Why it is called Keiki Brain Works Centre?

"Keiki" is hawaiian word for children. I used to live and work in Hawaii. Many important life milestones of my happened in Hawaii. Hawaii is a lovely place. To remind me with my work motem, I decided to use Hawaiian words to name the therapy centre. Keiki Brain Works Centre is a child- centered learning centre where neurological development of a child is emphasized.   

Learning Centre For Mild Disabilities Pre Schooler

Leap Program --- a pre-school readiness program (8:30 am to 11:30am, Monday to Friday) for preschooler (4-6 years old) includes:

●      Academic

●      Social skills 

●      Self help skills

Keiki Brain Works is a learning Centre caters for children who learn differently, are labeled as having “special needs”, although this is not the term used at our learning place.

Keiki Brain Works is led by Claire Ang, a specialist in special education for over ten years. She is a trained psychologist and Kinesiologist who believes “movement is the door to learning”. Hence, the learning curriculum for preschoolers is based on national preschool syllabus incorporate with Brain Gym® activities.

Our Philosophy

We believe that each child has unique needs and potentials. We recognize the importance to use different approaches and methods to draw out their potentials so that they enjoy learning journey.

Our Goal

Our goal is to help your children, our clients to draw out potential and thus learn effectively and at ease.

Up Coming Workshops 2013 at Keiki Brain Works Centre

For details, please check out www.keikibrainworks.com

Keiki Brain Works Centre: 47A, Jln Harmonium 35/1,

Tmn Desa Tebrau, Johor Bahru.

An Introductory Class on How to enhance Learning through Movements for all ages and Special Needs

Date: 20/1/2013        Time: 10 am to 12:30 noon

Venue: Keiki Brain Works Centre

This short class is a great way to experience the uniqueness of movement in enhancing learning. It is for all ages and abilities. As what Dr. Paul Dennison, creator of Brain Gym and learning specialist from USA said “movement is the door to learning.” The techniques are worth learning to activate sensory system and stimulating neurological development. Thus, it integrates emotions, mental process and body.   

 Series 1

Brain Gym Movements class for Parents and Educators

Do you need simple, quick tools to help you support your kids with their learning?    

 

Session 1 Date: 10/3/2013 (Sunday)    Time: 2pm to 4:30pm

Venue: Keiki Brain Works Centre

How to have better concentration, reading comprehension and thinking        skills 

Session 2 Date: 30/3/2013 (Saturday)  Time: 2 pm to 4:30 pm

Venue: Keiki Brain Works Centre

How to improve child’s organization skills

How to reduce stress in learning

Session 3: Date: 28/4/2013 (Sunday)   Time: 2 pm to 4:30 pm   

Venue: Keiki Brain Works Centre

How to enhance academic learning skills

Intructor: Ang Menglin Claire, who is a psychologist by profession and certified Brain Gym Consultant. She has vast experience working with students in mainstream school and children with special needs. She has been working in intervention sector for nearly ten years in Malaysia and USA.

             

 Series 2

Movement Based Learning Activities 1 ---

The importance of movements in growing up journey

Date: 5/5/2013                        Time: 10 am to 12 noon

Venue: Keiki Brain Works Centre

Target Participants: All are welcome; especially parents, who wish to empower parenting skills.

In this class, participants are able to open a new understanding of supporting the children with different abilities and learning styles with effective tools of building blocks. Movements and activities in this workshop are based on child’s natural movements and normal human development.  Movements Based Learning brings together the science of the body with the science of brain. They bring about rapid and often dramatic improvements in focus, comprehension, communication, organization and physical movements.

