Below find 2 compulsory activities plus your journal to do before next segment, and further ideas that you can continue to work with, either on your own, or within your study groups. The printable version is at the end.
Much of what I have included below are simply questions/ideas to direct your learning. Use them as you will.
I have given you a lot to explore – feel free to develop your own learning plan and strategies to put it into action.
Find what interests you, find a level of challenge that you feel comfortable with and PRACTISE.
Also find time to enjoy simply being, and see what can emerge when you are not needing to consciously look for or find something…..allow something to simply emerge.
FIRST ACTIVITY – DESIGNING ATM SERIES – *****COMPULSORY*****
I really want to keep your ATM teaching alive and foreground in your attention, so this is a ‘virtual’ exercise – a place for you to try out new ideas, challenge yourself, make yourself think, come up against what you’re not sure of, feel your insecurities, find a way through them, and all in the safety of your imagination – it can be a powerful learning experience. And it’s possible for all of you to partake in it, even if you’re not teaching ATMs yet.
It is also a useful way to begin to think/ponder how you would develop a series of FI lessons for a client.
Again we are interested in using the model of
• WHAT THEY WANT ……… what they ask for that would be useful to them in their life, what they would like to improve, develop more skills/options in.
• WHAT THEY NEED ………. in Feldenkrais terms/language, what would they benefit from understanding, in terms of what they want. You could think of this in terms of the DNA model we talked about last time – having a learning strand, and a movement strand, that together would enhance/expand their self-image.
• WHAT THEY CAN ACCEPT………… within the ATM structure what lessons do you think would be appropriate for your participant/s. What learning language may be ‘potent’ for them? What schema/mind maps may they have that could ‘get in the way’ of their learning, that you would need to address.
• WHAT THEY CAN USE………….. how could you help them to transfer their learning to their lives in a way that is meaningful and relevant to them.
Choose a group of people that you would be interested in teaching, but don’t feel you have the experience or confidence to present to yet. Make it challenging but not threatening to your sense of what is possible for you to imagine.
Think of a function that you think they would be interested in exploring over a series of 5 lessons – you can make this as abstract or concrete as you like. For example – it may be a group of acrobats who want to improve their balance on the high-wire, or a group of elderly people who want to have more fun in their lives, or professional sprinters who want to start out of the blocks better, or a group of meditators who want a sense of feeling ‘enlightened’, or a group who want to feel more comfortable in dealing with anxiety. Be as outlandish as you dare!
• How would you break this function up into its main components – what do they need to understand?
• What would be important in terms of timing, orientation and manipulation with reference to this function?
• If you needed to investigate this function more to get a clearer sense of it in yourself, what avenues would you explore, what would you need to understand?
• Once you have more clarity on what the function involves, what ATMs could you use to address the function?
• How would you assess where they were in their ability to do this function at the beginning of the series?
• How would you progress the lessons – what order would you put them in?
• What criteria would you use from one lesson to the next that would tell you that the function was becoming more integrated?
• What could you specifically bring their attention to that would aid in the learning of this function?
By all means feel free to get ideas from your fellow students, or to use them as a ‘sounding board’, however this is mainly about you finding ‘your way’ on this. HAVE FUN!
Come to the next segment with your 3-5 lessons, and to be able to talk about your ideas/questions/reflections on the above process in a small group.
SECOND ACTIVITY – ATM PRACTICE
Keep up a regular ATM practice to further refine your self-image, your organisation and your learning abilities, skills and knowledge.
Attend a regular ATM class with a practitioner, do recorded ATMs, ‘play’ around on the floor. Simply DO IT REGULARLY.
Reflect on the lessons from the last segment. What did you learn specifically and generally from those lessons
1. about yourself as a learner within ATM?
2. about your organisation?
3. about your self-image?
THIRD ACTIVITY – ATM Teaching Practice
Continue with teaching ATM – build on your experience of teaching – it doesn’t matter who you teach to or how many people you teach to. Teach to further enhance your skills, AND continue after teaching to go over the categories we have been using to reflect on what you did well, and what you would like to improve further.
FOURTH ACTIVITY – Amherst FI Videos *****COMPULSORY*****
Zoran suggested you watch the Amherst FI video – Becky #3 11July 1980, and to attend to how Dr Feldenkrais works with Becky to facilitate her breathing. And to note what ideas, expressed through handling and movement, do you recognise in this FI lesson.
