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Brain training vs. tutoring: What's right for your child?

 

Tutoring vs. brain training: What’s right for your child?

 

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What’s the right help for your child this summer? Tutoring? Medications? Brian training?

 

Find out what's happening in Napervillewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Many parents are looking this summer at ways to close the gaps in their child’s academic learning. Parents often have to weigh what’s right for their child. Here are some tips on ways to determine whether tutoring or brain training are options.

 

* Does your child need to be retaught information for a single class?

* Did they miss a large chunk of school due to an absence?

 

If so, tutoring might be the answer.

 

 But if your child struggles in school perhaps the struggle stems from weak cognitive skills. These are skills we use to think, reason, remember and pay attention Common signs of weak cognitive skills include:

* Low test scores, grades or reading comprehension levels

* Difficulty organizing an activity

* Poor study and work habits

* Taking a long time to complete tasks, including homework

* Disinterest or dislike of school

* Poor memory

* Lack of confidence

*  Anxiety

* "Mystery ailments" such as unexplained sicknesses on test days

“Intense one-on-one personalized brain training is the best way to strengthen these underlying cognitive skills,” said Mia Tischer, executive director of LearningRx Chicago-Naperville. Most school work is aimed at helping students gain knowledge or to reinforce a concept already taught. If cognitive skills are weak – like sustained attention or working memory -- students may have trouble grasping and remembering the concept no matter how many times it is taught, she said.

Brain training is clinically proven to give students a mental edge and improve their learning potential by strengthening their core skills. A child can’t learn if they can’t pay attention, hold and store information or have a visual or auditory processing weakness.

“These ‘better thinking skills’ from brain training are transferable to any class, subject area or grade throughout your child’s school career,” she said.

Students who go through the LearningRx program are often able to build cognitive skills to the point where they no longer need medication for ADHD, no longer are in a remediation reading group, or pulled out for special help. 

 “Our brain training program does for the brain what exercise does for the body,” said Tischer. LearningRx is actually changing the brain to learn better and retain information more effectively, she said.

“Our brains are remarkable,” said Tischer. “We can train them to hold and manipulate information in new ways through a series of intense mental exercises.”

LearningRx has developed a methodology that can quickly build up cognitive mental tools with fun, game-like exercises that increasingly become more difficult and intense.  One-on-one trainers act as coaches to students of all ages, encouraging them to reach and stretch higher. The training can also reduce or eliminate learning troubles and can help remove the barriers created by ADHD and dyslexia.

 

 

About LearningRx-Naperville: LearningRx-Naperville specializes in treating the root cause of learning struggles, such as dyslexia, ADD, ADHD, and provides support in reading, math, and career and academic advancement. Anyone of any age can increase the speed, power or function of his or her brain. LearningRx-Naperville opened in November 2011 and is the only one-on-one Brain Training Center in Illinois.

 

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