Seven Tips for Implementing your Daily Routine – 1. Be Mindful of Movement

Shinjita and Shilpi discussed the importance of the daily routine and shared suggestions for implementing the daily routine.

In this blog post, I want to introduce my seven tips for implementing your daily routine. We discovered these tips gradually. The Enki approach based on the Waldorf approach was a key influence on how we designed our daily routines. Movement, arts, and storytelling are integral parts of our daily routine even today.

This week I will start with the first tip:

Be mindful of movement

Be Mindful of Movement

This week is the right week for introducing this tip. Ananth’s website, A Journey to Bharat through Natya went live this week. You can view his website here.

Movement has played a critical role in his life. Fortunately, we homeschooled and lived in a place where it was possible to go for long walks together. Ananth and I have been walking partners for over 15 years! I walk with him because we can have conversations and continue our academic discussions. So even though he can go on walks by himself, we still walk together because it is an efficient way to learn!

In 2012, he started Bharatanatyam. Bharatanatyam has been a game changer for him. Bharatanatyam impacted many areas including speech, executive function, processing speed, visual processing, posture etc.

In 2020, Ananth performed his Bharatanatyam arangetram. The arangetram was the beginning of his theater arts journey with RASA. Dr. Ambika Kameshwar was the chief guest at his arangetram. Theater arts expanded his opportunities for practicing coordinated movement with others and further developed his communication skills.

Ananth participated in his first RASA Day experience in August 2022. It was an amazing experience that expanded connections and developed skills! Looking forward to the next RASA Day!

This week, we are in Bengaluru. Through RASA, we discovered a Bharatanatyam coach for Ananth in Bengaluru too. Ananth did lessons with Ujwal Jagadeesh, a senior artiste and a senior faculty at the Ramana Maharshi Centre for Learning, Bengaluru. Ujwal’s approach of drawing attention to the gift of movement and natya as a means of fully utlizing and developing these gifts resonates with me. I also like how he nudges Ananth to smile!

Coordinated Movement and Coregulation

The question I have for parents today:

How do you create opportunities for coordinated movement throughout the day?

The word coordinated is important. While formal, structured movement instruction for Ananth started later, Relationship Development Intervention (RDI) led us to simple, coordinated movement. We walked together even before we started RDI. But once we started RDI, we made into a coregulation opportunity. I would stop suddenly, run, walk in the opposite direction etc. We would put dishes away together. We discovered many opportunities for coordinated movement throughout the day.

Tip of the Week

Become mindful of opportunities for coordinated movement with your child. Seek small opportunities for purposeful movement with your child daily. Move together as a part of shared experiences. For example, clean together, hang up clothes together, and walk together.

I will end this post with a suggestion for parents:

Look ways for incorporating movement throughout the day. Do not worry about sitting tolerance. Over time, sitting tolerance will develop. In the meantime, use your gifts of movement and help your child discover their gifts!