By Wendy Harron - July 2, 2012
Self awareness impacts so much of our daily life. Awareness of where we are in space has a huge impact on safety. Awareness of other people around us impacts development of our social skills. Awareness of how we maintain our body impacts development of self care skills.
One of the skills that I have seen and gotten positive feedback from parents on while their children are involved in IM is the development of awareness. They have noted that their child is more observant, and less impulsive. When impulsivity decreases, it allows awareness to flourish. I had a 7 year old little boy with ADHD who was crashing into other children in the line at school. By the end of our sessions, his teacher had noticed that she did not need to redirect him when they were moving from class to class in the line nearly as often. Another 9 year old girl is now more aware and interested in keeping herself clean, dressed nicely and well groomed. An 8 year old boy with autism became aware of other people in his surroundings and made a friend.
When your children work with an IM trainer, one of the things they work on is learning how to pace themselves. Many children’s timing is way too fast. They try to anticipate to the point of just throwing themselves over the edge. It is wonderful to watch them learn how to slow themselves down, hesitate, pause – all things they had never done before, but that are useful in everyday life! They are sometimes very unaware of things around them – they bump into people, trip over things in their environment, come in disheveled and with very few friends. If this sounds like your child, you may want them to be evaluated for Interactive Metronome!