The Wellness Through Movement (WTM) program was tested in the trenches of three private and two public elementary schools (2006-2014) in the Kohala communities. Kohala Elementary, our pilot school for five years, is a public school in a rural area. In addition, forty years (1987-present) of research were spent analyzing muscular-skeletal patterning in chronic conditions with the Feldenkrais® Method. WTM movement lessons adapted developmental movements with the Feldenkrais® methods, Awareness Through Movement® and Functional Integration® (link Feldenkrais Method), and the physical education standards required for the United States elementary schools. 

Three programs out of the eight years of testing in the methods were created: a school-wide program, Get Sensational Attention; a physical education program, Part I and Part II of WTM; and WTM methods adaptable to academic curriculum.

Methods: Strategies, based on the Feldenkrais Method, was implemented in a movement program to enhance both body ownership and re-educate sensorimotor patterns. Strategies were tested and revised between 2006-2018 at a public elementary school with children from multicultural and below poverty backgrounds.  Over 500 children (in groups of 6-22 participants) and ages 5-10 years old experienced these strategies:

1. Developing awareness in the organic nature of the body and what it wants to do without interfering 
2. Developing awareness of the presence of a physicalness in relation to hearing
3. Developing awareness of a synergistic attention, sensing your body while attention is outside yourself
4. Developing awareness of the details in parts and spaces of bodily organization 
5. Developing awareness of how physical changes relate to psychological and cognitive changes
6. Developing awareness in the relationships between the organization of movements in the body and behavioral patterns

Chronological Order of Research and Testing:

(1987-1990 Feldenkrais Training)

1990 – Present Feldenkrais Practice

2005 Hawaii Preparatory Academy, Lower School, with Physical Education Teacher and Co-Creator of WTM, Susie Jones, with special thanks to Hope Soo
2006 First pilot class Hawaii Preparatory (fourteen weeks) 
(2007 Schools Attuned Training)
(2007, Brain Gym Training)
(2007, Yoga Ed Training) 
2007, April 12 -April 25, and January 15 lessons segment program HPA 
2008 – 2014 Kohala Elementary 
2008 Hawaii Preparatory Academy
2008, August 15, Intro to Kohala teachers 
2008, September 10, Introduction to Parents at Kohala Elementary 
(2009, Trained/Teamed with Schools Attuned)

2009 WTM physical education teacher Kohala Elementary 
2010, Hawaii Association for Physical Education Recreation and Dance Presentation 
2010, Kohala after-school program, one week, 25 students 
2010, May 7, Hawaii Association Physical Education Presentation 
2010 – 2011, Kohala Elementary School Breaks 30 sessions 
2011, Kohala Community School Meeting

2011 Intro at Kohala elementary¬ Festival/Spring 
2011, March 14th – 18th, Kohala spring break 
2011, September-May Parker School, Donna Rohr 
2013-2014, Research team: Feldenkrais In Schools Hui in Schools (FISH)
2013, Waldorf School Kohala November 29 
2014, the Last program at Kohala Elementary
2014- 2015, June 2014 – September 2015, video animation program produced– Get Sensational Attention, school-wide program 

Movement Intelligence, Attention, and the Sensory Body (SB)

Introduction

Some people have to run to think, walk to listen, or move to talk. What most people may not understand is that movement is not merely a mechanical action – especially for children. Movement “could” also be the intelligence that cultivates perception, attention, and executive functioning. (Clark, Schumann, and Mostofsky, 2015). This “intelligence” I will call the “Sensory Body (SB),”  or what scientists maybe labeling “body ownership.”6 (Erhsson, H. H., 2012)

SB gives birth to an awareness of one’s way of being. In other words, the SB bridges information from the motor, sensory, and memory association areas (of the body) crucial for perception and thought processing.

Could the awareness of the SB be what stimulated improvements in children’s behavior and cognitive disorders? 

Could this be scientifically proven? 

The Wellness Through Movement lessons focused on the development of the SB with children and proved effective in benefitting attention deficit and general wellbeing. Over five hundred Kohala Elementary school children experienced the Wellness Through Movement (WTM) lessons. The techniques incorporated the Feldenkrais® Method with developmental movement into physical education games for children. Methods in the lessons were adapted to meet the physical education standards and academic curriculum for elementary schools in the United States. The focus of the lessons is to sense the body as a sensory language. 

For children, when movement intelligence was brought into awareness, cognitive disorders were not the only improvements measured. Social-emotional behavior and general well-being also showed measurable results. According to Principle Garcia (2008-2014) at Kohala Elementary, bullying incidents disappeared for three years.

Redefining movement to feel the Sensory Body (SB) was foundational to the techniques employed. The importance of lessons was to expand the common notion of movement as “an exercise or activity” into a “sense of being and a language of becoming.” 

From the SB an awareness develops from inside the body to the outer world. In other words, demonstrating a movement was rarely used. The SB is not merely a concept to be demonstrated, but an experience directed from inside. This type of “perception” sees the body-form as a cause of identity itself. Movement is used to witness the creative process of subtle yet familiar qualities in the motor sense related to behavior. Children’s personalities are still searching to become all they can be. For children, the motor sense is not viewed as just a feeling of muscles and bones but a physical sensation of a person becoming a unique individual. Over time, movement organically and creatively clarifies an appearance of the self from the motor sense. 

