Movement Integrates

Episode 305

In this episode, number 305, I interview DIR® Expert Training Leader and Occupational Therapist Maude Le Roux who has a DIR® clinic, A Total Approach, in Glen Mills, PA. She has her own online academy where she trains professionals and parents and recently launched a fabulous new Family Support Circle. She is an international trainer in many other modalities as well. We are discussing the importance of daily movement. Why should we move with our kids every day? How should we do the movements with interaction for sensory integration and motor planning?

You can also subscribe on your preferred podcast app by searching, “We chose play from Affect Autism”

Why Movement?

I asked Maude why we should move with our kids every day and how we should do the movements with interactions, adding in that Floortime aspect for sensory integration and motor planning. Parents struggle so much to get our kids to move and to get off the screens! Maude says that in Candace Pert’s book Molecules of Emotion: The Science Behind Mind-Body Medicine she talked about the peptides that are released that she called the molecules of joy because when you move, it energizes your system into more arousal that actually supports the hormonal interaction for experiencing joy.

The Struggle to Move Enough

Movement is the biggest piece of health, Maude continues. It’s so much more than simply just looking at the vestibular system. It impacts all other functions of life. Movement is an integrator for the entire sensory nervous system. Movement is a part of praxis, motor planning, sequencing, and timing. When we don’t move, Maude states, it causes so many more ripple effects that we are seeing every day in kids. I shared how many Autistic kids can’t stop moving, like my son did when he was little. 

As they get older, screens dominate more and more as they discover video games, YouTube, and find their interests. I struggle with getting in enough movement that is fun and play-based by following the child’s lead versus just directing with instructions! It seems like you need so much thought and planning to do this. I’ve tried to facilitate this in ICDL’s DIR Parent Network by referencing activities in the Visual Spatial Planning Assessment (ViSPA) created by the Rebecca School from concepts in the book Thinking Goes to School where they list movements mapped on the New York State curriculum. 

The authors of the ViSPA worked with one of the authors of the Thinking Goes to School book, and Dr. Stanley Greenspan used to say to them to do these movements every chance you can including when the kids entered school, such as having them trace a Figure 8 and another movement when they go into their classroom, etc., tying opportunities for movements into routines already in place. Still, parents struggle with this because we have to figure out how can we make this fun and less overwhelming.

It’s Not All About Seeking Vestibular Input

Maude says we probably wouldn’t be talking about older Autistics in this way if we understood it. When they were high movers when they were younger and really think about movement in those earlier times when the momentum was at the core and they were running everywhere, we can really look at what that movement means. If we can harness that at that age we probably won’t be looking at what we’re looking at in older ages. Many people think that because a child is a high mover that they are seeking vestibular movement. It may be so, but it’s actually only a fraction of the kids, Maude declares.

Many of them are more seekers of deep pressure and the connection between the vestibular and deep pressure. Others are using movement because of the fact that they don’t feel relationally secure. Some kids are movement seeking out of protection of their own nervous system that if they’re on the go, then they can be catching something when it’s coming at them and they can protect themselves. We need to be far more discerning as to what that vestibular system is really needing at those ages of 2, 3, 4, and 5 so we can do the right intervention at the right time, Maude claims, which means everybody needs to be involved.

It’s relationship. It’s the task activity. It’s the skill. It’s the regulation. It is all intermixed as Greenspan absolutely explained to us in his DIR® model, Maude continues. If you harness FEDC 1 and 2 very well, which is where all of this is actually landing, then you can look at a brighter FEDC 3 and 4, which is a big piece of what we’re talking about. Maude was referring to the functional emotional developmental capacities, the D in the DIR® model.

Screen Time

Maude emphasizes that what is really important when thinking about the video game piece is that the technology takes your focus to your center, which takes away the periphery. You’re simply sedentary, so you’re losing skill. That’s why the Center for Disease Control says no electronics until the age of 2, unless you’re doing Facetime with somebody that’s far away, then occasionally use at ages 3 to 4 with parent supervision for maybe 30 minutes a day. But then after that, they still say parent discretion.

The other part of this is that since there’s a high visual component to these games that they’re playing, the visual is moving all the time on the screen, Maude continues. It becomes a compensation for the movement system of the body to get some movement. And then for some kids, it becomes addictive because they’re not moving their body. That’s one place they can get movement without having to actually do much in practice. The screen does it for you. It’s not all bad, though, she says.

Maude said that if a child is playing Super Mario games, it’s great to have a social conversation about Mario. But if we get these hours on hours and hours of screen time, we are working against the very thing we want to see. Then, when we get them into the school setting with academics, there are huge problems with social, movement, how you integrate timing and your body so you can even be on time for the bus.

