Children’s brains organize from bottom to top, starting from their brainstem and moving to cortical, ‘higher thinking’ areas last. Some children have a hyper-active stress response, and they quickly swing into brainstem survival modes of fight/ flight/ freeze.
One way to help these children move children from these super high anxiety states, to their calming ‘thinking brain’, is patterned, repetitive rhythmic activity.
Some examples of ‘brainstem calmer’ activities are:
Walking/ marching
Dancing
Running
Skipping rope
Drumming
Tapping
Breathing
Rocking
Listening to rhythmic music
Bouncing a ball
Swimming
Chewing
Linear swinging
Animal grooming
Singing
Poi spinning (older children)
Therapeutic massage
Chanting
This information has been adapted from Beaconhouse.org. Check out their website for tons of great information and resources.