Class outline: Experiential basis, Discussion, parents sharing

Movement Based Learning Activities 2 ---

A good play—the essential part of growing up

Date: 1/6/2013                 Time: 10 am to 12 noon

Movement Based Learning Activities 3 ---

Building blocks in learning for all abilities

Date: 30/6/2013                      Time: 10 am to 12 noon

Movement Based Learning Activities 4 ---

Love and Guidance are necessary in growing up journey

Date: 7/7/2013                        Time: 10 am to 12 noon

Movement Based Learning Activities 5 ---

To moving forward is to back up

Date: 8/9/2013                        Time: 10 am to 12 noon

Movement Based Learning Activities 6 ---

Vision --- a key to unlock the block

Date: 7/7/2013                        Time: 10 am to 12 noon

New Address and New Program

Keiki Brain Works Centre will be moving to new place. New address is 47A, Jln Harmonium 35/1, Tmn Desa Tebrau, JB, Johor.

New program include: One to one intervention

                                       Pre School Readiness Program

                                       Workshops for teachers and Parents

                                                      

Brain Gym One Day Workshop in Johor Bahru, November 2011

When: 12/11/2011 Saturday

Where:
Keiki Brain Works Centre, Tebrau One Residence, BLK E, 
06-10, Jln Harmonium 24/2, Tmn Desa Tebrau.

Who should come:
Parents, teachers, special needs teachers, therapists, and people who want to enhance ability in learning.

Instructor:
Claire Ang Menglin , certified Brain Gym Instructor and trained psychologist.

Time: 9am to 4 pm.

Fee : RM 270 (incl 2 refreshments, and a Brain Gym illustration booklet)

Email: ang.claire@ymail.com

Nature versus Nurture

“ To find for each person his true character,

to differentiate him from all others,

means to know him” Herman Hesse.

Introduction

It has been a long debate over the past decades about the importance of nature and nurture in shaping personality and behavior. Some extremists even talk about which one is more important in breeding a genius child. However, in the recent year people tend to change their view and arguments due to the fact that many current researches show that both components play an important role as these two components are interweaved.

How we view the heredity and environment (nature/ nurture) issue slants the way we perceive and behave towards our children and thus shaping their personality. They indeed are our next generation. In other words, the issue of nature versus nurture is a serious topic as it may lead to contemporary culture and ideas that we may not foresee now.

In addition, knowing the some important components of nature and nurture may help us in day to day life decisions. The knowledge that a child is genetically predisposed at birth to a quality such a temperament is important because it may help the parents to predict and adjust in many ways. For example, life style of parents, parenting style, attachments styles and even disciplines styles. We can see whether such quality remains stable through life or whether it changes, whether it is present all the time or depending on the situation, and whether there are other traits that can be expected to emergence or retreat into the shadows of character when circumstance change.

Nevertheless by knowing environmental factors that could affect personality traits and learning ability of human being is also important because it helps us to better aware of potential issues or problems so that we are able to better equip ourselves with knowledge. In other words, we may be able to prevent potential problems or unwanted trends in the next generation. As evolutionary psychologists stated, by putting all the pieces of psychological findings together, it provide a platform for all the human beings to better understand ourselves and  the next generations.

Definition of Nature

Nature is defined as the innate traits with which we are born and it is believed that the genes are the blueprints of it. To state it more clearly, it is Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), the blueprint of being which is an enormously large and complex molecule that encodes all of the genetic information necessary to build a life. DNA can be thought of as a sequence of letters that determines the structure of the body’s protein. We are a biological singularity because we have a unique collection of proteins. For the sake of safety and stability, individual pieces of DNA are usually wrapped in protein and coiled into a structure know as a chromosome which can specify the structure and function of the vast number of cells in ours body. No two chromosomes are identical; the precise code for how to synthesize a particular protein can vary substantially between the chromosomes in a pair.  (Steen, 1996)

Definition of Nurture

What genetics cannot control are the external events that occur during the internal processes of growth and development. Nurture is often taken to mean the social environment that surrounds and protects the child from birth to independence. However, this is a narrow definition. In fact, nurture should broadly define as anything and everything not explicitly in the genes. It includes family structure, parenting style, family attachment, the shared and non shared environment, the nutrition, family social income background and etc.

