Keep It Short & Simple

I adore the word "Simplicity" it can mean freedom from confusion and offer clarity by breaking down a complex issue into short simple and clear information.

Many Special Needs Children and Adults suffer from disorientation and overload of sensors before they even sit down to try and learn something, so it will always help firstly to address the sensory issues and then proceed clearly with the task in hand, remembering the acronym K.I.S.S. Keep It Short & Simple.

MaxiSteps is focusing on K.I.S.S.

Having A Good Posture

As a child I can remember in the evenings sitting at the family dining table, no sooner had I relaxed and slouched down then whack, my father gave me a quick flick on my knuckles with a spoon, I would automatically sit up straight to attention. At the time I thought he was too military with me and was always getting on my case. Now I can thank him for all the hundreds of times he reminded me to keep my back straight. Thanks Dad I am grateful.

Guess what, history repeats itself, I am doing the same thing with my own son, verbally of course with a little push in the back. Although we are in another time of history some things have not changed, our spines serve us better and longer by giving them some respect, straight at that.

I have become quite observant how many people have bad postures, more and more I notice young children, including children with special needs. According to my friend “Ted the fitness guru” he explained how it takes strong discipline to command your brain to remind your body to operate, the body more than often looks for the easy way out, it’s lazy, this also applies for facial muscles, remember to smile!

Incorporated into the MaxiSteps project is a section on posture. Let's get it right from an early stage, we can avoid a lot of pain later on in life.

Time Out

To all of my blog followers, I have been looking after a poorly family member for the last week, so please bear with me. Hope to be back blogging a.s.a.p. Kind Regards x

Making Connections

Don't you just love making connections in your life. I am a big fan of innovation and ideas and this morning I was reading my email a general newsletter from Martin Lindstrom (teaching major companies how to market their brand, see "Brandflash") promoting his new book "Buy.ology" the Truth and Lies About Why We Buy. Sound interesting! well for me blood starts rushing to my brain, why? because I am making a connection that's why, brain to perception back to brain.

Okay before you start believing this girl has really lost the plot, please read the synopsis of the book
Quote: Reveals what actually goes on inside our heads, it shows factors as varied as childhood memories and religious belief come together to influence our decisions and shape our tastes.Unquote
(Lindstrom conducted a three-year, $7 million neuromarketing study (sponsored by GlaxoSmithKline and Bertelsmann, among others that measured the brain activity of 2,000 volunteers from around the world. Some of the results confirmed marketing-industry hunches; others flew in the face of conventional wisdom).
Are you seeing what I am seeing, from a designers eye? Connections, no matter how irrelevant at the time, are vitally important to the big picture.

Disclaimer: I have no financial interest in this book.

Help! Hidden Data

While designing material for Special Needs I am faced with trying to put myself in the minds of the users ...... just look briefly at the importantance of perception.

We know that perception means having an awareness of or understand sensory information. So where does one begin? Let us look very briefly, in clear English, at the 5 main stimuli input zones that build our perception; Visually from our eyes; Hearing, sounds from our ears; Taste, from the receptive buds on our tongue; Smell from the receptors in our nose; Touch, from the nerve endings in our skin.

Then there are the hidden sensors, mentioning just a few of the many; from the inner ear, vibrations felt through the body; balance, feeling the body movement; heat and cold; pain (the 3 types); fear; emotions; joy, comfort etc. etc.

Okay let's imagine a super high-tech computer database that has just been created, let’s call it “My Personal Perception A”, slowly that database A will to fill up with masses of stimuli data, it will takes years, continuously making new connections, logically the more data inputted and large variance produces a wider more knowledgeable Personal Perception A.

Now when it comes to the second super high-tech database of “My Personal Perception Special Needs B”, firstly we know from the specialists that this database B has interference signals for example overload and/or lose of some connections which interfere with the initial process. So again it is logical to assume that the data input for Database B will differ in some respect to that of Database A.

What is the solution?

Firstly, we will need lots and lots of patience with database B it really is special. Some of the data will input easily, especially the visual data, usually resulting in millions of stored images, whereas other data for example the touch data might well temporary block Database B, objecting strongly to certain codes and therefore new codes and inventive methods will need to be implemented to enable the data to entered correctly.

Be pre-warned, Database B will always look for the “comfort” zone going on energy save and generally speaking database B will take longer because it often uses a different route than the database A.

Also expect with database B to use the “Enter” key again, again and again and might need to be pushed to overload on some occasions to achieve the desired activity.

However, database B is full of surprises and will hold lots of additional “hidden data", quite often filed incorrectly, usually surfacing at a later date or when focused and maximised.

What intrigues me is how much data is passed and stored in our personal database before we are born?

Are you left or right handed?

I've been looking into the subject area of left and/or right-handed users and the theory of Norman Geschwind's in relation to learning disorders, dyslexia and stuttering as well as increased spatial ability. It is such an immense topic and truly fascinating. I came across these interesting statistics on wikipedia.org

Quote:Though constituting less than 10% of the general population, 60% of U.S. presidents in the last 30 years have been left-handed, including Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain also happen to be left-handed. Unquote

I could not resist researching more under the heading "Left-handedness and intelligence", if you have time do click on the link below and have a quick browse http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left_handed. Lots of food for thought.

Next week I will be posting my notes on perception and different ways of thinking.

What is it with the name Joe?

I have been following the US Election, it is hard to avoid. The name Joe first came up with Sarah Palin and Joe six pack, we all had to wonder who is this Joe six pack, did she mean six packs of cigarettes, six cans of beer or the nickname for someone who goes to the gym and works on their six pack! Then later with McCain came Joe the plumber! even Obama was talking about poor Joe.

You know I hate to disappoint them all but I came up with "Joe" before in my learning to write sheets, designed months ago. Well we can joke but the name sure sits in your thoughts, do you think they went to the records for the most popular baby names in the 60's and 70's ? I wonder