| Objectives
The objectives of this school are the following:
· To create a learning environment that will form the basis for developing a whole person through holistic and well-rounded education.
· To develop the inherent strength of each child through support and guidance to enable them to create a successful career path for themselves.
· To instil core values in each learner so that he or she will be of benefit to the environment, community, and the country in which they live in.
· To empower learners with self- knowledge to support them to think creatively, analytically, and responsibly.
· To harness parents, teachers and learners to strive towards a common goal in preparing the learners for a stable and productive adulthood.
· To unleash the creative spirit of each child to reach his/her full potential.
· To facilitate the process of education as an integrated fun-filled learning experience.
· To develop balanced, creative entrepreneurs by teaching life and thinking skills intertwined with core values.
· To expose learners to sensory integration therapy to achieve maximum academic success, as learning is a function of the brain and academic performance is directly linked to the level of sensory integration.
· To give special attention to creativity, self-motivation and building of self-esteem.
· To enable learners to manage their own health from a young age.
Mission
· The mission of the Tutor Centre is to constructively evaluate learning material to enable learners to learn with confidence and to strengthen their inherent aptitude to apply their knowledge and skills successfully; to expose the children to the full spectrum of enhancing experiences, enabling them to make healthy, responsible and balanced lifestyle choices, and to become creative analytical leaders with mutual respect for all role players.
· To use an approach to teaching and learning that will foster an attitude of the constructive evaluation of learning material as relevant and appropriate.
· To instil powerful strategies and methods into learners using these tools to learn with confidence and apply their knowledge and skills successfully.
· To expose learners to the full spectrum of constructive experiences to develop good decision-making skills and a healthy lifestyle.
· To enable learners to take responsibility for their own choices using creative and analytical thinking skills.
· To demonstrate the power of working together to achieve a common goal and show mutual respect for all role players.
Additional to the Academy’s curriculum, the following techniques are implemented: |
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- Colour Therapy:
The use of colour as a therapy is truly a non-invasive and powerful therapy which dates back thousands of years. Colour is simply light of varying wavelengths and is a form of energy. This light energy affects all living cells. Used in the right way, these different frequencies of light can have a profound and healing effect on all creation, human or otherwise. It is a well-known scientific fact that everything has a vibration and that all things have their own vibration or frequency.
Colour Therapy can be used for any problem, whether, physical, mental, emotional or spiritual for specific problems as well as an overall relaxations therapy. Colour energy can be the catalyst for our healing process and encourages normal and healthy workings of the body.
Some people have definite colour preferences:
Either by life experiences involving that – a negative life experience will make us dislike a certain colour, a positive life experience, involving a particular colour, will make us feel drawn to that colour
Or
An aversion to a colour can indicate an imbalance in a particular area of the body.
Colour therefore can be incredibly enlightening and transforming because colour is simply light of different wavelengths and each colour has its own specific wavelength and vibration. These wavelengths resonate with energies in different areas of the body. As we absorb colour energy not only through the eyes but also through the skin and our electromagnetic fields. 20
- Music Therapy
Research has shown that music has a profound effect on your body and psyche. It is scientifically proven that music has an influence on your brain waves. It is very beneficial with children within the classroom situation as it helps to promote movement, calm down children, ease muscle tension.
With alterations in brainwaves come changes in other bodily functions. Those governed by the autonomic nervous system, such as breathing and heart rate, can also be altered by the changes music can bring. This can mean slower breathing, slower heart rate and in activation of the relaxation response.
Music can also be used to bring a more positive state of mind, helping to keep depression and anxiety at bay. This can help prevent the stress response from wreaking havoc on the body and can help keep creativity and optimism levels higher.
Music has also been found to bring many other benefits, such as lowering blood pressure, boost immunity, ease muscle tensions, etc.
One of the minimum standards at the school is that every teacher should have music in her classroom. The school also make use of Mr John Broome’s, Mind Power subliminals.
Subliminal CD’s:
All Titles available in Classical Baroque and Ambient Music.
Subliminal CD’s contain positive statements or affirmations concealed in beautiful music. Although one van not consciously hear any spoken words on the CD’s, the messages are perceived by the subconscious mind which cancel negative, self-limiting beliefs and replace them with new positive thoughts.
Once one free the learner of the self-defeating beliefs that have held them back, you see their life’s changing for the better.