Argument for Nurture

As many scholars are now realizing everything we associate with nurture is at some level of product of our biology. It is supported by many current researches. Environment is an element that helps to shape us from brain development to food preferences. Consider the development of the brain. While gestating in the womb, a child develops some 50 trillion neurons. But those cells become functional only as they respond to external stimuli. If no external stimuli, for instance, touching on the skin, listening to the ears, looking at the light; the neurons will dead off gradually or in other words, the brain does not develop as it should be and designed for. During the first year of life, the most frequently stimulated neurons forms elaborate networks for processing information and get developed. One could say that our brain determines the structure of our experience or that experience determines the structure of our brains. (Cowley, 1995)

           As implied by Moreno, nature predisposition cannot dictate what language a child will speak (Moreno, 2010).  As on the similar thought, biology aspect also cannot dictate what game a child will play, what rites a child will observe or what a child will feel guilty or jealous about. Biology, in short does not determine exactly what will do in life. It is environment factors determines how different we are in various aspect. Our biology itself is a record of environments that our ancestors encountered in the past.

            Most of current researches show that gender difference in several aspects. It proven by most researchers that these difference are interaction between genetics and environments. For example, overall girls are more sociable and have higher verbal ability than boy. In contrast boys are more active physically and perform better in visuospatial tasks. (Moreno, 2010) Anthropology researches also yield the similar result that gender different in perceptual styles. That is men tend to excel at spatial reasoning, women is good at spotting stationary objects and remembering their locations. Such discrepancy may have biological basis, but anthropology researchers have traced the biology back to specific environmental pressure, that is men hunted and women forage throughout vast stretches of evolutionary time. (Cowley, 1995) Thus, from the Anthropology point of view, environmental factors do affect the biology structure in the evolutionary times in order to meet basic needs and to survive.

Argument of Nature

The core of many behaviors and most personality traits, the determinants of whether we are shy or extroverted, even the kind of jokes we find funny seem largely embedded in the coils of chromosomes that our parents pass to us at conception. The question today is no longer whether genetics influence personality, but rather how much and in what ways. The answer emerging in the last decades primarily from longitudinal studies of twins and adopted children brings increasing clarity to the nature versus nurture debate. While environmental forces can help to shape personality, it is apparently equally true that genes can dictate an individual’s response to those environmental forces.

A great deal of evidence shows that vast majority of human traits are controlled by different genes. Basically any trait that varies over broad ranges of expression is believed to be controlled by several to many different genes, in a process called mutligenic inheritance. Classic examples of traits that show a continuous range of variation caused by multigenetic inheritance include height, weight and Schizophrenia. (Freedman et al, 2001)

Behavior is surely one of the most complex and subtle of all human traits. Recent adoption studies confirm that environmental factor has very little nearly zero influence on the traits of extraversion and neurocism. (Larsen and Buss, 2010) Researches also show that genetic factors can play a role in schizophrenia, depression, alcoholism. (Franklin, 1989) (Freedman et al, 2001) According to a study done in Denmark in 1977, if one identical twin suffers from bipolar manic depression, the other has 79 percent likelihood of having the same disorder. In contrast, only 19 percent correlation in fraternal twin that may suffer from bipolar manic depression. ( Franklin, 1989)

 As a conclusion, genetic factor, to certain extend, contribute to several disorder in mankind. It thus is an important variable to study human personality and behavior.

My belief about Nature versus nurture

My choice of belief is neither for pure nature or pure nurture. I believe in the interplay of both roles. I think that only when all physical conditions are satisfactorily met, can a child begin to fulfill its genetics potential. Since mere survival can occur under conditions that are far from optimal for growth and development, this implies that the environment will often hinder a child from fulfilling its genetic potential. This is why it is so critical that care providers should be sensitive to those needs of the child. Direct interactions between the infant and the mother immediately after the birth are extremely important and the relationship with the mother remains important for the entire life of the child.

