Sakshum team recently thought to find ways to reach to a wider community and benefit it.
Our on going projects like
Sponsor a child is going great and more and more children are benefited every year. However, this effort still can bring the difference to a few. So, we thought to invest the same amount in a way to maximize the benefits to the community.
One of the idea came was to adopt a small school which is either a slum school or a govt school with very less basic facilities. Sakshum will try to nurture such school and there by can impact and improve the life of more number of people.
For the same the very first step is the identify such school. We request you to suggest such school if you come across.
Please email me us at info@sakshum.com for the same
Posted byUnknown
at
5:31 PM
Labels:
child education,
education
It has been seen that most of the children with developmental disability have some or other fine motor difficulties. The reason could be one or many of poor coordination between 2 brain hemispheres, poor eye hand coordination, poor muscle tone, poor dexterity skills and proximal stability. These children have poor grasp, hold and transfer activities in their early developmental period but later, his or her functional activities are effected which indirectly affects the academic progress. Poor hand functions leads to poor writing and copying skills which could be so severe, that some children withdraw themselves academically and socially.
Coordinated hand functions are important for ADL’s (activities of daily living). But sometime, especially in younger children, the importance of hand functions are missed which could be very difficult for care takers and children. Majority of caretakers have concerns of poor hand writing.
To improve the functions of hand, the child has to thoroughly assessed not only in hand functions like grip, hold and transfer but also to bilateral hand movements, tactile and Proprioceptive sensitivity, Visio-spatial ability, hand dominance, eye hand coordination, proximal and distal joints and their muscle functions and various functions of brain (laterality, focusing and centering).
The child can be prepared for hand writing by strengthening the muscles around distal and proximal joints, coordination exercises for brain and definitely lot of encouragement. Apart from exercises, the child should be taught to write on the sand, black board or on the wall for better understanding of strokes and movements or forming the letters. Later, he can be trained to write smaller on grids or on dots for spatial alignment. This should be done in graded fashion so that the child does adjust well. The child learns faster when writing is combined with auditory input like “up to down” is “one” and so on. Some times, the child has to assist with physical support or modifications like grippers or weights.
Physical activities concentrating on proximal stability and brain gym activities would be beneficial with other coordinated and strengthening exercises.
Both the parents and regular teachers should also understand the difficulties faced by the children. They should not burden the child with lots of activities and writing stuff so that the child gets frustrated and gives up. The teaching should be patient, playful and easy and graded for the child.
Posted byNeeti
at
11:31 PM
Labels:
child disability,
early intervention,
education,
finemotor control,
guidance,
parenting tips,
writing
While every child with autism is a unique individual with his or her own particular personality, set of behaviors and degree of severity of delay, there is a fundamental pattern that is part of the autism spectrum. Most of the children with ASD or other childhood disabilities have movement or motor problems. Sometimes motor problems or difficulties are neglected because of other prominent problems like speech delay and social isolation.
Researches have proved that persistence of primitive reflexes and fixed motor patterns may be responsible for learning difficulties in children with ASD, ADHD and other disabilities. So, movement therapy, reflex inhibition or rhythmic movements or motor repatterning therapy can help child to learn better from his environment.
Most of us don’t know that sitting still is a tough and actually a complex brain mechanism requiring certain developmental processes in proper function. If functions are not proper, then to sit is something like sleeping. So, to be active and alert the child must move. For those children who have poor initiation or whose arousal level is too high they need movement therapy even in the class room. For example, doing an activity on the therapy ball or on the water bed.
Somebody correctly said “what we call thinking is [actually] the internalization of movement. Cognition and movement are really the same.”
Posted byNeeti
at
11:46 PM
Labels:
ADHD,
autism,
child disability,
earlyintervention,
movement,
parenting tips,
Therapy
From the Vedic science to the modern science, Senses are given utter importance for human development. For overall development senses play an important role. We can not even think our life if we don’t have or have a disturb sense.