The use of Subliminal CD’s?
Simply play the CD’s as you go about your daily activities – while working, driving, reading, watching TV, exercising, relaxing or even sleeping.
Listening to the CD’s takes no time out of your daily routine, and no concentration or active effort is required for the CD’s to be effective.
How quickly can you expect results?
A minimum standard at the practice is that an Occupational Therapist, Therapeutic Horse-riding therapist or teacher are not allowed to work with a learner without specific music.
There are different titles, but the best results were obtained with the following topics:
-Prosperity
– Positive Self image
– Success for Children
– Excel in School
– Powerful Memory, learning and concentration
– Creativity
– Relaxation
– Personal Effectiveness
– Successful Relationships
Para-liminals used with the learners:
Para-liminal CDs from Paul Scheele MA at Learning Strategies Corporation in Minneapolis, USA.
Para-liminal CDs are used on a daily basis. One can hear one voice in one ear speaking to one part of your brain while simultaneously hear another voice in the other ear speaking to a different part of the brain. Very unusual, very pleasurable and very effective.
There are no “questionable” subliminal messages on these CD’s. Learners experience a short-term motivational hype. Positive affirmations are used.
Para-liminal CD’s increases personal power, by activating both hemispheres of the brain simultaneously with a precise blend of music and words. Each CD is carefully scripted by Paul Scheele, who is trained in neuro-linguistic programming, whole mind learning and pre-conscious processing.
NEW: The Para-liminals are now enhanced with Holosync audio tones from Centre point Research Institute. Holosync usage creates new neural pathways between left and right brain hemispheres, balancing the brain, enhancing mental / emotional health and healing unresolved emotional problems.
Specific para-liminal’s used in the school are the following:
Para-liminal CD Titles
Acquire new behaviours that help you reach goals and neutralize those you do not want. Paul’s favourite CD.
Change emotions and memories that stop you
Create new solutions and choices
Draw abundance and prosperity into any area of your life
Eliminate procrastination and be driven to achieve
Strengthen your ability to perform
Gain freedom from fear and anxieties
Attract and / or improve relationships
- Self – Esteem Supercharger
Build confidence, immediately feel better about yourself
Enter the deepest state of relaxation free from stress
Improve your memory instantly
Use your true, natural genius for learning
Align your mind and body for perfect health
Energize and become mentally alert in just 10 minutes
Free yourself from addictive behaviours
- Focus & Concentration (with Brian Tracy)
Accomplish more in less time with focal point thinking
- Power Thinking (with Bob Proctor of The Secret)
Think clearer, smarter, faster
The use of Para-liminal CD’s
The CDs should always be listened to with headphones. Para-liminal learning combines a unique blend of multiple voices, 3-D spatially enhanced sound, original music, whole brain communication and accelerative learning methods.
- Ozone therapy
Ozone therapy can provide a wide range of health benefits, from relaxation and detoxification to immune system stimulation and increased blood circulation:
- Help relax and loosen muscles by reducing the build-up of lactic acid.
- Oxidize toxins so they can be eliminated through mayor organs.
- Increase blood circulation, which helps injured muscles repair quicker.
- Stimulate vaso-dilations of peripheral blood vessels for pain relief.
- Speed up the metabolic processes of the organs and endocrine glands.
- Promote cleaner, softer, rejuvenated skin
- Normalize cell respiration.
- Help with chronic fatigue and environmental illnesses.
- Stimulate the immune system.
- Reduce carbon monoxide poisoning.
- Increase oxygen, assisting the body’s natural detoxifying process.
Ozone therapy is considered the most effective method to treat nearly every condition and is used legally worldwide. It has little or no side effects. Remember, ozone is an oxygen compound and is non-toxic and life giving.21,22,23,24
- Multiple intelligences and Education – Dr Howard Gardner
According to Smith and Smith’s (1994), Howard Gardner’s work has been a paradigm shifter. He questioned the idea that intelligence is a single entity, that it results from a single factor and that it can be measured simply via IQ tests.
His theory has been embraced by a range of educational theorists and significantly applied by teachers and policy makers to the problems of schooling. It would allow for different ways to teach, rather than one.