Having said the above mentioned idea, I would like to stress that parenting styles do influence how a child develop and growth. By knowing how parents and their children interact, we can more or less able to predict the child behavior. And this idea is proven by many current researches. For example, one research done by Haycraft and Blissett (2010) show authoritarian and permissive parenting styles are correlate to eating disorder. On the self report basis, one hundreds and five mothers were asked about the parenting styles. In contrast, authoritative parenting style has no correlation ship with eating disorder. Eating disorder has long believed relate to personality and stress, however in this research it showed to be related to parenting style. It is reasonable to believed that one’s behavior could be influenced  under of long period of stress and thus may lead to eating disorder. In another study about parenting styles and driving behavior found that teenagers reported parents with authoritative parenting styles are 71% less likely to drive when intoxicated and less likely to use cellular phone when driving. In the same study, researchers also found that teenagers with authoritative parents or authoritarian parents reported used of seat belt twice as often. The rationale behind this study show that parents’ involvement is truly essential in shaping children behavior. Authoritative parents always set high expectation and provide support and positive feedback on children behavior. This type of parenting style also emphasizes rules and rationale. Thus, children of this type of parenting style turn out to be more confidence and self controlled.  Authoritarian parenting style on the other hand, sets high expectation and rule but does not provide positive support or response to child’s behavior.  As compared to uninvolved and permissive parenting style which do not set any rules and rationale and are also not responded to children behavior, the above mentioned two parenting style are better in shaping desired behavior. And this is proven in this study. As conclusion of this study, clinician believe that policy makers should encourage parents to set rules and to monitor teenagers driving behavior in a supportive context. (Gingburh et al, 2009)

Parenting style is definitely a factor in shaping behavior since infancy. But as an individual grows up even with the non shared environment factors influence, parents as the significant other in one’s life affect the personality in long run, it may be affecting the whole development process of that individual. As a study reveals parenting styles is related to adjustment in middle and late adulthood.  It predicts multiple dimensions in adulthood. In a group of 2232 adults, the investigators assess the association between parenting behaviours remembered from childhood-classified as authoritative, authoritarian, indulgent, and uninvolved-and psychological well-being, depressive symptoms, and substance abuse, in a subsample of mid- and later-life adults. Differences in outcomes by sex, race, and childhood socioeconomic status were also examined across parenting styles. Results show that adults who remembered authoritative compared with authoritarian and uninvolved parents reported greater psychological well-being and fewer depressive symptoms, and those with uninvolved parents noted greater substance abuse. Authoritative parenting compared with uninvolved was more strongly associated with men's psychological well-being than women's. This research crucially prove that even just by remembered parenting styles, it continue to be related to functioning across the lifespan.(Rothrauff, 2009) This study also show that genetics and environments are inter-influence . As it shows that sex of female and male are parts of the variable. It can then imply that hormone (nature) does influence in the behaviour.

How a child structures his own environment is critically important and may radically affect how different children experience the same social content or even the same family. We are not passive in our own life. We actively structure the environment around us all the time. And children are certainly able to do that. The structure a child chooses to impose on his environment is the structure with which that child feels most comfortable, and this structure is likely to have something of genetic components.

What we see is shaped by how we see, and how we see is influenced by our genes. The infant is programmed to react to the mother’s breast and suck by instinct. Given the will and the right conditions for the insight into our predisposed patterns, nature will return to us.

            Based on the video “ The human animal: Nature and Nurture”, there are twin brothers who grew up in different families in different countries, yet they have so much similarities, such as smoking the same brand of cigar, liking the same color, and drinking the same wine. This indicates that genes do influences the behavior somehow or other. We can actually ask if genes predict the future, why then does the future remain so unpredictable? To put is another way, if we are all extraordinarily precise creature, functioning in a way completely determined by our genes, why is continual change in the human condition seemingly so inevitable? It may seem that nature has so overwhelmed nurture that upbringing may have no significant effect. But to argue that genes are destiny is surely as naïve as to argue that the environment alone determines the growth and development of a child. Asking whether nature or nurture is more important is like asking whether length or width is a better gauge of size.

