Q & A
(√) Was WTM tested?
Yes.
For 13 years, Catherine Rosasco-Mitchell and help from a team of professionals rigorously tested and refined lessons in 4 different kinds of elementary schools with hundreds of children. (Kohala Elementary, 2008 to 2016; Parker Elementary School, 2010; and Hawaii Preparatory Academy’s lower school, 2006)
(√) Does movement organization affect behavior even if a child acts normal?
Yes.
All children use movement to develop their perception, they still lack awareness of how their body organization and brain work together. Like most skills, movement organization starts with the Sensory Body (SB). All learning starts with the SB. Everything a child does, thinks, and feels involves motion and attention which are inseparable functions in the human body.
For example, desires and actions must learn to align. How, or whether they align, can impact the qualities of self-confidence and perseverance. Imagine a baby sees a bottle. Will they learn to find their way to the bottle? Initially, the baby’s the legs move, but there is no sense of how to propel forward. This fumbling stage is so valuable. The simple movements the infant makes help teach the baby where they are in space, how to negotiate between the brain and the body, and how to problem-solve a desire. All these aspects of the mind-body begin to form the self.
A child’s movement can also provide psychologists with insights into their behavior. Aspects of movement unveil insights to the biosphere of behavior, self-confidence, and character development.
As mentioned many times on this website, the WTM movement is not merely a means to achieve a motor skill; it knocks on the door to an innate intelligence trying to be learned. More importantly, the sense of the Sensory Body (SB) helps children gain tangible insights into their internal processes. The tangible feeling of the body helps them understand their inner processes. WTM complements psychotherapy with the same goal for children to make better choices between their internal processes to external actions.
For more information on how to help your school introduce the SB, refer to the program “Get Sensational Attention (GSA),” GSA teaches children through animation video program and a User Guide. To explore more about the relationship between movement and the psyche, visit the Science page. You can also find research backing how the method is used at the bottom of that page.
(√) What should I look for in children’s movement?
Look for awkwardness. Look for movement patterns. Look for movement patterns that may be challenging how the child wants to operate versus what is operating. For example, are their two eyes tracking together? Do they use only one leg when they crawl? If your child can walk, do they seem balanced on each leg when walking up or down steps?
Movements beyond exercise have patterns. We usually think of movement as exercise. However, how we move communicates to the brain in how we think. We move in accordance with the behavior of every emotion and thought. We move to find and organize balance and coordination. The results? Physical movement patterns give the brain biological tendencies for mental development.
Henry, a five-year-old boy, couldn’t listen. He would look like he was listening, then crawl under the desks. One day, he was walking up a staircase. I (Catherine Mitchell) noticed his movement was similar to that of a child with cerebral palsy. Henry would grasp the railing with every step for balance having difficulty maneuvering his feet.
In the WTM class (Part II), instead of playing on top of the mat, Henry crawls underneath the mat right at the beginning of the class and disrupt the whole class. What would a teacher need to observe in Henry? What was his body saying it wanted. Henry’s body wanted pressure to be around his lower body. Under the mat, the sense of tactile contact was helping him do that.
Movement behavior is a clue to how to help a child’s brain. Henry needed to feel where his lower body was in space. Each class, Henry would run into the classroom and lie down under the mat. His sense of organization from his lower body to his upper body was not happening.
In the following weeks, he put his feet within reach of me. The functional actions of his movement patterns are awkward from his feet and his torso. For the next six weeks (a few minutes a week), movements were designed to stimulate actions from his feet to his lower body and into his torso. (See find Feldenkrais® Practitioner, because with cognitive disorders, you need professional eyes to see what needs to be done.)
Once Henry’s nervous system senses the dysfunctional patterns of action, it begins to reeducate them. That awkward movement pattern is tied to his cognitive disorder. When his body integrated (meaning it became graceful from his feet to his spine), within 48 hours, his character totally changed. We saw this time frame of shifts with every cognitively challenged child.
With Henry, he surprisingly started talking for the first time. Not only did he talk, but he also shared some traumas he experienced in school. He could also follow one direction at a time. (Full disclosure, Henry was never put on any medication for his condition to our knowledge.)
The takeaway from this section is to help adults view children’s misbehavior as more than just being “bad.” Here’s information about the Feldenkrais® work or the Science behind the body-brain. We are asked many times if there is research. If You Want More, look at the bottom of the science page for the references. Researchers worldwide are identifying correlations between motion and the cognitive sciences. Also see the WTM strategies talk given at an international movement and cognition conference (2018). The talk is a more in-depth study of methods for influencing cognitive behavior through motion.
(√) What do you mean by the “biomechanics behind psychology?”
Biomechanics behind psychology is the awareness of what scientists may call “proprioception”, “body ownership”, or “neural elasticity”. Since the Industrial Revolution, there has been a “great divide” between brain and body that still shapes our education and healthcare systems today. Although scientists around the world recognize that there is a foundational, integrative unity between motion and cognitive development, the community is still unaware of it. It is up to our educational systems, specifically administrators, to introduce these concepts.
How can movement change the demeanor of a child? What effects does motion have on mental disorders such as attention deficit? The science behind the biomechanics of psychology deserves serious attention. Today (2025), more than ever, we are seeing skyrocketing examples of people not knowing the difference between what they do and what they think they are doing. Is it technology? Is it the way children are raised? We need to be the bridge builders between research, classrooms, and communities. The “bridge” is made of the heart—more specifically, the heart of consciousness in the Sensory Body.
When the word “mind” is used in the English language, we think of thoughts. When the term “body” is used, we typically think of the physical structure of bones, flesh, and organs. The Biomechanics of Psychology is neither and both. If you bring awareness to the body and mind together, something very valuable happens.
The gravitational field, motion, speed, and timing in an action tie together emotions, sensing, feelings, and actions through sensation. These impressions of sensations become conversations of movement. If the movement repeats, it becomes a rote pattern.
When the word “awareness” is used in this context, it means the experience of sensory knowledge. Sensory knowledge, or the Sensory Body (SB), is sensations, actions, and organization of motion married to the brain as one. Only “experience” teaches the SB because it’s a feeling, not a thought.
Teaching children is much simpler than teaching an adult; this is why it is so vital that you are reading this article. Here’s some help you can start to do: the Personal Bubbles Freeze Dance game. If you are doing school counseling, it is highly recommended that you use the game in the program (Get Sensational Attention) with your school. The program is free and online here.