It is important as to know what the learner’s strongest intelligence is and to use it to his benefit in teaching. It is however also very important to develop the weaker intelligences. By doing this, one will get the child to use maximum of his/her potential. Multiple intelligences defined by Gardner:25
- Linguistic intelligence
- Logical –mathematical intelligence
- Musical intelligence
- Bodily-kinesthetic intelligence
- Spatial intelligence
- Inter-personal intelligence
- Intra-personal intelligence
- Naturalist intelligence
- Spiritual intelligence
- Existential intelligence
- Moral intelligence
- Brain Gym
Brain Gym is a program of simple, fun, physical activities that quickly improves learning in all areas. (8) In over 90 countries worldwide, thousands of teachers and students use Brain Gym effectively to improve reading skills, raise test scores and learn anything easily and quickly. By doing that, one develops neural pathways necessary for learning and remembering. Movement as used in Brain Gym, is a natural and essential element of optimal brain functioning. Students will:
- Learn anything quicker and easier
- Control ADD/ADHD
- Raise test scores
- Boost learning for special needs (autism, dyslexia, etc)
- Lower stress
- Calm down
- Stay on track
- Improve listening
- Creating the future – Techniques of Dr Luis Alberto Machado
Dr Luis Alberto Machado was the first person to be appointed as Minister of Intelligence in Venezuela in 1979.
The development of intelligence is a fundamental educational factor. Education for participation requires a process aimed at the self-discovery of the person and his/her environment, one that will reinforce the reasoning capacity for analysing and judging and will enrich the inner world of each individual through the awareness of his own dignity and that of his neighbour. It is a true process of personalization the strengthening of the human being and his/her specific qualities – mental, physical, emotional and social.
Through the development of human intelligence, we can achieve that future. Now at the end of the 20th century, this has to be our goal. Our universal goal! He writes,
“No one is born civilized or primitive. The difference between primitive man and civilized man is not biological; it is educational.”26
- Thinking skills – Edward de Bono
We assume that everybody has the ability to think, which is not true. Indeed, it is an art.27
The teachings and programmes of De Bono are used in our school, e.g.
- Six Thinking Hats
- Six Action Shoes
- Thinking Tools
- Light & Sound Technology
An AVS (Audio Visual Stimulation) – system consist of a light/sound synthesizer, stereo head phones and stimulation glasses with pulsating lights.
It has different set programmes. The first aspect of AVE involves dissociation. This is the clearing of thoughts. Secondly, cerebral blood flow increases. Most cognitive and emotional disorders involve areas of the brain that are low in blood flow. A study by Fox and Reichle shows AVE increased cerebral blood flow up to 28%.28
When the Neurosurgeons put people onto an Electroencephalograph (EEG), they measure the electrical frequencies in the brain. Four broad bands of consciousness are referred to: Beta, Alpha, Theta, and Delta, ranging from wide awake in Beta to fast asleep in Delta.
These frequencies are measured in cycles per second (CPS) or in Hertz (Hz). These altered states can be accessed through our Light and Sound machines which we import from Mind Alive in Canada. They are the original manufactures of small portable machines.
Let’s look at these brain states individually and understand what happens in each of them.
1) The Beta State (measured from 13Hz upwards)
Beta is the awake, aware, concentrating state. In normal awake, concentrating states we are at about 16-18 Hz frequency. When we get stressed the brain frequency goes way up to 30 or 40 Hz. So, it is very important to get stress out of our lives.
In Attention Deficit Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADD and ADHD) children the brain does not get up into the Beta state where they can concentrate. It is also why they don’t do well in school because the brain does not click up into concentrating states. L/S machines get the brain up into concentrating states and we have found that we can get children off Ritalin in 2 to 3 months. Beta states encourage focus and concentration and one can kick start the brain without the need for caffeine. Energy is also boosted.
2) The Alpha State (8—13 Hz)
In Alpha states when the brain hemispheres become balanced, we get whole brain function and improve our mental acuity, so, memory, both long and short term, and learning are enhanced. We always hear kids being told to play Baroque music while studying. This is because Baroque music resonates at about 10 CPS, right in the middle of the Alpha range of frequencies, which of course assists in learning.
In Alpha, the brain produces Endorphins and Serotonin, natural neurochemicals. Endorphins are the body’s natural stimulants and pain relievers. Serotonin is a natural anti-depressant. These are known as the happy hormones which make us feel good. Stress and depression are very easily treated by being in the Alpha state.