This report will introduce “how” movement activity was used to develop a SB awareness; give insights into possible reasons why this type of body awareness helped get long-term results; and answer common questions received over the years from scientists and school administrators. 

The information shared below will help researchers and movement specialists use movement in new ways to improve behavior, cognitive development, and body ownership. Most importantly, learning from the SB will guide individuals to become responsible for their own well-being: mind, body, and heart.

Further Discussion

Researchers know movement helps the brain, but what movement creates perception? And if movement is recognized as crucial for cognitive development (Boring, 1930), why can’t we feel the relationships among movement, cognition, and perception? 

The WTM lessons attempt to answer these questions from inside children by creating experiences for them to feel the continuum of body and mind. Two variables, movement and attention inward, were used in conjunction with every lesson to help participants feel their bodies’ intelligence. 

Movement is nature’s way of teaching wholeness in the relationships to every part of the body, mind, and immediate environment. We used movement as a teacher to introduce children to their bodies and to feel how their bodies influence the way they listen, communicate, and perceive the outer world. 

The introduction of the body to the brain begins with sensations of motion exploring space. “Space,” in this context, is referring to inside the body, as well as around it. “Signals from this sensory orchestra are sent by afferent nerves through the spinal cord to the somatosensory, motor, and parietal cortices of the brain, where they continuously feed and update dynamic sensory-motor maps of the body. This major intelligence of the body [this inner teacher] has missed the attention it truly deserves.” (Smetacek & Mechsner, 2004, p. 21). 

For those who don’t know these words: “Afferent nerves” bring sensory information from the world and the body to the brain. “Somatosensory” relates to sensations, and “parietal cortices” are the major lobes of the brain on either side of the head. The scientists, in other words, are saying this information sent by sensations from the body to the brain is foundational to how the brain operates and needs further investigation. Primal reflexes are one of nature’s ways of stimulating action in an infant. Similar to how primal reflexes work, WTM lessons are designed to trigger sensory signals to push and pull the participants’ attention toward the mapping of motion among body parts.

Muscle Memory, Motor Patterns, and Behavior

It is important to clarify the differences between muscle memory and motor patterns. Muscle memory is a movement that knows how to repeat itself. Motor patterns are records of motion in the motor sense related to behavior. In other words, behavioral patterns have motor patterns. Common behavioral patterns in children were stress, frustration, and anger. Change the motor pattern of behavior, and it was hard for the children to repeat the behavior.

The body is a physical structure of historical record from desires, circumstances, and activity. Children’s desires try to get fulfilled by behaviors of successful strategies. As children’s strategies succeed, they become fine-tuned in the muscular-skeletal system. Over time, these strategies carve out ways of being and eventually become a carriage of sensory-motor identity. 

If movements succeed, these ways of how children are conducting themselves lock into place through their motor patterns. These patterns become the physical attire of muscular-skeletal tendencies persuading the children how to act, behave, and speak. 

We analyzed children’s movements, postures, and gaites to understand how their bodies may affect their dispositions. The movement tries to find balance and grace by negotiating between an intention and action. It is essential to note, that for children some patterns of actions need to be disregarded but often can’t be let go. At the same time, other actions that serve desires strive to be repeated with no success. Teaching awareness of the SB shows the children the way their bodies process information and helps both the body and mind to find grace and balance inside and out.

When the exact measurement of time optimized efficiency and changed behavior, the amount of “exercise” was sacrificed to train participants in their awareness of the SB. To review, the SB is the awareness that bridges sensing, feeling, and thinking. In other words, the SB is a grounding wire that connects the wholeness of body-mind-heart.

To understand the unseen and the seen in one’s body, children learn to sense movement patterns in the muscular-skeletal systems. Long before the brain notices, the SB can sense from biological sensations the very beginnings of psychological behaviors. Fine qualities of sensations from the physical structure can by-pass an individual’s perception. When children sense their SB, they start to understand a movement intelligence that gives vital insights into their ways of daily processing – and they learn ways to make different choices.

Benefits of the SB

Eight years after working in our pilot school (2006-2013), Principal Garcia of Kohala Elementary called to share a testimony. (audio testimony) He said a kindergarten student (from 2006) with verbal and physical harassment issues still has an improved demeanor not recognizable from his past. Similar reports have come from teachers and parents sharing improvements in children’s attention span and social-emotional well-being.

Principal Garcia believes the kindergartner had long-term improvements from a lesson called “No Place Like Home” in Part I of the WTM programs. (p. 46, Rosasco, 2013) The lesson used the movement of an exhalation to “attach” attention to a sensation and pull it inside their bodies. The children then were directed to process the outer circumstances from inside their bodies, where their exhalations stopped. 

