setting that is familiar but portrayed (from the screams) as horrible or dangerous and ‰ÛÏwhy mommy are you leaving me here?‰Û

Whereas, if you are the parent with the child that is confident, happy and excited about going to school, the child gets to school, runs off as soon as seeing his friends, forgetting to say goodbye. Some parents may feel ignored, as if their child does not love them enough to say goodbye. But don‰Ûªt! You may safely feel at ease and can rush off to work without feeling heavy hearted. You should pretty much feel like your day can go smoothly from there on. Oh what the hell, you might even win the lotto).

Here are just a few tips to avoid or prevent any further waterfalls and deathly screams:

• Assess your child‰Ûªs personality, how he likes things done. Go along with it, within certain boundaries.
• Don‰Ûªt YOU be in too much of a rush yourself, make sure there is enough time to get dressed, have breakfast, so the ride to school and drop off isn‰Ûªt literally a ‰ÛÏdrop-off‰Û.
• Prepare the school bag and set out the clothing the night before.
• Don‰Ûªt show signs of weakness or insecurity. Be confident and loving in the way you say good-bye.
• Empower your child; make him feel good about himself.
• Draw a little something on his hand, or write a short note and place it in his pocket that he can read through the day, spray a touch of your perfume or cologne on him to smell whenever he needs to think of you to get through the day.
• If it persists for over two weeks, it has led to manipulation then you should look into dealing with the issues, be it at home or school.

Good-luck! It will soon go smoothly.

How many of us keep our New Year’s resolution, or even bother making one, for fear of not accomplishing it.

Why not break the New Year up into days and take it “one day at a time”. You can make a goal of what you want to achieve, but it is HOW you get there that is important.

Don’t run around stressed, like a headless chicken, rushing about.

Don’t run around in panic, losing yourself along the way, like a lizard losing its tail.

Or if you haven’t attained the goal, hiding your head in shame, like an ostrich with it’s head in the ground.

Let’s look at it from another perspective and assess the above as: don’t stress, don’t panic and don’t be too hard on yourself! Be an Elephant!

If you were an elephant, you would plan your tasks well and would save yourself the stress which in turn would exude calm from within yourself and calm within the home. Your child wouldn’t be so angry, he would listen more and you would shout less. You would find the time for yourself and for him. And when he misbehaves, you there to guide him the right way, with still a loving hug at the end of the day.

So take each step this year firmly with caution, precision and calm, because your calf is watching you and learning your every move.

In my line of work, fantasy and imaginative play forms a vital part in the child‰Ûªs social and emotional development, helping the child to resolve issues. When a child is in a state of anxiety, fear or sadness they will create a fantasy in order to get through it.

Christmas holidays are a very exciting time for a child. The opening of presents; going on holiday; family traditions and of course seeing Santa Claus.

Try to keep the imagination flowing, especially between the ages 3 and 6. Imagination will bring on the creativity of the child which can benefit the child academically as well. This in turn allows the child to ‰ÛÏexperience‰Û or visualise different alternatives to a problem situation. For example, by experiencing or trying out different methods to get to a result to a maths problem or resolving a social conflict. Broadening the child‰Ûªs creative side or make-belief allows them to experience more results or successes in their life.

Let them make-believe in Santa Claus.

For children aged between 7 and 9 years of age, their cognitive processes become more abstract and realistic. This is when scepticism creeps in and they start to realise that Santa Claus isn‰Ûªt real. However, children of this age still remain engaged in the fantasy world and imagination by using dancing, acting or playing out different scenarios.

When the child heads towards their teenage years fantasy and imagination plays a lesser role in their lives. Their creative abilities are still expressed through art, poems, songs or acting. It is still important to remember that a teenager does need a bit of an escape into the fantasy world from their stressful day, i.e.: reading a book, watching a movie, writing a diary or a poem, listening to music.

A common question asked: When do I tell my child that Santa Claus isn‰Ûªt real?

Well, although the above was promoting the fantasy and imagination, we as parents also need to help the child to be able to distinguish between reality and fantasy. So there comes a time where ‰ÛÏpretending‰Û is ok as long as the child still understands that what is done in the pretend world may not necessarily be able to be done in the real world.

When faced with the question, try and get a sense of whether the child wants reassurance or the truth; obviously looking at the age of the child. Ultimately, what you tell your child depends on your belief system, traditions and values.

It is not all that bad for us adults to take in mind that we too need to ‰ÛÏescape‰Û from the real world to help us manage our stressful lives.

Happy Holidays! Meet up again in the New Year.

Tip: Parents try and encourage the idea that these holidays are a time for giving and we can all get involved by learning to give to others who have less.

