8 | October 2012 www.womanthismonth.com ‘Healing Through Art’ touched my heart. As an artist myself I believe that every soul has creativity in it. Art is the most spontaneous and true form of expression. A simple dot takes you forward with a line and then a design; a dot of colour grows to be overwhelming emotion. Ms Dalal is doing wonderful work by inviting children and adults into a beautiful world of colours. Colours are always healing that is why God made flowers, butterflies so colourful. They not only bring joy and happiness but tender and gentle feeling within our heart, which is gentle and warm offers us peace. We need peace in the world and young Dalal has chosen to show us the way. Geeta, by email. Letters Helping a Mother STAR LETTER Write Here Write Now 16 | September 2012 www.womanthismonth.com It’s with art that she learnt to solve her problems. Dalal Al Sindi talks of her therapeutic relationship with art. Art Healing through There’s an artist in all of us and everyone is capable of making a mark, says Dalal, when we catch up with her over coffee. Dalal should know. As Bahrain’s only qualified art therapist, she practises alternative means of healing and therapy through visual expression and the creative process. Given that each individual’s approach to art is quite personal, Dalal is able to get a deeper understanding of a client’s psyche through an analysis of their use of shapes, colours, symbols and creative inspiration. Growing up in a family of artists, it was natural for her to dabble in art in her growing years. Art for her was a journey of self discovery, especially during the difficult phases in her life. “With art, I learnt I could solve my problems creatively and the same applies to others as well,” she says. Following her master’s degree in art therapy from UK, Dalal went on to pursue her most challenging assignment at the King Fahad Medical City in Riyadh. Here she worked to rehabilitate patients suffering from physical and psychological issues such as stroke, traumatic brain injury, cancer, multiple sclerosis, schizophrenia and depression. “Alternative therapy results in the understanding and healing of a person’s mind through creative self-expression. I work with individuals and groups to help identify hidden issues and then develop a plan for healing and rehabilitation,” she says. In her sessions with clients, her focus is on encouragement and positive reinforcement to build confidence and motivation, thus minimising negativity. Dalal now conducts art therapy sessions at the Namaste Healing Centre in Budaiya besides working with schools for special-needs children. She’s also worked with the Ministry of Social Development on a campaign to unite children in Bahrain through art. She wants to continue her work with children with autism. “Specialneeds children never cease to amaze me with their potential. Working with them is the most rewarding experience,” she feels. The 28-year old is constantly exploring channels in alternative healing. She’s completed a course in the Japanese healing system of Reiki and also dabbles in Yoga. People www.womanthismonth.com 49 September 2012 | Your memory is your brain The human brain is highly complex and features many different ‘compartments’ each that does something unique. One way to get your head around it (excuse the pun) is by visualising the brain as a library stocked full of memories, instead of books. In this library, the librarian would be the hippocampus — the part of the brain most involved in memory. The hippocampus has a lot of responsibility. It simultaneously juggles the new releases of the short-term memory whilst cataloging materials for the permanent long-term memory section. It’s not the only part at work, however, in storing these chapters of our lives. The Memory Game It’s time to get working on your mind and memory. Just as we care for our body with exercise and the correct diet, we also need to care for our mind to ensure those precious moments aren’t forgotten. By Alison Coldridge www.womanthismonth.com Wellbeing We all have those loopy moments where we tear apart our homes looking for glasses perched innocuously atop our heads, or those embarrassing blunders where we call a colleague by the wrong name. The fact of the matter is the brain is congested and sometimes needs help, particularly within the memory department. Without being able to store memories, every element of life would be a struggle; challenges that people with dementia have to face. Our memory assists us with every aspect of our day-to-day life, from how to do basic equations to what the name of your mother is. Information overload Different kinds of memory are stored in different areas of the brain. With such a large system, the brain needs a system of encoding and retrieving memories, something a bit more complex than the local library’s Dewey Decimal System. The brain has to be able to instantly pull information when required; whether you need to remember a fact such as a phone number or a distant memory that’s been sitting in storage for years. Help is at hand Whether you are eight or 80, there are many ways in which you can improve your memory. In fact, it is far easier than you would think. You can progress your memory just as easily as you can your language or maths skills, simply by repeating and practising. 48 | September 2012 Art as a Healer WRITE IN AND WIN I appreciate ‘The Memory Game’ in September’s edition of the magazine. As women — whether we are students, employees, business owners or housewives — we more often than not tend to overload our minds with mental notes of tasks to do. We think about our responsibilities all the time and even worry about the problems of others. Your article reminds us of the importance of a healthy mind to complete our body and soul’s wellbeing too. Thank you! Dunia, by email A Healthy Mind Thank you to the whole team of Woman This Month for giving us readers such a good magazine. This September issue is really a good one with many helpful write-ups. I particularly liked ‘The Memory Game’ in Wellbeing, ‘Little Learners and Language’ in Parenting. The parenting section helps me a great deal as my daughter will turn three this December. I am sure all the mums would agree that it is a challenge bringing-up kids of this generation as compared to ours. Until my daughter was 18 months old, I used to talk a lot with her, especially saying rhymes, various sounds, songs, etc. My daughter now talks so much that sometimes I wonder why I taught her to talk! Jokes apart, kids at this age are filled with enormous curiosity and hence have infinite questions to ask. After reading ‘Little learners’, I feel proud that my daughter can grasp all words very easily and pronounce them correctly. Similarly, ’The Memory Game’ helped me. After my daughter’s birth, my memory seems to face sudden challenges at times. So much so, that I keep things in important files, documents in one definite place so that I find them immediately when required; but I actually don’t remember it when needed. I have started my own exercises for this and I guess these tips for memory will help me overcome this difficulty. Shreya, by email. 