How to understand and help your sensitive child

Some children seem to let nothing get them down while others seem to take everything personally. You may or may not be aware that your child is sensitive.

An easy way to check is to watch your child and listen carefully to his/her stories. Does she say yes to things she shouldn’t? Is he concerned about a boy in class that doesn’t like him? Is she always trying to please others? Is he upset that a friend doesn't want to play with him? Does he look bewildered with loud noises? Is she having nightmares about something she saw on TV?

These are a few ways to guess at sensitivity and the interesting thing about sensitivity is that it is directly connected to either a dominant left ear or left eye or both. This is tested during the genetic brain profile. This is also my favourite part of the brain profile.

Sensitive children all have the following in common:

-    They find it hard to say “no” to people, even if the request is irrational.

-    They want people to be happy. If not, they’ll try to cheer the person up in some or other way.

-    They want people to like them. If one person doesn’t like them, they’ll be fixated on that and rarely focus on the people who do like them.

-    They are compassionate towards other people and sincere empathy comes naturally to them.

-    When they stress, they feel like the whole world is against them, nobody cares about them, everybody hates them and they may even be scared.

Sensitive EAR	Sensitive EYE
- Sensitive to tone and pitch - Are distracted by noise - If people SOUND angry, they assume it's their fault and stress - Shrill or loud voices = angry voices	- Sensitive to body language - Are distracted by movement - If people LOOK angry, they assume it's their fault and stress - Violence/painful scenes haunts them
*Need VERBAL RECOGNITION	*Need VISUAL RECOGNITION
Spoken words of affirmation: “I love you”, “you are beautiful”, “thank you”, "Mommy is proud of you", etc.	Show affection: hugs; kisses; notes on the fridge, pillow or in lunch boxes; special gestures (eg. favorite dinner), etc.
*This is not an ego booster. Without these recognitions, the child assumes the opposite is true and develops a low self esteem.

It is vital to understand your child’s sensitivity. Giving the wrong kind of recognition leads to misunderstandings and lots of heartache for both parent and child. 

CASE STUDY

I have had a family who came to me with three boys. When we started talking about sensitivities, two of the boys had sensitive eyes while the other had a sensitive ear. The sensitive ear suddenly looked up to me and said very surprised: "So my dad actually loves me?"

The other boys were very surprised by his question and so was the mother (dad wasn't present at the session).

It turned out that their dad was a very involved dad, driving them to games, never missing a single game of all the boys, taking them for ice-cream and so on. But never ever did he express his love in words. The two boys thought their dad was awesome, but the sensitive ear boy just assumed that his dad didn't like him as much. It was a very emotional discovery for the whole family.

You can never underestimate the power of "speaking the right language" with your loved ones.

Sensitive children also need guidance to learn how to say “no” to people; otherwise they will always be “the sucker who says yes”. They need to learn how to be compassionate without compromising themselves and for that they need gentle parenting and guidance.

Some children have both of these sensitivities, which make them classic people pleasers. Help and show them how to be assertive because they easily fall prey to others’ manipulations. They also need both types of recognition to develop a healthy self esteem.

Some children have no sensitivity at all which you need to be aware of as well. They can become arrogant, defiant and manipulative. They need to learn how to deal with other peoples’ feelings (since they don’t care what other people think of them) and be considerate towards others. 

It doesn't mean that you shouldn't say or show you love these children, but it won't affect them the way it would for a sensitive child.

People are all different and it never ceases to amaze me. Learn about your own family's specific needs and see how your relationship changes.

I will gladly answer any questions or comments you might have regarding sensitivities.

 

The Importance of Class Placement

We all know that feeling: Standing in line of our classroom for the very first day, wondering where we’ll sit, if we’ll like the teacher and the subject. Either the teacher will let everyone choose their own seats or assign them based on some kind of order (alphabetically, academic performance) and of course move the kids that cause problems of some kind.

In a perfect world I would want to show each and every teacher where to place each child in their classrooms. Why? Because it has a greater impact on learning than you think.

Each person has a dominant ear and a dominant eye. This means that you see and hear better with a specific eye and ear and you process the information differently depending on the dominant side. As a general rule a child should sit with his dominant ear faced towards the teacher, therefore if your child is left ear dominant, he should sit on the right side of the classroom.