How Kids Can Compensate

I shared how my son used to run all the time, always moving, knocking things over, and we know that for him, he cannot get enough proprioceptive input. However, when some kids need proprioceptive input and you give too much, they go over that threshold into dysregulation. But specifically for my son, he can’t get enough proprioceptive input. It’s what he’s seeking when he goes on the big roller coasters with their fast movement. Maude adds that the roller coaster is also providing the momentum required to make it work.

When you’re sitting still at a desk, though, doing academic work, all of that momentum support goes away and now you just have to sustain your body against gravity, and this is why many kids can look like they are beautifully coordinated when they’re running, but when they sit at the desk, it feels like they can’t coordinate themselves enough to do what is expected of them. When we are sedentary, Maude says, our entire vestibular system is supporting us to understand where our bodies are in space, and we can use our body in any shape or form that we want to without thinking about it, such as how Maude can grab a sip of coffee while talking to me without thinking about it.

Movement Supports Us

Movement integrates how our visual system is going to be applied to reading and writing. Movement integrates how our body is going to be supported in any kind of a sports activity. Movement supports how we can listen and look at a social partner when having a social discussion. Movement is everywhere. When we gesture, we’re moving. When we communicate we are moving.

Neuroanatomically speaking, Maude continues, movement is the only system that really revolves into itself. All of the other systems need the movement system. Movement is also completely linked to our auditory system. You cannot separate them, neuroanatomically. They even share the same cranial nerve, and we only have 12 of them. So if you want to support the auditory system for better communication and better listening, movement is key, Maude states.

How to Apply Movement Into Each Day

Maude says that Autistics have their preferred interests, and if you work with the preferred interest, good old Floortime, you’re going to get further. You need to be able to think about how to pair an everyday activity with something that they prefer. When my son was little, everything was trains. At Maude’s clinic, they used the trains to get my son to move around the track, and when they on purpose didn’t have the right tracks at the right place, he had to get up to look for them. All of that was any transition that you do from sitting to standing from standing to crawling.

All of those transitions are movement, so sometimes simply changing the positioning is movement. You don’t have to get as extreme as having to go to the monkey bars. It’s keeping the body mobilized. If you can jump up and do some jumping jacks with them or something fun every now and again, great! Plan outings to a petting farm or touch museum where you have to walk around to see things. Whatever it is, Maude reminds us that we have to be involved. The relationship is what’s going to cover the impetus and the intrinsic motivation, she says. If you’re going to wait for your child to start moving on their own, you’re going to wait a long time.

We have to model it. That’s what the research is saying very clearly to us, Maude states. It’s not what we say; it’s what we do. Development asks that we be their core regulators as adults, Maude shares. I referred to a couple of podcast episodes I did with Occupational Therapist Robbie Levy during COVID who recommended stop-start movements over using a weighted vest, for instance, which your body acclimates to quickly. When Maude mentioned jumping jacks that’s what made me think of that, and I use it at home with my son. If he is playing with his Mario characters and forgot some in the bathtub, I have him run upstairs to grab them and he’s very motivated to do that.

Maude responded that jerky movements are alerting movements so they arouse your system which is what you want because what they do on the video games, for example, is stay settled. They’re so involved in their mind, and again, video games can be excellent for cognitive skill, but too much of it is at the cost of the body. And kids are never too old to play chase, Maude suggests. Just suggesting that you race to the door and see who will be first can actually work. Competition works well with a teenager that understands what the competition is about. It doesn’t work well with the young one. They don’t have the same timing or sequencing. It does get better when they get older and they can get motivated by it, Maude assures. Maude suggests even adding a few hops as you’re walking to exhilarate that nervous system.

Maude also mentioned doing things in different ways or in different places each day, such as getting dressed, and including singing with related songs on YouTube because rhythm is movement. When you’re incorporating this in everyday activities, it also prepares them so much better for school. Whenever Maude visits a school she is always on about how there should be a movement routine in the morning before they sit at desks. People must understand that they’re transitioning from outside and transitions are not so easy. You could use music playing in the background, such as marching tunes where you march together.

Every parent has a huge amount of stress and lack of time. Maude wants parents to be parents. It’s all about the relationship, so don’t think of it as having to add more to your day, she says. Instead, think about slightly altering a getting up routine, for instance, where you sing together in a fun way as you get up, adding rhythm to the trip to the bathroom. That piece alone, when you’re embedding that all through the day, through your relationship, will amaze you, Maude promises, to see how much quicker the child’s occupational therapy will go.

Don’t worry about what you didn’t do in the past, Maude says. Think about how you can move forward and just incorporate little movements every day, one step at a time.

Thank you to Maude for sharing this valuable information with us about the importance of movement. If you found this episode helpful and informative, please consider sharing it on social media!

Until next time, here’s to choosing play and experiencing joy every day!