New Routine & Right Brainers!

If you know what a Right Brain learner is - Great. If not let me explore it with you! Because some of this is new for me too!

Right Brain learners are total opposites as Left Brain learners (duh lol). I have finally come to realize that both my boys are Right Brainers. However almost everything caters to Left Brain learners! All curriculum in my house is Left Brain geared. Right brain learners need visual cues, they need hands on activities, for stories they need webs and maps. 

My daughter is a left brain learner. She loves workbooks, reading and doing things over and over, she is the one that has to get everything just perfect. She is great at phonics and writing. However my boys find those things extremely hard tasks to complete. Before we moved I had found a local homeschool mom that taught a program for Re-Training the brain with movement and specific exercise to help re connect those brain wires. We had paid for 3 sessions and we were actually seeing results in DS1. I then in turn done these motions at home with all 3 children to try to help all 3 of them have learning pathways opened. Learning glitches are when something just isn’t clicking for the child, it’s a continuous problem. It’s not that there is a lack of instruction; it’s simply that it can’t make sense to the child and it’s overly hard.

Now my oldest son has Auditory Processing Disorder which obviously contributes to his learning difficulties but even after a year of therapy he didn’t improved as much as I had hoped. With Auditory Processing Disorder it’s normally a disorder within the right side of the brain simply because of the topics that those people struggle with, but it goes a lot further than just right or left brained. That was the reason why I sought out additional help for him. I had done everything that was requested of me. I purchased additional Spelling Curriculum for him who he has done awesome with but he cannot remember rules, which again goes fully back to the APD and his low memory issues with that. I purchased a $400.00 set of Music that was supposed to help. You listened 20 minutes 2 times a day – NOTHING. I sold them in week 7. I took him to therapy once a week and spent a lone time with him daily for over a year and half to do the activities requested of me from them.

Now my smallest son, who is 7, is showing me the same signs my oldest did and I’m going to be very honest it scares me! I want to do better with my oldest in regards to finding something that helps his learning come easier. After all isn’t that why I homeschool? So now not only am I concerned that my oldest is still having issues but I have my smallest that is so funny and bright and has a huge imagination and all boy, might I add, that I am highly concerned over. I have been praying for guidance to help my boys. I want them to be confident learners and thrive!

My weakness shows here tremendously. I’m not too big to admit it. I feel like I have failed for letting this go on as long as it has with my oldest. I sought out help over 4 hours away. Went and stayed for an extremely lengthy testing session (6 hours just for the testing) and have took him to see a therapist and done everything that was asked of me for over a year! To see no real concrete results that he carries over into any subject. 

 I am a left brain learner. So books are my best friend. Doing something that’s not in a book is difficult for me. With that said I have found several things that I am going to be using with my boys. 

Starting Monday I will begin an L E N G H T Y review on Learning Link Technologies. God really has blessed me here. They sought me out! How’s that for God helping and answering prayers! They offer retraining the brain exercises that you download and have instructions for at home. Not only are the exercises and activities step by step included but also they have a video that you have to aid you in the movements in case you’re unsure of what to have the child do. We will be doing this first step for 1 month. Then we will be able to move onto step 2. The best thing I discovered while preparing for this was not only is it going to help with the processing issues my oldest has, but they offer additional activities for

Dyscalculia

Dysgraphia (which both boys have)

Dyslexia (DS2)

Reading

This is at NO additional charge! Many right brain learners have all these difficulties that they have to overcome. I think it’s awesome that they include these as extras! I was looking at additional resources to compare and I saw several books that was anywhere from $49 - $99 for each topic they wasn’t even bunched together like the assortment in the additional activities from Learning Link. I was so thrilled to have these included!

I would also love to add a quote from their site " More Academics Do NOT Fix Poor Academics."

We will resort to doing this as our main curriculum until we see much improvement within our boys. This is a HUGE change in our homeschool. We will stop everything, except Math U See which we are almost completely finished with anyway. I must feel as if I am doing all I can to help benefit the life of my children. You will start seeing updates on this program weekly probably in our weekly wrap ups. You will also see my likes and dislikes. From the things I’ve downloaded we will have no issues with the first month simply because it’s things we had already worked on with the other lady before we moved. 

If you’re concerned that you have a right brain learner there are a few tricks that you can start now to help. I will post next week on a list of helpful ideas for teaching right brainers.

Disclaimer: This product was given to me free of charge for an honest review on my blog. However this review is much more than that to me, this was something my sons needed and I'm thankful for this review.  This review is in no way related to the schoolhouse crew that  I also review for.