Right Brained Learners — Ground Rules
Jan 3rd, 2008 by willa
Here are the ground rules for raising a right brained child, according to this great book, Right Brained Children in a Left Brained World — it was geared towards ADD kids and my kids don’t tend to be classically ADD but they do fit into the RBL category in several ways.
These are drafts from about a year ago when I read the book — I was going to work these into posts but HA! completion is, as usual, an issue! But I am trying to clear them out of my draft box for 2008 and thought they might be helpful for someone even just as rough notes, so here goes:
Don’t pressure
Use positive reinforcement — reward efforts not outcome, pass over mistakes initially.
Aim high — RB children don’t learn sequentially or evenly — they can sometimes jump ahead and it helps their confidence to be “ahead”.
Make tutoring a priority — consistency, brevity, good time of day
Pick quiet environment
Don’t insist he sit still
Let him learn through interests
Give him the big picture
Let him see and observe before jumping in
Help him understand WHY he is doing this.
Use humor
Teach him to make pictures in his head. Rightbrained children can turn auditory input into visual if they take time and effort to do so. Teach him to monitor if this process is going on.
That last one is a big one. When I first read the book I started to experiment with drawing quick visual icons as I read to try to help me remember. It did help, but it was a slow process trying to figure out graphics that I could actually draw (art isn’t a strong point for me) that would accurately represent sometimes abstract concepts (I am a conceptual thinker; my RBL son who is a concrete detail person could probably do better this way, and in fact I bet that is exactly why he has such a comprehensive memory for facts about everything — he is the family encyclopedia!)
Self-monitoring is also a useful skill — asking yourself “am I getting this?” and giving yourself a chance to reflect.
And giving oneself a chance to observe and get used to a situation before jumping in is a valuable coping strategy. I use it regularly in homeschooling now, and it works for a lot of different types of situations. It even works for me as a mom — say there is something I want to try in the homeschool or some new activity — if I allow myself a way to enter the situation gradually, it is more likely to be pleasant and positive.
Anyway, if you look at those ground rules for right brained learners, you see that many or even most of them — like personal tutoring, learning through interests, focusing on efforts not results, allowing jumps ahead, humor — are also traits of a good homeschool.
I remember reading this book, and all of these things apply to James! Thanks for putting it together this way. I still have trouble getting a handle on how to do this:
Teach him to make pictures in his head. Rightbrained children can turn auditory input into visual if they take time and effort to do so. Teach him to monitor if this process is going on.
I don’t really know how to teach him to visualize.
“Let him see and observe before jumping in”
This one has been big for me as I have attempted to do new things. The latest thing that I have had to ease into gradually has been teaching piano lessons and singing classes. It took several years before I developed enough of a plan (and enough confidence) to make the leap into offering lessons, but I have been doing it for three years now. And I am finally going to be offering a weekly singing class coming up in the fall, but I have thought about doing this for at least a year already– it took that long for me to visualize success in this area!
I have a daughter who has ADD tendencies, and I can see some of these traits in her, too. Some of the things I have noticed with her are 1)pressure really causes her to break down, 2)one-on-one tutoring is a must, especially at the beginning of a new program or book, 3)visualization is a big plus– when she slows down and focuses enough to do it! 4)she *can* sit still, but does not retain as much– it’s like she is concentrating so hard on keeping herself still that she can’t apply herself as much to the lesson. This need for movement is gradually diminishing for her.