In Alpha we accelerate recovery from injury, surgery, disease, trauma, physical exertion and jet lag. We reduce anxiety, sleep patterns are enhanced for about 2 to 3 nights, even with Alpha stimulation, bearing in mind that Delta is the sleep state. There are also some immune system gains, although the big gains in this come in the next state down, Theta.
3) The Theta State (4-7Hz)
Research, from the Longevity Institute International, shows that in Theta the brain causes the suppression of the production of cortisol by the adrenal glands to. This is the stressing, anti-immune and ageing factor in humans. And it enhances the production of the DHEA hormone. DHEA strengthens the immune system and enables us to live longer.
In Theta creativity and problem-solving abilities are enhanced. Theta is where Psychologists do regressions because this is where repressed memories are best accessed. This is the “baggage” that is holding us back from living more fulfilled lives. We enhance mental and emotional health and heal unresolved emotional problems. Memory is enhanced and sleep patterns are improved.
4) Delta (below 4Hz)
Delta is the sleep state. Children sleep in very deep delta, us adults sleep in a very light delta state. The good news is that in deep Delta the brain produces Human Growth Hormone, the substance that builds bone, muscle, tissue, hair, gives us energy and slows down the ageing process. One of the sessions specifically developed gets us down to just below 1 Hz. In this deep delta state, the brain floods the body with endorphins which relieve pain without the need for pain killers. We have had chronic pain sufferers go up to 3 days pain free, without the use of pain killers, which burn holes in the stomach.
The benefits of AVE include deep relaxation, strengthened immune system, accelerated learning, peak mental performance, increased energy, focus and concentration, enhanced creativity, problem solving and intuition, expanded perception, whole brain function (by balancing the two hemispheres of the brain), improved confidence and motivation.
- Control Theory /Reality Theory – Dr William Glasser
This theory is all about having more effective control over one’s life and to stay in control. It is important that learners discover their different need systems and to understand one’s behaviour and why one reacts in a certain way. In Control theory, we also assist the learner to discover their picture system, sense system and behaviour system. The practice of Reality Therapy is an ongoing process made up of two major components:
- The counselling environment
- Specific procedures that lead to changes in behaviour.30-33
- Dr Georgi Lozanov from Sophia, Bulgaria, received in the early 1960’s the Nobel prize for his research and teachings. His research showed that one can learn a child in 3 x 45-minute sessions, 150 new words in a foreign Suggestopedia – Dr Lozanov34language. The three major building blocks being:
- A relaxed and happy environment
- Involvement of both hemispheres, the cortex, sub-cortex, the conscious and sub-conscious
- Positive suggestion
- Visualization:
Richard Eckersley, a scientific journalist did an article on “Japan widens the gap in the intelligence race” He reported about a comparative research study that was done between the difference between the intelligence of children (VSA versus Japan). It was found that the Japanese children had a higher percentage of 15 %.
Visualization is a powerful tool for the following reasons:35
- Self-image
- Psychological growth
- Improved empathy
- Increased creativity
- Better memory
- Better concentration
- Sensory Integration:
Sensory integration is the ability of the brain to organize, process and integrate sensory stimuli so that the relevant response can take place in the form of movement.
The human senses supply the information of the body’s physical state and that of its surroundings. Senses are continuously received by the brain, not only by the eyes but also by all the senses in the body.
The brain localizes sorts and gives direction to these senses. When these senses reach the brain in a logical and well-integrated manner, it can lead to the forming of perceptual behavior and the learning processes. When the flow of the senses to the brain is disorganized, it’s results in a disorganized process and results in disorganized response in the person.
Sensory integration begins before birth and even before the child can walk, much sensory integration has already taken place. Spelling, movement and academic learning lead for e.g., to the complex integration of sensations from the eyes, neck muscles and ears.
Although each child is born with the basic ability for sensory integration, he must still be stimulated through interaction with his environment and the adaptation of his body and brain must occur during childhood. If the brain’s ability for sensory integration is sufficient to cope with the demands that the environment presents to the child, his response is creative, sufficient, and satisfying.
If your child can respond to this challenge and react successfully, then it can be said that this “pleasure” is described as successful integration.
Learning and behavior is the tangible evidence of sensory integration and therefore basic activities are part of the school’s curriculum.
- Life skills:
These play a vital role in the success of the Tutor’s Centre:
