Another exercise from Gail and Paul dennison's book, Brain Gym is called the thinking X.   Whenever you move the left side of your body, you're using the right side of your brain.  When you use the right side of your body, the left side of your brain is active.  If you think of an X in your mind and see it, move your eyes fromleft to right and right to left.

Thinking of an X tells your brain you want to use both sies of your brain at the same time.  This is a good thing.  It will help you with speed reading and becoming more coordinated in sports and play activities.

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Skipping uses both sides of the brain together.  It will help with creative thnking, study skills, speed reading, and oral reading.  See if your child can lift one knee up and the arm of the opposite hand.  Put them down and then bring the other knee up and the opposite arm.  Do this slowly and then speed it up until your child can skip.   more »

Another brain gym exercise found in the Dennisons' book, Brain Gym, is called the Balance Button.  It helps with thinking, relaxing for test taking, and organizational skills.  While sitting down, touch two fingers to the indentation at the base of the skull, behind the ear.  Rest the other hand on your navel.  Imagine breathing the energy up through the body, slowly and deeply.  After a minute, switch hands and hold your two fingers behind the other ear.   more »

Paul and Gail Dennison have this exercise in their book, Brain Gym that helps with math and spelling skills.  The elephant will also help you to listen better.  Stand up, bending your knees and 'glue' your head to your shoulder and point across the room to the left.  Use your ribs to move your whole upper body as you trace a Lazy 8 on it's side.  Look past your fingers.  Then, repeat with the other side.

If you have your child practice spelling his or her spelling words in the air, it helps him or her to remember them.

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Another great exercise by Gail and Paul Dennison helps with study skills, math, and riding in a car, bus or plane.

Neck Rolls helps to relax your neck and shoulders.  You can stand or sit while you breathe in deeply and slowly, relaxing your shoulders and dropping your head forward.  Move your head slowly from side to side, in a slow, rolling action.  Imagine breathing out any tension.  As you do this, your chin draws a smooth curve across your chest as your neck relaxes.

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Thinking Caps is used to improve your ability to listen better, do public speaking, short-term memory, thinking abilities and spelling.  It also can help improve your concentration while working ont he computer.

Take your hands and place them at the top of each ear.  Using both hands, start at the top of each ear and "unroll" the curved part of the edge of the ears at the same time.  Continue moving your hands down the ear all the way to the bottom of the ear lobes.  Repeat this until you have done it three times.

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This exercise helps you with centering, grounding and relaxing the nervous system.  Standing, you hold one hand tocuhing the upper lip and the other hand touching behind you, just above the tailbone.  Hold while you take three slow, deep breaths.  Reverse hands and breathe the same way for three breaths.   more »

Belly breathing improves the supply of oxygen to the blood and brain.  It helps relax you, which increases your energy level.  It will also make it easier for you to read and speak.

Standing up, place your hands on your abdomen.  exhale through your mouth in short little puffs.  Next, inhale slowly and deeply, fillling your abdomen like a balloon underneath your hands.  Slowly and fully exhale the air.  repeat this a few times, making sure you have a natural rhythmn going.

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Double Doodle helps to develop writing skills, spelling and math.  It also makes it easier to be able to follow directions and improve eye-hand coordination.

Imagine a line drawn the middle of the body, from the nose to the belly button.  Put both hands up in the air and begin drawing identical doodles on each side of the line.  have some fun with it.  It gives your brain a great workout!

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These simple exercises are based on the work presented by Carla Hannaford, Ph.D. . Carla Hannaford, Ph.D. is a neurophysiologist and educator with more than 28 years of teaching experience. In her best selling book "Smart Moves", Dr. Hannaford states that our bodies are very much a part of all our learning, and learning is not an isolated "brain" function. Every nerve and cell is a network contributing to our intelligence and our learning capability. Many educators have found this work quite helpful in improving overall concentration in class. Introduced here, you will find four basic "Brain Gym" exercises which implement the ideas developed in "Smart Moves" and can be used quickly in any classroom. They are surprisingly simple, but very effective!

• Drink Water

As Carla Hannaford says, "Water comprises more of the brain (with estimates of 90%) than of any other organ of the body." Having students drink some ...   more »

This exercise helps coordinate right and left brain by exercising the information flow between the two hemispheres. It is useful for spelling, writing, listening, reading and comprehension.  Its found in the Dennison's book, Brain Gym.

• Stand or sit. Put the right hand across the body to the left knee as you raise it, and then do the same thing for the left hand on the right knee just as if you were marching.
• Just do this either sitting or standing for about 2 minutes.

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Take the pointer finger of your right hand and draw a large, imaginary figure eight on it's side on the wall.  Make sure you're crossing over your mid-line, moving your finger way over to the left and then, over to the right.  Do this three times with each hand, and then three times with both hands.  It will help you and your child focus more and remember better what you read.   more »

Paul and Gail dennison have written a small, paperback book, Brain Gym.  In it is an exercise called "gravity glider."  It not only helps with reading comprehension, it's good to do after sitting at the offie all day and before playing in a sports event like baseball or soccer.

Sit on a chair or sofa.  Cross your ankles.  keeping your knees relaxed, bend forward and reach out in front of you with straight arms.  Let your arms glide down toward your feet as you exhale.  Glide arms up as you inhale.  Repeat, moving arms to the left and up, right and up, and then center.  Change your legs and repeat.  For most people, their body feels lighter and more relaxed.

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Another brain gym exercise from Paul and Gail Dennison's book, Brain Gym, is called "Thinking Caps."  It's good to do to help your child (and you) improve attention and listenting.   Gently unroll your ears, three times from top to bottom.  Start at the fold of the ear at the top and gently use your fingers to unroill the fold on both ears at the same time.   more »

You can help your child do better on tests by showing uim or her a brain gym activty called the cross crawl.  It's fun to do it with music in the background for fun.  I've had kids skip to the music.  When the left foot is off the ground, the right hand is in the air.  When the right foot is off the ground, the left hand is on the air.  This takes concentration and practice for some.

This gets both sides of the brain working together and will help you feel more open to learning new things and being relaxed.

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Brain Gym, written by Paul and Gail Dennison, is a small, paperback book loaded with exercises you can do with your child to help the brain function more effectively.  I'll be sharing some of the exercises with you ovr the next few entries.

Brain gym exercises have been developed that help with:

reading skills

writing skills

math skills

thinking skills

self awareness skills

study skills

Successful parenting happens when you can help your child to focus better on school work or tasks and to use both sides of the brain together to improve thinking abilities, which will always help with school work.

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