But why is this important? After all, you have been sitting in different places in classroom all your life and you’ve always been able to hear, right? Yes, you can hear no matter where you sit, but you will hear better when your dominant ear faces the speaker. You will also be less distracted because you won’t have to unconsciously turn your head to hear better.

As soon as a child has to turn his head to hear and process information better, he notices other things like classmates chit-chatting, someone’s hair that’s out of place, mismatched socks, and more. This can be so distracting that the child misses most of the lesson as he day dreams.

What’s more is that “problem children” are usually placed in front “where I can keep an eye on you”! These are usually children that need to move a lot in order to keep their brains from going into “sleep mode” (see my post on stress for more information on this). Now they have to sit in front where they will distract all the other kids when they move and what’s worse is that they are permanently in the spotlight: “Sit still! Be quiet! Leave him alone! Focus! Look at me! Stop that! What did I just say?”
This makes the child believe that he is naughty and therefore he will act naughty because it is expected of him.

A better way to manage this is to place the antsy children at the back of the class where they can move without disturbing the other kids. They only need some guidance as to how to move without disrupting the class (jumping up and running is out of the question, but squeezing a stress ball and/or sitting on a pilates ball is quiet, inconspicuous and keep that little brain alert).

Similarly children who are left eye dominant are prone to daydreaming and if they sit too far back, there is a whole host of things that could distract them. They should not sit farther back than the middle of the classroom.

So is this really an issue? Does it really make a noticeable difference?

Yes, it does!

I had a mother who brought her first grader to me because his teacher was insisting that he had ADD and needed medication. The mother was heartbroken and not wanting to just go to the doctor for a prescription, she came to me instead. Nothing in the child’s profile pointed to ADD, although he was left eye dominant and therefore prone to daydreaming.

I recommended he be moved to a different place in the classroom and the teacher refused as she had gone through a lot of trouble arranging her students. A month later the teacher gave in and moved the child. A week later the mother received a phone call from the teacher who apologised for jumping to conclusions - since he was moved to the correct spot in class he has been paying attention, completing tasks and the teacher could no longer see any symptoms of ADD.

It is amazing that something as small as where you sit in the classroom can make such a marked difference.

Do something different this year and have your child sit in the correct place in class and see for yourself if it makes a difference.
I will gladly assess your child and recommend the optimal position for him/her in a classroom.

Feel free to comment or contact me if you have any questions or concerns.

Stress: an Infographic

I spent some time on Canva (www.canva.com) to create an infographic. I had so much fun! Here it is. Let me know what you think!

The End Is In Sight

The grade 12's are in their final exam for 2015 and their parents are losing sleep, hoping that their kids have done enough through the year and doing their part studying for each paper.
Yes, the end of school is in sight for our seniors, but their lives are just beginning! Some of them will go on to university or other tertiary institutions to study for a specific vocation, others will enter the work force right after they receive their certificates.

Choosing a career is such a big decision, especially if you will spend a lot of money and invest time into studying for this career. You certainly won't want to waste either your time or (your parents') money by choosing an unsuitable course, only to find out a year or so into studying that you'll have to start all over again.
That's why it's advisable to get some kind of career advice from an expert before choosing.

Many students have already secured their places at university for their chosen courses, but it's not too late to re-evaluate their choices. Courses can be changed easily in the first few weeks of university, so as soon as you realise that this just isn't for you, march off to the student career advisor's office and have a chat with them on changing your course.
Don't feel you have to stick it out, just because you started it and your parents are paying good money for that course. Rather change quickly and start off right than having to admit a year or so later that it wasn't right after all.

I am always available to evaluate your choice with you before the universities open next year and if in doubt when classes start, my doors are still open to help you find a more suitable course.

In the mean time, good luck to all the matrics! I hope your first week of exams have gone smoothly and that your hard work will pay off when you receive those certificates!

Left Brain vs Right Brain Infographic

Here is a nice infographic I found on Pinterest that sums up some of the functions of the left and right brain hemispheres. Of course it is only a drop in the bucket of what a complete brain profile might tell you, but it is a very nice overview.