Searching the Heart

About three years ago I was led to NDT by Dennis Gunderson of Grace and Truth books. I was in the trivium pursuit e-loop asking about a phonics program for children with autism. He then recommended a book “Too Wise To Be Mistaken, Too Good To Be Unkind” by Cathy Steere. It was the first book I read on autism written from a Christian perspective. I was touched by her story as it mimicked ours except they had the correct view of God and man as they trained their son with autism. We didn’t pursue it further until a year later when a neurodevelopment therapist came to the Valley Home Educator’s Conference in Modesto.

The therapy we are currently doing is simple but it’s assumptions are founded on neurobiology. It uses brain plasticity to address sensory issues and therefore improve function through frequency, intensity and duration. It is very similar to physical training of athletes, except instead of muscle it works on neurons and neuropathways. It is an approach to remediation that addresses the root causes of the bizarre behavior our son exhibits. It also explains that these odd behaviors are symptoms of a disorganized brain. Their clients range from those in the autism spectrum, down sydrome to dyslexia and ADD.

When we met our current NDT therapist she did a developmental profile that consisted of 6 main areas: Gross Motor, Expressive Language, Fine Motor, Visual, Auditory and Tactility. Each area is scored based on where the child falls in level of development which goes from Level 1(babies) to Level 9(Adult). These exercises done with sufficient consistency give the brain effective stimulation it needs to move the child to the next level of development.

For many years, a lot of resources were spent on his education and various therapies. But NDT puts them all together into one cohesive program that includes, but is not limited to, speech therapy, sensory integration, vision therapy, biochemistry, and sound therapy.