Let's talk about Ditoso class today!
Yeay!
This is an entry that i was working with (acheehh..sbnrnya dok tangguh.nangis! (T_T) since few weeks back.
What is Ditoso class??
Ditoso means happy and blessed in Portugese.
For the place we've been to, was just the sake for the name of the center.
Lovely center, with nice interior decorations. And nice teachers.
Let's learn more about right brain development just for a start. I had no idea before, but that is why mr.google is around, kan?? :)
Below is abstracted from Ditoso's website :)
The Brain
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The brain is divided laterally into two hemispheres. Although two sides of the brain are designed to work together, each has a vastly unique personality and abilities.
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The Left and right
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| Use or lose it | ||||
| Just like a muscle, our brains works on the principle of “Use it or Lose it”. Around the second year of age, a process called “Synaptic Pruning” starts to eliminate the weaker synaptic connections while stronger connections are kept and strengthened; that is, the side of hemisphere which is utilized more than the other does will gradually take the dominance. | ||||
| Hemispheric Dominance | ||||
| A person’s dominant hemisphere is usually the one that processes incoming information; that means, hemispheric dominance has everything to do with learning, for example, reading. | ||||
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| Right brain in a society of left-brained teaching approach | ||||
| Left-brained approach has been in place for decades; it has been endorsed and blessed by national associations, and it is taught in teaching colleges. However, at ages between 0~6, a child’s brain is at a development stage in which his right brain is developing rapidly. If at this stage, the child’s right brain is left unused or unchallenged, or he is educated in an extremely left-brain oriented environment, his right brain will grow weaker and weaker, as a result of “Use or Lose it”. | ||||
Balance is the goal!
"There is no way to tell whether the patterns extracted by the right hemisphere are real or imaginary without subjecting them to left-hemisphere scrutiny. On the other hand, mere critical thinking, without creative and intuitive insights, without the search for new patterns, is sterile and doomed.To solve complex problems in changing circumstances requires the activity of both cerebral hemispheres; the path to the future lies through the corpus callosum."
--The dragons of Eden by Carl Sagan
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| When the right brain is kept active as the conscious left-brain develops and matures, then the whole brain will be used in all activities; which means that if we want to help our children learn to the best of their abilities and potential, it is crucial to: | ||||
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Right Brain Window, 0~6
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Age 0-3 is the period in which the child maximizes the utilization of the right brain. From age 4-6, the brain starts to link and switch to using left hemispheres while the right brain remains open and active. Henceforth, the critical period of ages 0-6 is also known as “the right brain window”. The window will never close, however, certain learning capabilities, such as “hearing mechanism”, are only open for this critical period of time; missing it would be difficult or even impossible to modify the capability.
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To begin with, Hamizah, a friend of mine, found some great offers online and decide to ask us, her office friends to tag along for the 1 hr class. Office friends sounds really better and warm than office colleagues kan?, btw. At normal rate the class would be RM100/hr, but we got it on discount, so why not? We booked a session on a Friday afternoon and all four of us went :) All four of us had boys aged around 2yrs old with Adeeb going to be 5 next yr.
It was a really great exposure for Iman actually, he was really excited! :)
We arrived at 10.45 and waited for others. We had a tour around the class, which turns to have a great interior design and made Iman excited as well. They have a waiting lounge, several classrooms, an office room, a kitchen and a beautiful toilet. Yes, i said beautiful! :) He played and run around happily and did'nt even want to drink milk. He washed his hands in the sink provided three times! Excited.
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| Wash hands instructions |
The class finally started off at 11.45 after all arrived . I was already a lil worry as Iman was starting to become a bit cranky due to all the waiting. Nevertheless he bear with the class and was excited at first. All the kids were required to wash hands before the class begins. A good thing!
He concentrated on half of the class and was a little distracted and hungry on the other half, as i expected. Tak apa iman, mommy understand how you felt, sb mommy pun dok kriok kriok lapar juga..hehehehee. He had his bottle in class, and wanted to sleep.Despite of that, he seems to understand some of the games and was quite eager on what the teacher has to offer. Ok lah. He answered several questions correctly and was interested with games with gadgets rather than cards and pictures. I think that is really typical with boys.
There were a lot of cards and show and picture games which gave me some ideas on how generally the right brain training is all about and gave me some ideas to have some games re-created at home! How nice- bagi ideas for me on my weekend homeschooling project!! Most games were brain games and memory games and really need concentration. Some involves listening and singing as well. But if you're really into having all the games and play and schooling to the experts than, Ditoso and classes like this are nice choices.
All in all, it was really a nice time with the Teacher Josephine from Taiwan and all the other friends, Adeeb, Aniq and Haziq. They looked like they had enjoyed the class. :)
Let's see some pictures in class, as well :)
However, for my lil Iman, frankly, these kind of classes seems to bore him off, as the activities were quite similar between one another and was done in a stray of arrays. Nonstop for one hour..hmm. Some, even bore me off.. hahaha. I would rather find a nicer playgroup or class that involves physical activity, and more gadget playings and maybe some pretend play (doctor, play masterchef, play grocery store), or even puppet plays as well in between for Iman's personality. This is just my view. Other mommies might differ.
For now, lets just have all of that 3hrs on saturday and 3hrs on sunday (9am-12pm) at home with mommy, Mommy will try to do her best!! :)
Thank you to mama adeeb, mama aniQ and mama haziQ for courtesy of the pictures :)
Love,
Mommy Zahra
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