Could you also watch the first 2 lessons that Becky has ( #1 – 5 July 1980, #2 – 9 July 1980) and come up with your ideas based on what you see, and on getting on the floor and being Becky, that you think allowed Dr Feldenkrais to work more specifically with her breathing in the third lesson.
See what you come up with and come prepared to share your ideas in the next segment.
FIFTH ACTIVITY – FI Practise
My experience is that the major way of developing your competence and confidence as a Feldenkrais Practitioner is to PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTISE!!
Feldenkrais stated that learning, takes TIME, ATTENTION and CONTINUING DISCRIMINATION.
A REMINDER –
Two of the most important skills to learn when giving FI lessons are –
***Remember these questions are only suggestions for you to consider while practising. Use them or not, whatever you find that enhances your learning is what we are interested in.
1. The importance of your SELF-USE. As we mainly communicate through touch in FI, and are giving the ‘client’ a sense of quality movement through our organisation, it is important that we are organised to the best of our ability (at that moment, on that day). This usually means staying within our ‘neutral’ range.
• Are you becoming clearer on HOW you define this range?
• HOW do you know that you are in this range?
• HOW do you assess it?
• WHAT are its sensory motor characteristics?
• DO you take time to continually reassess this during your FI practice?
• HOW does staying within this range influence your thinking, feeling, sensing and moving abilities while practising FI? – both of yourself and your client.
• HOW does it influence your client’s experience of the lesson?
• HOW important is it to find this neutral range when you are doing something that you don’t feel competent doing, especially when it is new skills that are being asked for?
This is really useful to continually make further distinctions and get feedback on, both from your fellow colleagues and others outside the training.
Share these thoughts with your colleagues…………..
2. GUIDING the learning process. We all know from our experiences in the FM the importance of creating a safe and supportive environment, where we can be challenged, and still feel a sense of competency.
We know that it is easier to sense differences when we use less effort, go slower, and spread our attention.
When learning we are constantly moving along a spectrum from being bored, to challenged to threatened. For each activity how do we find a suitable amount of ‘challenge’ for both ourselves and our clients?
HOW when practising FI can you provide a safe, supportive environment for both yourself and your client. HOW can you position them to find as quickly as possible a place where they feel more connected, where they already have some understanding of what is being asked of them.
Just like you in ATM if the movement or position is too challenging, very little learning can take place – everything feels a struggle, too hard, ‘you’re not getting it’. It’s difficult to spread your attention, to have a bigger picture.
HOW do you find a place/position for you client to be successful, to feel competent – what support do you both need?
We want you to be successful and feel competent as well, so HOW do you organise yourself and your client to be in a position where you both feel challenged not threatened, where it is easier to make distinctions, to go with what we already understand and expand from there.
A lot to think about……………………..see what you come up with as you practise.
HOW do you think of these 2 skills above as you do your FI practise between segments.
******ALSO a wonderful learning tool is to observe these 2 criteria when watching the Amherst FI videos. How does Dr Feldenkrais ‘enact’ these during the lessons?
Most importantly…………SIMPLY PRACTISE.
SIXTH ACTIVITY – Transferring FM principles to other areas of your life
Think of an aspect of your life that you would like to have more options in or improve in.
If ‘we know what we’re doing’ we can do what we want’. Another saying that Feldenkrais (&many others) use is ‘know thyself’.
We ORGANISE ourselves to not have options, to procrastinate, to be happy, to be ‘open’ to others etc. If our action is achieving our intention – that’s good, however could we be doing it with more ease, less effort, adaptable breathing and a sense of reversibility. If our action is not achieving our intention or we feel cross-motivated – HOW can we find another way of doing what we’re doing?
How important is the concept of ‘ neutral range’ (at any given moment) in allowing us to have more possibilities in our thinking, feeling, sensing and moving; to have a larger image of what is possible for us living, relating and acting in the environment that we do.
JOURNALS – THIS IS STILL COMPULSORY!!
The new learning groups for this year will be sent out soon so that you know who to contact if you have any questions between segments
Could you include in your journal what your personal learning has been between the segments.
We are interested in your process, rather than in what you have ‘achieved’. What is an honest appraisal of where you feel you are in your journey of becoming a Feldenkrais Practitioner in both FI and ATM?
What questions do you have, what do you think you need more practice &/or clarification in the next segment to further facilitate your learning?
Could all journals be in to Jenni, Zoran and myself, by Wednesday 29th March for Melbourne participants, and Wednesday 19th April for Sydney participants.
All the best……ENJOY THE LEARNING,
Julie