That it‰Ûªs not only Santa who gives, but us too!

The end of the year is not easy for both the parent or the child.

Both the child and parent stress about the end of year exams. Concern for parents over whether their offspring are studying correctly or enough or even retaining the crucial information to enable them to pass the looming exams.

I thought I could provide a few tips to assist the parents and kids with exam preparations:

Firstly, parents need to be calm. Set a calming environment helps children to focus on studying and keeps their anxiety to a minimum.

Secondly, drawing up and keeping to a schedule will help children and parents to spread out the workload over a manageable period of time. Check in on homework and scheduled studying on a daily basis with your child. This way if there is any missing information, it can be quickly rectified before the schedule loses momentum.

Thirdly, identify times when your child is more alert and make use of these times. It may be that mornings on weekends can be very productive. Or else your child might be able to get more during early evening. It’s a team effort for parent and child to assist in making use of the most optimum times.

Fourthly, try to assess which studying methods your child responds to best. I mention three learning methods below, with some extra resources for you to investigate.

Fifth: very important, understand and implement rest breaks for your child based on their attention span. Rest the brain and give time for a game, exercise, chores or a meal. Fuel is important, and consider rest as a refueling process.

Some other tips: If given the opportunity, try to revise with your child; get them to bed early before an exam; hydrate properly; maintain a proper diet ‰ÛÒ take some tips from Patrick Holford:

Brain Friendly Diet ‰ÛÒ Patrick Holford

The starting point for tuning up your brain is to follow an optimum nutrition diet and take daily supplements. Here are the ten golden rules to follow to make sure your diet is maximising your mental health.

• Eat wholefoods ‰ÛÒ wholegrains, lentils, beans, nuts, seeds, fresh fruit and vegetables ‰ÛÒ and avoid refined, white and overcooked foods.

• Avoid any form of sugar – in biscuits, cakes, confectionery and also foods with added sugar in the forms of syrups, dextrose and maltose.
• Eat five or more servings of fruits and vegetables.Choose dark green, leafy and root vegetables such as watercress, carrots, sweet potatoes, broccoli, Brussel sprouts, spinach, green beans or peppers, all raw or lightly cooked. Choose fresh fruit such as apples, pears, berries, plums, melon or citrus fruit. Have bananas, grapes and potatoes in moderation only (they contain a lot of natural sugar). Dilute fruit juices and only eat dried fruits infrequently in small quantities, preferably soaked.
• Eat four or more servings of wholegrains such as rice, millet, rye, oats, wholewheat, corn or quinoa as cereal, breads and pasta. 

  Combine protein foods with carbohydrate foods by eating wholegrain cereals and fruit with raw, unsalted nuts or seeds, and ensuring you eat starchy foods (potatoes, bread, pasta or rice) with protein-rich fish, lentils, beans, eggs or tofu. If eating animal protein, choose lean, white meat or preferably fish, organic whenever possible.

• Eat eggs ‰ÛÒ preferably free-range, organic and high in omega-3s. Aim for about 3-5 a week.
• Eat cold-water carnivorous fish. A serving of herring, mackerel, salmon or fresh trout two or three times a week provides a good source of omega-3 fats and protein.
• Eat raw, unsalted seeds and nuts.The best seeds are flax (or linseed), hemp, pumpkin, sunflower and sesame. You get more goodness out of them by grinding them first and sprinkling on cereal, soups and salads.
• Use cold-pressed seed oils. Choose an oil blend containing flaxseed oil or hemp oil for salad dressings and cold uses, such as drizzling on vegetables instead of butter. Don’t cook with these oils as their fats are easily damaged by heat.
• Minimise your intake of fried food, processed food and saturated fat from meat and dairy to prevent damage to brain fats.

Learning Styles:

Bear these in mind, and explore which works best for your child

• Your child may be an Auditory Learner ‰ÛÒ learning best by hearing. This learner retains most information by listening and repeating what he has heard. Tip: he may record his learning material and play back to himself. http://www.studyingstyle.com/auditory-learners.html
• åÊYour child may be a Visual Learner ‰ÛÒ processing information using images and other visual stimuli. See mind maps http://www.buzanworld.com/Mind_Maps.htm
• Your child may be a Kinesthetic Learner ‰ÛÒ liking movement and retains information best when moving around and gesticulating. Tip: this child cannot sit at a desk for long periods, so let them move around while studying in mock presentation of the topic being studied. 

Try this quiz to help determine which learning style your child falls best into: http://www.studyingstyle.com/learning-style-quiz.html

Remember that a child’s emotional, social and environmental elements have an influence on the child’s ability to learn.

Good luck to all children writing exams, and strength to all parents during these times.