Organization...

One of the things that we are wondering that would help kids such as DS is "organization" :-) Let me explain - when there is a constant flow of information, their senses tend to get overwhelmed that it shuts down. For us, in a busy/stressful situation, we tend to organize and structure the situation/environment so that we can manage it. Also, even in a normal situation, when we have information coming at us, I believe, we tend to structure/slot/organize the data so that we make it easy to recall or even understand.

For example, if someone talks to me about how decisions are made my the Japanese PM after discussion at Diet, I can relate it to being a gathering of decision makers rather than to food - it is so, since I'm exposed to Indian parliament model. Also, I make some educated guess about Diet now. I dont really need to read about Diet immediately and I dont feel anymore that lack of knowledge of the word "Diet" to be stressful.

So this summer, we are looking to work with DS on some small micro-exercises.

The intent here is to train the brain to think so. So we are looking at a 5-10min  three step micro-exercises that we would work with DS.

The Step-1 is to get the brain-trained on a very physical thing that he can touch, see and can really relate to. So, for example we will take something like a table and see how is it structured. Just talk about why it is that way - why four legs, why not three legs, why flat top etc etc. At Step-1, my supposition is that his brain is tuned to see a structure/organization in something.

As step-2, we give him something physical and ask him to assemble or organize. Takes about 2-3 minute; Ask him why he organized that in the way he did and why not some other way. He typically responds to with his past experience of what he has seen or done or heard. The intent of step-2 is to take the training in step-1 that is still fresh in his mind and apply that thought process to the problem at hand. The brain is at organize mode now.

As Step-3, we want to give him an abstract data; and follow-up with some question. For example, I gave him "Obama is the president of US and lives in the White-house". The key-indices are President, US, White-house. So, my question is what does he recall when he heard that - i prompted him similarities - US with India, Obama with Pranab M, White-house with Rashtrapati Bhavan...

We are hoping with this training, based on organization/structure,  he would be able to convert data into information and then into insight. An example would be - if we tell him
Data = that tomorrow's going to be 95'F
Information = he should get that it will very hot
Insight = and that he will wear cotton clothes and  hydrate himself...

Not an easy exercise, but we hope to try this out this summer !

ps: Btw, when we go to shops or malls or restaurants, we ask him to tell us how those are organized and why so? When we went to a Indian groceries, he told us how the store was organized - the snacks on the front right, two stacks of shelf with spices, grains and condiments and the vegetables in the back and the freezer along the walls. When I asked him why not mix then, he said it would be tough to find things if the "categories" are mixed. Then I asked him, why not freezer in the middle of the shop, he said then they would need to run the wires down to the center and that would not be easy.