Comments on: Brain Gym loses its trousers (figuratively)

By: draust

draust — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 12:25:56 +0000

To re-iterate: posts with something to say are welcome. Posts which simply add spam-style links to long tirades of personal abuse are not.

She-Liger, if you cannot stick to this I will have to bar you altogether.

By: She-Liger

She-Liger — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 17:12:18 +0000

[link deleted to long and rambling post denouncing Edzard Ernst on "She-Liger's" blog]

By: draust

draust — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 12:29:05 +0000

Hi Sana The best place to start is the Bad Science collection that deals with Brain Gym and the (vaguely related) Dore programme for dyslexia. In particular, Ben Goldacre’s original 2006 piece flaying Brain Gym, and the follow up a week later contain (among much entertaining ranting) a discussion of, and links to, any academic references that relate to Brain Gym. Basically the message is that there are no independent trials specifically of the Brain Gym programme, and the evidence the company cites is minimal, amateur-ish, wholly done or funded by them, and not published in anything remotely resembling a serious journal. You could also try asking Brainduck, who is a psychologist (just graduated) and has written a lot about the Dore Programme, but I see from the blog that s/he (the Duck) is off on holiday As I understand it the critique of Brain Gym is NOT the underlying principle that physical exercise might be of mild benefit for helping concentration, or even improving cognitive ability. The problem is that this fairly common sense idea needs to be dressed up in a whole load of utter scientific nonsense (the patented “Brain Gym” programme). And not just that: patented nonsense that is making money for someone AND requires teachers to sign up to, and pass on to the kids, a whole bunch of stuff that is laughably silly and factually incorrect - as detailed in the Sense About Science debunk job I linked to in the original post.

By: Sana Santos

Sana Santos — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:34:24 +0000

I will be attending a 3-day Brain Gym training in several weeks, paid for by my school district. I have decided to design a one-unit Independent Study class based on my summer school teaching before and after the training (which falls in the middle). I promised my professor that I would also research professional critiques of this program.
Any help??
Thanks!

By: In-human resources, science and pizza

In-human resources, science and pizza — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 05:04:27 +0000

[...] Dr Aust’s cogent comments are at “Brain Gym” loses its trousers. [...]

By: draust

draust — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:27:25 +0000

That is appalling, Frank. It does make the analogy with other “science-free parallel-reality nonsense approaches” clearer, though. Thus as with “officially sanctioned” BG for teachers, so also Hospital Trust-approved Vocational Qualifications in Homeopathy, Reiki or “Therapeutic Touch” for Nurses, and so on.

It is the “Doublethink” of forcing teachers to buy into it that really pisses me off. At one stroke you give the dozier teachers the thumbs up to mislead themselves and the children, whilst giving the more analytically and critically minded ones the clear steer that Educational Authorities no longer care about distinguishing reality and mumbo-jumbo. Barking.

Anyway, good job on the debunking fact sheet - nice to see eminences like David Attwell and Colin Blakemore lending their names to it,as well as the younger folk. Here’s hoping all the LEA folk and the civil servants read it and that BG disappears without trace.

Perhaps teachers could replace it with some stretching exercises*….

*Which might genuinely increase blood flow, though not by any of the kind of idiotic mechanisms BG implies.

By: Frank

Frank — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:08:16 +0000

It’s not just BG instructors who are pushing it - many Local Authorities and even the Dept for Schools, Children & Families recommend brain gym courses as part of the continued professional development of teachers. Which is why we wrote to every single LA in the land to persuade them that BG isn’t science. Hopefully that’ll mean less tax money spent on expensive nonsense.