Conductive Education

By Susan Saundercook

Andrew Sutton believes we need to make a paradigm shift about motor disabilities.

Director of the Foundation for Conductive Education (CE) in England, Sutton was in Toronto recently as a guest of Ontario March of Dimes and spoke to representatives of non-profit organizations, educators and healthcare professionals about the benefits of Conductive Education, a groundbreaking program for people with motor disorders. Sutton is one of the world’s leading experts and academics in the field, and trained the first Canadian conductor, who now works at Ontario March of Dimes, one of the only providers of Conductive Education in Canada.

Developed in the 1940s by the Hungarian physician András Peto, Conductive Education is a learning system that merges elements of education and rehabilitation to assist children and adults with motor disabilities to become more self-confident and independent.

Specially trained teachers called conductors motivate students to learn the skills needed to find their own solutions to the practical problems of daily living. Within a structured program of activities, individuals develop skills in body control, mobility and communication. From many potential goals, the students determine what they want to achieve, such as greater balance, easier transfers or enhanced speech. This has been especially beneficial for people with Parkinson’s disease, cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, acquired brain injuries and stroke.

For those attempting to explain Conductive Education, the initial impulse is to describe it as a therapy or treatment, which may present fewer challenges. But CE is not a therapy. It approaches motor disorders as a problem of learning or relearning - a problem that will respond to the appropriate teaching. Conductive Education expects more of all people - not only those with the motor disorder. The belief is that providing wheelchairs, ramps and accessible buildings is not enough - society must undergo a paradigm shift or philosophical change about what people are capable of learning.

"This paradigm shift says that motor disabilities - difficulties in coordination due to problems in the central nervous system, either through disease or damage - present a learning problem," says Sutton. "If you treat them as a learning problem, proper teaching can be provided to transform people and they will adapt and learn to live all the better."

Yet, Sutton does not propose to transform participants into the people they might have been if the motor disability weren’t there. "But you can make a significant additional difference if you provide appropriate teaching and learning," he adds.

One of the first questions Sutton usually hears when he addresses an audience is: "Where is the scientific proof that Conductive Education works?" Most people are looking for quantitative data and hard science to explain Conductive Education. But its results are not scientifically measurable in this way.

Most CE participants claim a great sense of accomplishment and increased self-confidence. They begin to feel part of a community, where outwardly small, but personally significant, improvements in daily activities are gained.

How can science measure these kinds of results? Sutton gave the example of choosing Conductive Education as similar to choosing a school for your child. "You can send your child to any number of schools, whether Catholic, private, or Montessori," Sutton explains. "Why do you do this? Because you value the type of education found at these schools. How do you measure this? You don’t - it’s the kind of education that you value and it is impossible to measure values."

Andrew Sutton: Conductive Education is to Motor Disorders as Braille is to Blindness...
Sutton describes Conductive Education as one of the greatest breakthroughs to date for children and adults with motor disorders - comparable to the introduction of Braille or sign language to people with sensory disorders.

Before Braille became a common form of communication for those with vision disabilities, the world of reading was completely unknown to them - that is, until a man named Louis Braille developed a new concept. At first, the notion of blind people reading with their fingers seemed preposterous. But now people with vision disabilities can read - if they are taught. Braille initiated a philosophical shift in society’s view of sensory disorders and what we can expect from those with vision disabilities. Sutton believes a major shift is necessary in what society perceives as possible for people with motor disorders.

"People with motor disorders are cared for with wheelchairs, some ramps and gadgets," says Sutton. "I’m not knocking any of those approaches to people with motor disorders - but where is the philosophical change? Where is the leap forward in the understanding of what people might expect of themselves?"

Sutton doesn’t regard the invention of the wheelchair, the motorized wheelchair or the computerized, motorized wheelchair as a fundamental re-conceptualization. "I am suggesting to you that [with CE] we have the additional potential paradigm shift that is analogous to Louis Braille’s invention of Braille."

Sutton also drew comparisons between Conductive Education and sign language. A century and half ago, the prognosis for a child who was born deaf was grim. The child was prevented from learning many basic skills because he was unable to communicate. How did this change? Sutton claims it was proper education and finding a new ways of learning that made the difference.

"You can argue about the way you educate children with hearing impairment. Do you use signs? Total communication? Lip reading? But nobody says, ’Let the child go untaught,’" says Sutton. "Conductive Education assumes something our society often doesn’t - that society can change people. If you want to change people, you have to change their society."

HOW CAN CE HELP ME?
The Conductive Education Program at Ontario March of Dimes

Each person’s experience with Conductive Education (CE) is highly individualized. Conductors help create a program based on your present abilities and personal goals.

Acquired Brain Injuries
Conductive Education helps people adapt after a brain injury by helping them to re-learn skills they have lost. Focus is placed on overcoming loss of mobility and control, sensory and communication difficulties and any behavioural and attention problems.

Cerebral Palsy
Conductive Education focuses on lifelong learning. Conductors work with participants to help them use the skills they have in the most efficient way. The program focuses on all areas of motor skills, including speech and breathing. CE helps develop the use of rhythm in order to gain greater control over ataxia, spasticity and involuntary movements.

Multiple Sclerosis
Conductive Education , for those with multiple sclerosis, focuses on common problems such as writing, fine movements, dressing and personal care. There is an emphasis on spasticity reduction, skills to control eye movements, and breathing techniques to enhance speech, circulation and well-being.

Parkinson’s Disease
Students with Parkinson’s work with conductors to devise a personal set of goals that can include increased confidence, maintenance of their condition, assistance with daily management, improvements in body control and mobility, and the ability to overcome the restrictions and frustrations that accompany Parkinson’s disease.

Stroke
Conductive Education can help stroke survivors recover as much movement as possible of those parts of the body affected by the stroke. Emphasis is placed on tasks to enhance coordination, balance and control, and on helping the stroke survivor compensate for sensory loss. Specific sessions are held for stroke survivors who are aphasic and whose speech, memory or language have been affected.

Other Conditions
Conductive Education programs are also offered for adults with ataxia, multiple systems atrophy and other neurologically based movement conditions.

Ontario March of Dimes operates one of the only Conductive Education programs for adults in the world and the only year-round program in North America. A summer camp program operates for children. For more information about the Conductive Education Program at Ontario March of Dimes, call 1-800-263-3463 or e-mail ce@dimes.on.ca.