In the 60s when I first began working with students with Learning Disabilities, we often emphasized activities designed to promote perceptual and motor development. We were operating on the theory that motor development undergirded cognitive development; that correcting underlying motor and perceptual problems would provide a foundation for better cognitive development; and that having children walk on raised beams, make “angles in the snow,” practice eye-hand coordination, and so forth would help correct those underlying problems and, indirectly, help with academic learning. After scores of studies, we realized that those activities aided perceptual and motor skills, but had no benefits on skills such as reading, writing, computing, and such.
Welp…it’s back! There are Web sites and more. For example, I found the same balogna in an article with the title of “New Brain Fitness Device Help Children with Learning Disabilities.” It refers to Frank Belgau, once identified as “director of the Visual and Motor Control Lab at The University of Houston,” who has equipment and training seminars for sale at Learning Breakthrough and Balametrics
Here’s a snippet.
The Learning Breakthrough Program is a balance and sensory activity program designed to help better organize brain processing. The program entails a child watching a DVD or VHS which takes him or her through tasks such as throwing beanbags, tossing balls at a bounce back target while standing on a unique balance board or tapping a hanging ball.
The article includes some contextual materials about LD that are actually pretty accurate. But it also includes lots of other matter of dubious nature. The Web sites give some background on the developer and even refers to research about it. The research is actually quite weak. There is what amounts to a testimonial and a reference to one study. The one study shows improvement in early adolescent students who received training, changes that are equally likely to be observed because of the passage of time or because individuals who have extreme scores at the first time of testing are likely to have less extreme scores on a second testing (regression to the mean). That study is available as a PDF from the Dore Achievement Center in the UK.
I have no problem with teaching children physical skills. Those are valuable in their own right. But, please don’t expect that improvements in perceptual-motor skills will lead to improved academic performance. These folks are showing us one weak study. That is not sufficient to outweigh the 180 studies that, in aggregate, show neglible benefits…and there’s another summary for which I don’t have a link.
Milwaukee newspaper editorial
In an editorial about a special education class action suit, the Milwaukee (WI, US) Journal Sentinal got it spot-on right! After remarking on the obligation of the Milwaukee Public Schools to provide a free and appropriate publice education for students with disabilities and the failure of the local education agency (LEA) to identify children with Learning Disabilities, the un-named editorial writer notes that a magistrate encourage the plantifs and the LEA to negotiate a settlemenet.
Bingo! What a refreshing view. I’m writing a letter to the editor.
Link to the editorial and also read an accompanying story.