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ME (Maryellen)
| | Posted on Friday, March 21, 2003 - 08:00 am: | 
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Hi Shelli,
What the "cake" does is allow you to see if the student can move their minds eye at will...
It does not need to be cake, although cake is something most folks understand so well that it is easy for them to picture. Whether you use focus or orientation, you need to know if they can control their minds eye and move it. If they cannot visualize or cannot change perspective, the Davis techniques may not be appropriate. Time to talk to a professional facilitator would be my guess...
With my cousin's 7 year-old, we went through the cake exercise...I was surprised at the change in the description of the "piece of cake" as he moved his minds eye to look at the cake from different vantage points. Around the sides, he described the layers of cake, whipped cream & pudding (pudding cake was his favorite)...from the top, the whipped cream and sprinkles (multi-colored)...from various angles, various descriptions that matched what you would see if you took a photo of a real piece of cake from those particular angles.
That exercise told me that he was thinking multidimensionally, in pictures, and that he had control over the perspective. Once that was confirmed, it was easy to move on to the focus.
As far as I know, there is no reason not to try the focus procedure with your older child. If, however, he has enough difficulty with 2 dimensional symbols...he may need the more precise orientation point. Again, if there is difficulty, it's probably time to consult with a professional facilitator.
It seems to be either extremely easy to get an orientation point or really difficult. My cousin, age 40, got it just from talking about the process that my children went through, as opposed to the focus procedure I was going to try with her 7 year old...She didn't even realize that she was dyslexic...She just thought (as she'd been told often enough at school) that she was stupid. What a change in her life as she went through the symbol mastery, spell read, symbol mastery for words, sweep reading, and picture-at-punctuation reading along with her 7 year old. For the first time in her life, she felt smart and confident.
My cousin's 15 year old son is doing a week with a professional facilitator this week...When I worked with him over Xmas break, he could move his mind's eye and get on point, but could not keep the point in a stable position...that was way beyond my "mom" experience. I recommended that she take him to the facilitor my children worked with. He's been having a great week...and by the end of day 2 had gone from "SCHOOL SUCKS" to "Mom, I know what Cyndi means about the tools and can see ways to use them. School's going to be OK..."
Hope that helps...
ME
Madison, WI
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It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men....Frederick Douglass |
chris joy
| | Posted on Sunday, May 18, 2003 - 01:23 am: |
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I am about to commence the perceptual ability assessment with my 12 1/2 year old dyslectic son.
I do find it very difficult to understand how one is able to move their mind's eye around at will as I cannot do that. It that how it is with non dyslectics or should I be able to?
I did occur to me that just as you can clearly focus on a word in a text and then willfully go into double vision and then refocus again, is perhaps similar to what a corrected dyslectic does when he moves his mind's eye around. Does that make sense? |
Liz Jolly
| | Posted on Sunday, May 18, 2003 - 04:17 am: |
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Hi Chris, don't worry that you can't move your mind's eye round that is OK. I well remember the February day when with book in hand Matt and I sat down to do the perceptual ability assessment. As we got to the first piece about visualizing a piece of cake, he just found it so easy, I was left thinking why can't I!!!!Being able to move the mind's eye is one of the perceputual talents used to resolve confusion, it works wonderfully for objects but not for the written word. It is great for someone with a primarily visual learning style but for those who do not have this style it can be difficult or impossible. For those people there is the Alignment Orientation Procedure. This was originally developed to give a non-dyslexic person a sense of what orientation was about, but is also used as alternative for people who are primarily kinaesthetic or tactile learners.
I hope this helps, my son is now just 13 and has almost finished his Trigger word list. If you would like to chat off board then my e-mail is Liz@mountainpass.co.uk Liz |
Jeannie
| | Posted on Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - 10:17 pm: |
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Abigal,
I have an odd question for you. My daughter went through the Davis program in Bellingham, WA four years ago. I now have another daughter ready to go through it. We were very happy with our facilitator and still are. She, however, is no longer with the Davis group. I spoke with her last night and she didn't really say why. I am trying to decide what direction to go from here. Can you give me any insight? |
DDAI Webmaster (Abigail)
| | Posted on Friday, February 25, 2005 - 05:10 pm: |
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Davis Facilitators are licensed for one year, with the licenses being renewed on an annual basis. Facilitators elect not to renew for a number of reasons: some need to take time off for personal, family, or health reasons; others take on different employment for financial reasons; and for others, life simply takes them in different directions. It is like any other profession -- I used to be a lawyer, and from time to time I get calls from former clients who are rather disappointed when I tell them I am no longer practicing law.
We currently have 10 licensed Facilitators in Washington, including one in Bellingham, and another in Mt. Vernon, about 25 miles away. You can find listings here:
http://dyslexia.com/cb/state.cgi?WA
Best wishes,
Abigail |
Margaret
| | Posted on Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 07:56 pm: |
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I am working with my 19 year old son. When doing the perceptual ability testing, he was able to see and describe his chocolate multi-layered cake with precision and accuracy from every angle. He was able to get his orientation point without difficulty and was able to anchor it down (he used fishing line and reeled it in and even commented that it hurt!). He even got a headache trying to hold his mind's eye on his orientation point. However, when I try to work with him and ask him to check his point to see that he is on point, or to see if his mind's eye has left his orientation point, or whatever wording I use, he says he doesn't get it. He doen't know what to check or what he is supposed to feel, sense, or whatever. I ask him if he can still find his orientation point and he can, and he can put his mind's eye on it, but he doesn't understand the process of figuring out if he is disoriented and how to reorient (I think). Any suggestions? |
Mark Fifer
| | Posted on Monday, March 20, 2006 - 10:47 am: |
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As a forty-year-old Dyslexic I can understand why you might not get it but that doesn't matter. It does matter that He gets it. First off the headaches are common in the beginning and will subside. If they are too distracting do the release exercise, which should help a lot. As for adjusting his point just have him move his finger to where he feels his point is, if it is not where it should be (as described in the book) move his point with his finger to where it should be. Have your son reel in his tethers. As for being disoriented he should know when he is disoriented. Some symptoms are as follows but are not limited to, dizziness while reading, difficulty understanding what you have read, difficulty keeping your place while reading "rereading same passage over and over, letters jumping,. Keep in mind whatever symptoms he has they may be very different from mine or any other dyslexic. Have your son take stock of the symptoms (difficulties) he has had reading in the past and use those as indications of disorientation. I have found a mirror useful when adjusting my point and have also found left to right drifting is more important than slight variations up or down. Having said all this if he is not having difficulty while reading his point is probably ok. Good luck |
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