As the late psychologist Donald O. Hebb of McGill University put it” Heredity determines the range through which environment can modify the individual.” (Steen 1996) This simple quote also acknowledges that there is an ongoing interplay between the genes and the environments, in other words, each of us are products of both forces. There is a continual tension between the possible and the actual, with the possible determined by the genes and the actual determined by the environment because experience modifies appearances, lifestyles and other domains in life. 

At last , I would like to state that it is impossible to argue either nature or nurture is more important in shaping personality traits and behavior. Of most of the researches and studies prove that both are important components in the human development. It is as stated in the textbook by Larsen and Buss (2010), human development is the function of external factors and genetic factors. From evolutionary point of view, genetic factors also affected by natural selection process along with our ancestors solved the problem of surviving and breeding.

I would like to conclude that we need not predict the future as long as we lead a positive and meaningful life at the present level. In the aspect of shaping personality of  young children is concern, it more important to be a supportive and loving parents and teachers in daily activities. Loving, caring, mindful and supportive are the essential qualities anyway as a mature adult, regardless if one is dealing with human, animal, and or the environment.  The will is coming back to us eventually.

References:

1.      Cowley, Geoffrey. “It’s time to rethink nature and nurture.” Newsweek March 27 1995:52-54.

2.      Franklin, Debarah. “What a Child is given.” The New York Times Magazine September 8, 1989: 36-38+

3.      Larsen, Randy J.; Buss, David M. “Personality Psychology.” Mc-Graw Hill: 2010

4.      Moreno, Roxana. “Educationaly Pyschology.” Wiley Publication: 2010

5.      Steen, R. Grant. DNA and Destiny­--- Nature and Nurture in Human Behavior. American: Plenum Publication: 1996.

6.      Huver, Rose ; Otten, Roy; De Vries, Hein, and Engels, Rutger. : “Personality and parenting style in parents of adolescents.”Journal of Adolescence; Jun2010, Vol. 33

issue 3, p395-402.

7.      Haycraft, Emma and Blissett, JackieSource: “parenting style and eating disorder.”

Appetite; Feb2010, Vol. 54 Issue 1, p221-224.

8.      Rothrauff, Tanja; Cooney, Teraa; Jeong, shin An. “Remembered Parenting Styles and Adjustment in Middle and Late Adulthood.” Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences & Social Sciences; Jan2009, Vol. 64B Issue 1, p137-146.

9.       Ginsburg, Kenneth R.; Durbin, Dennies R.; Garcia-Espana, J. Felipe.; Kalicka, Ewa A.; Wisston, Flaura K. “Associations Between Parenting Styles and Teen Driving, Safety-Related Behaviors and Attitudes.” Pediatric; October 2009, Vol 124, Issues 4, p1040-1051.

10.   ____________________, “The human animal: Nature and Nurture”, 1983,

What is Brain Gym®?

Brain Gym is a gently and energizing program which includes movements to coordinate the brain and body for greater productivity and learning. Brain Gym® movements prepare the brain and nervous system for optimal performance. The movements are used to release tense muscles, improve brain/ body communication, create a state of active relaxation and improve concentration, organization and coordination.

           How can Brain Gym® help a child?

“Brain Gym® activities imitate developmental movements that infants naturally do on their own when their physical development occurs without stress, injury, or interruption. These simple movements help stimulate the sensory system, coordinate eyes and hands and activate core postural muscles, supporting learning from inside out.” Cecilia Koester, USA, International Faculty, Brain Gym® Instructor. Brain Gym® focuses on the physical aspects of learning. It helps to enhance natural and joyful learning experiences through exercises that connect the brain and body.

How can Brain Gym® help an adult?

Qualified Brain Gym® consultant will lead you through a process called a balance. Choose a goal, something you wish to accomplish, or some potential within yourself that you would like to develop and you will be guided through a series of Brain Gym® activities to meet your specific needs. These activities help you access the skills and abilities that goal requires, allowing you an easily and enjoyably fulfill dreams that may once seemed unreachable.