It is important to note that our pilot school was in a Hawaiian community. The wisdom of an indigenous culture values the relationships among the mind, body, spirit, nature, and community. It is in their blood. Thanks to the parents and teachers of Kohala, the children also learned to adapt the SB into their home and classroom environments. Long-term benefits likely occurred because the community got involved. 

A typical response from teachers was surprise at how much the listening skills of children are influenced by their internal worlds. Traditional education tries to pull attention outside of the student to look towards the teacher, the SB learning is the opposite. 

For example, a third-grade girl felt frightened about a reading lesson and held her breath without knowing it. After learning the SB, she noticed for the first time that she stopped breathing every time the teacher said, “It’s time for our reading lesson.” Awareness through movement, or lack of movement in her breath, taught her what was going on inside and why she couldn’t listen. In other words, the movement in her body gave her the opportunity to sense the uniqueness of how she processed information. When she told the teacher, they reviewed the lesson called, “No Place Like Home Breath.” (p. 46, Rosasco, 2013) After the lesson, she directed her attention inside her body and learned from there how to read. 

Please note: When first learning about the SB, we taught children the lesson, “Personal Bubbles Freeze Dance.” (round three, p. 42, Rosasco, 2013) The lesson taught children how to keep attention inside and “play” from there. Playing versus learning from inside (the SB) is much easier. Once the children play with the sense of the SB it is easier for them to adapt it to a classroom environment. 

Similar testimonies from private sessions over the past forty years came from adults. Adults reported improvements in chronic ailments and their immune systems. These people improved because they could sense their physical structures in relation to their behaviors. (See Testimonials)

The SB is learned through movement and attention with three functions:

1. Body awareness

2. Dual attention

3. Awareness of Changes in the Physical to Differences in Perception

Once these three functions are clarified, a subtle archeological-like record imprinted on the motor sense was revealed to the children. Awareness of this “record” came from the SB. 

There is No Wrong Movement

The most difficult challenge for movement teachers or researchers is remembering there are no wrong movements. Movement is used as an artist’s palette of discoveries and possibilities. 

Like in nature, the movements of infants fumble about until they succeed in the action. There is no judgment in the infant, just an innocence of exploration. WTM movement, like in nature, is always intended to help children learn about themselves. Teaching movement is usually done by “modeling” a movement, so it is done correctly. In contrast, with WTM movement, time and space allow children to explore how their own bodies move in relation to their perceptions. This learning from inside is probably one of the few opportunities young children get in a school day.

Here’s one way we used movement to help the children explore possibilities. We gave a movement and watched if all the children did the movement suggested. If one child was doing something different, we mimicked that action in the next instruction for the whole class. We also watched where this particular participant’s action began and ended. For example, if the original instruction was to move the knee forward, and one of the children lifted her head and looked at her knee to move the knee forward, for the next instruction, we mimicked her action by asking all the participants to lift their heads and look at their knees to move their knees forward.

What’s the point? The point of this WTM technique is to show the participants there is no right or wrong movement. The movement teaches the children it’s okay to do something different; however, it’s not okay if they don’t know they did something different. Movement is also teaching compassion.

The intention is to help children experience new ways of looking at themselves (and each other). Movement is used to develop consciousness and explore the uniqueness of each individual, and their relationship within a group. From a “witness” state of the SB, we want children to have no judgment about what their bodies are doing relative to what their minds intended. And by experiencing the different actions of other participants, children learn from both their internal process of actions and their reactions to others. The experience of the movement intelligence is what teaches compassion. The movement helps children compare the (1) differences in their perceptions to the instructions, (2) others’ perceptions, and (3) the relationship of their body parts.

Dual Attention

Another way we introduced body awareness and taught compassion was with what we called, “Dual Attention.” Dual Attention is the ability to sense importance both inside the body and “out there.” In other words, for the children to learn how to take care of themselves they elicited information from dual attention. The more the dual attention was used, the clearer dual attention guided children to fine-tune a grace that restored balance and wellbeing.

Dual attention helps children feel their body-to-mind relationship from the feel of what we call “Home.” Home is inside the body where an exhalation ends. With dual attention, children turn their attention inward to Home and speak and listen to others from there. If they could not feel Home inside, they were asked to stop sharing and wait for themselves. This method was especially successful when children were conflicted. They were asked to share only if they could feel “Home” inside while talking. 

From dual attention there was a sense of harmony, and their assumptions about the external world changed more towards the heart. Like in an animal — and with practice — children’s dual attention generates strategies for what is truly needed — and no more. Their old familiar reactions get an opportunity to pause. After slowing down and pausing, children take an exhalation to turn attention inside their bodies and take a step back from their reactions. With dual attention, they are not overwhelmed by their outer situations and find an honest truth in themselves. 

To our surprise, each time children achieved dual attention (especially the five-year-olds) their points of reference came from a deeper place in their hearts. The tendencies of their muscular-skeletal systems returned their attention to their hearts, and from there redefined and classified ways of achieving solutions in kinder, peaceful, and more compassionate ways. Dual attention broadens the lens of consciousness and changes the focus. New ideas from children’s old familiar ways change their opinions of cause and effect. Children learn to use their motor sense to understand an integrity in their behaviors and how they affect others and situations.