52 | August 2012 | woman this month 53 woman this month | August 2012 | Parenting By Dr Clare Beckett-McInroy and Simon McInroy A love of learning and language is something that all parents want their children to obtain. However, many parents are not aware of the influence they have and the part they play in the development of their child’s language acquisition. This article will enable you to understand generic tips on how to encourage your child to grasp language learning; it will also provide you with specific points to ‘play’ with in relation to the English language. By the age of six, most schools have firm expectations in terms of speaking and listening, reading and writing milestones your child should have reached. In order to fully engage with a school curriculum, and indeed to even gain access to preferred schools in some cases, solid skills in these areas are key, not only for developing as a communicator, but for being able to fully access all areas of a school curriculum. It is also an essential part of play and can form the basis for lasting relationships between your child and their friends. Getting to grips with the early knowledge and skills your child needs to grasp is not always the easiest journey for you or your child. This is partly due to the ‘melting pot’ nature of the English language, which has evolved to reflect the many influences of those who arrived on British shores over the years. There are consequently many rules, or part-rules, in contemporary English to which there are various exceptions. For children learning how to use the sound symbol (phonographic) system, they are faced with learning to make 44 sounds (lightly debated) in more than one thousand ways. For example, consider the ways we make the long vowel sound for the letter ‘a’: ai as in rain, ay as in play, a_e as in make and then of course exceptions such as ‘they’. The aim of this article is to give you some insight and practical advice on how you can support your child’s learning in terms of early childhood developments. So, where to begin? Speaking and Listening It has been claimed that a child’s ability to annunciate sounds is shaped by the sounds they hear in their first 18 months. Without a rich early experience of hearing sounds children may have difficulty using these in speech. Children’s early experience of hearing and verbalising sounds will also have a significant impact on how they use sounds when attempting to decode letters for reading and, when using speech, to inform the letters we use when writing. What can you do to help provide these crucial early experiences? Consider the following options: sing songs, say rhymes, listen to stories, talk about stories and pictures and experiences, and create stories together and tell and act them out to others. It is never too early to start. Very young children understand a great deal more than they can verbalise. Their known vocabulary is growing all the time with words and meanings being ‘stored’ until they can physically be spoken. As you speak with your child, you are providing a model for communication. Your child needs to be a skilled verbal communicator before they will be able to communicate in terms of our writing conventions. So get talking! Reading and Writing As your child starts school, the major building block for reading (and writing) will be phonological awareness. This term refers to your child’s ability to know and use the sounds we use that our letter symbols represent. At school your child will probably learn phonics in an order that allows them to quickly use sounds to read and build words. Many schools follow an approach termed ‘synthetic phonics’ which teaches letter sounds in groups that can easily be used. This first group in this programme is s, a, t, n, i, p. There are many words that can be made from this small group of sounds such as sat, in and it, and so children can start developing the skill of blending sounds as they internalise the sound symbol relationships. Starting to use these sounds as they are learned establishes their relevance and gives children early satisfaction with reading and creating words. There is, therefore, a positive emotional experience in which learning is more likely to be retained. A fantastic website for supporting the acquisition of phonic knowledge and skills is www.phonicsplay.co.uk. Going back to an earlier point, speech is obviously important in using phonics to help your child spell words. If trying to spell ‘this’ when annunciating ‘th’ as ‘f’, could be tricky. Issues such as these can result from a lack of early experiences in terms of hearing sounds but, very often this is not something to overly worry about at an early stage. Being able to articulate sounds is a developmental process. There are sounds that children find more difficult to verbalise until certain ages and there are general statements we can make in terms of the differences between the ages boys and girls acquire the ability to clearly verbalise certain sounds. If concerned, ask your child’s school or another expert for details. Language Little Learners and This month’s star letter will win a BD50 online shopping voucher from Namshi.com. So, to get shopping send us your views and opinions on this month’s edition either by email to editor@womanthismonth. com, by fax to 17 813-700 or by post to PO Box 20461.
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