Senses don’t work alone. Sense organs sense the sensation or stimuli and brain turns the sensation to perception. Perception is a form of learning. Most of us have near to normal functioning of all senses in coordination. But, sometime because of known and unknown reason the process of sensory process get affected which may further leads to problems in routine life. If problem is minor and mild it can be compensated but if processing is effected on larger scale may affect our functional and occupational life.
Children with ADHD, Autism, Cerebral Palsy, speech disorder, brain injured, Down’s syndrome, dyslexia and other learning disability and neurological disorders do have mild to severe degree of sensory problems. However sometime children with normal development do have sensory issues.
Let’s make Sensory awareness month a campaign to arise awareness about sensory processing disorder among parents, teachers, community and professionals. This will not only help in creating awareness but also make us to understand our children behaviour in better fashion rather than thinking the behaviour as odd.
Sensory integration therapy looks like organised and structured play which has an objective or goal. SI activities provide the right challenge (not too difficult and not too easy) so that the child is motivated to achieve the goal.
Posted byNeeti
at
4:18 PM
Labels:
ADHD,
autism,
awareness,
children,
early intervention,
knowledge sharing,
sensory integration
It was a milestone for Sakshum to screen 1000 children for vision problems under the project “Eye Care, I Care”.
On 19th September 2009, students of the Vijaya Bharthi High School, Hyderabad from X to IV were screened for vision problems. Out of 305 children who were screened, 20 were found having vision problems. The screened children were referred to LVPEI for further evaluation and treatment.
15 volunteers actively participated in the event. One group of volunteers educated the children about the importance of eye hygiene, nutritional diet, proper light and posture during studying and prevention of corneal injury. The other group of volunteers screened the children with vision problem with E chart. The teachers were trained for screening the new admissions and rest of the children. The teachers were also counselled for maintaining the proper lights and early detection of problems in students.
The teachers and volunteers found the event useful for prevention and cure of the vision problems in children. Thanks to all the volunteers, teachers and LVPEI.
Posted byNeeti
at
10:54 PM
Labels:
awareness,
children,
education,
eye care I care,
knowledge sharing
Posted byUnknown
at
11:30 AM
Every one is born with the set of some primitive reflexes which are known for the survival of the child. These primitive reflexes help the child to protect, to assist feeding and for survival. During a developmental screening the child is checked for these primitive reflexes. Presence of primitive reflex indicates the functioning of Central Nervous System before 1 yr of development. After first year of development these reflexes should be integrated to develop more sophisticated set of reflexes called Postural reflexes. Hence the primitive reflexes form the platform for more specific and sophisticated functions like speech, intelligence and cognition.
Absence of primitive reflexes before one year or prolonged persistence indicates the problem with the nervous system or brain functioning. It not only affects the motor, speech and social functions but also affects overall learning. Inhibition of primitive reflexes leads to lateralisation of brain which as physically be seen as hand dominance, speech, interest in maths or music, writing and reading.
Some times due to some reasons the child behaves odd. Inspite of average intelligent and normal physical development he struggles to pass the exams, poor hand writing, aggressive, hyperactivity, inability to concentrate, poor listening skills, clumsy are few common features.
According to the theory of Neurodevelopment, any missed developmental sequence may develop a physical, psychological and behaviourally problem. The treatment is recapitulation, which means the child has to go through all the developmental stages which guide the normal development. Abnormal reflexes are to be inhibited with special skills and physical exercises to guide the normal development. Most common reflexes which are to be integrated, ATNR, STNR, Moro’s, Grasp reflex and TLR.
Children with Autism, Cerebral Palsy, ADHD, Developmental Delay and other behaviour and psychological like emotional unstable, poor handwriting and confusion, dyslexia and poor reading habits may need reflex inhibition therapy.
Posted byNeeti
at
6:29 PM
Labels:
autism,
awareness,
disability,
knowledge sharing,
Learning disability,
Therapy
