Autism
ADD & ADHD
Learning Disabilities
Auditory Processing
Dyslexia
Dyspraxia
Aspergers
Communication Disorder
Developmental Delay
During our early development, the foundation for how we will function in our daily life emerges. How we will function as we develop depends on such functions as learning to move, learning to co-ordinate and understand how we move, learning how to orient our body towards e.g. the catching of a moving object, learning how to maintain one’s balance, learning how to pay attention and to think about how to act or behave e.g. in social situations and learning to be aware of our reactions and emotions and move or act appropriately in accordance with what we feel.
All of these have an influence on each other - to think, to act, to sense and to feel – and how we learn to function in the outer world beyond ourselves.
The Feldenkrais Method® assists in a child’s process of learning to move and learning how to pay attention to him/herself by teaching the child to move easily as part of the process of life-long learning.
In Feldenkrais lessons, the focus is often on early developmental movement patterns, as the first years of life are a platform for the development of voluntary movement patterns. Voluntary movement is when movement becomes easy and effortless and when we can think, act and move at will. This allows us to more easily develop skills such as visual-spatial skills (where am I in relation to an object?), visual-motor skills (how easily can I learn to write or teach myself to climb a tree?), and the perceptual and sensory-motor systems (does it feel easy to jump or hop or skip or does it feel hard so I won’t give it a try). When these senses are all integrated - affecting balance, co-ordination and orientation - this has a positive influence on a child’s thinking and emotional state. A child will feel successful and curious to learn more. Learning then feels good and can elicit curiosity in the child to want to explore and learn more about his or her world.
However for some children during their early life, they may experience higher-than-healthy stress levels, an injury, or an illness or some other setback (including missing out on learning how to move easily). This may trigger compensatory mechanisms necessary for survival and on-track development. Over time, such temporary solutions for moving to get about may become ingrained patterns of movement. Our bodies are designed to move efficiently, with minimum effort and maximum ease, yet in these cases a child may find he or she cannot move in this way. The earlier learning constrains development instead of assisting it. This may correspondingly affect the child’s personality (a lack of self-confidence), it may inhibit the child in their ability (an unwillingness to try new things) and it may affect the quality of how easily a child learns how to do an activity easily.
Through the Feldenkrais Method®, a lesson can provide the experience of early stages of development and tap in to our innate capacity to learn – about how we ‘act in the world’. A person (of any age) can learn to explore movement patterns that may be limiting their experience and awareness of themselves. Using combinations of gentle movements and body awareness, it is possible to create freedom from habitual movements that are no longer helpful to daily life, even in infancy or at a very young age. It may be that through such a restriction as hospitalization, a child has not been able to explore him/herself in movement. In this case, the Feldenkrais Method® can fill in the building blocks for movement when learning to move really matters.
In a lesson, through observation of how the client is moving, it is possible to match the appropriate process of learning to the needs of the child, (or teenager or adult) to assist in their self - development. What the child, (teenager or adult) may need to learn about him/herself, depends on what he/she may be having difficulty with at the time, or a limiting postural or movement habit that needs attention.
By developing awareness and noticing differences in how he/she is moving, a child can learn from comparisons (learning to feel, sense, think and act on recognizing differences) and sub-consciously ‘let go’ by connecting to what is useful and easy to do. This is vital to the process of self-development and ‘learning how to learn’.
Feldenkrais is truly movement that makes a difference, so that learning can happen easily! Movement is THE model for learning. The Feldenkrais Method® is a very specific yet subtle hands-on approach to learning that uses perception of self through the framework of the skeleton to effect changes in the brain and encourage movement maturity.
For more information, visit the following websites:
Louise Rothols is a Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner
Member Australian Feldenkrais Guild
BA Arts Monash, Grad Dip Arts,
Rhythmic Movement Training, Kinesiology Level 2
Top