Brain Gym

Brain Gym is a training program that makes various claims about the benefits of certain exercises and postures in learning. It is widely used in British state schools. It is also offered to both children and adults in parts of the United States and Canada.

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The programme is billed as an introductory level program in Educational Kinesiology (Edu-K), a form of applied kinesiology previously known as Edu-Kinesthetics. It was presented by Paul E. Dennison and Gail E. Dennison in their booklets Switching On: A Guide to Edu-Kinesthetics (1980) and Brain Gym – Simple Activities for Whole Brain Learning (1986). It is based on the premise that all learning begins with movement, also supporting the idea that any learning challenges can be overcome by finding the right movements, to subsequently create new pathways in the brain. It claims that the repetition of certain movements "activates the brain for optimal storage and retrieval of information".^[1]

Brain Gym has been particularly criticized by Ben Goldacre of The Guardian's Bad Science pages. He found no supporting evidence for the assertions put forward by Brain Gym proponents in any of the main public research databases.^[2] Upon learning that the program was used at hundreds of UK state schools, he called it a "vast empire of pseudoscience" and went on to dissect parts of their teaching materials, refuting for instance claims that rubbing the chest would stimulate the carotid arteries, that "processed foods do not contain water", or that liquids other than water "are processed in the body as food, and do not serve the body's water needs."^[3] Many teachers responded by writing letters in support of Brain Gym. Goldacre reiterated his point that exercises and breaks were good for students, and that he was merely attacking "the stupid underlying science of Brain Gym".^[4]

In a separate column, Philip Beadle sided with him, adding that Goldacre's "argument is with what Dr Barry Beyerstein, a professor of psychology at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, Canada, describes as 'commercial ventures promoted by hucksters who mislead consumers into thinking that their products are sound applications of scientific knowledge'."^[5]

Brain Gym has also been criticised as being wholly unscientific in a wide-ranging and authoritative review of research into neuroscience and education published in 2007 by the UK Economic and Social Research Council's Teaching and Learning Research Programme.^[6] The report noted that doing any exercise can improve alertness, and exercise systems like Brain Gym, regardless of their pseudoscientific ideas, may help for that reason.^[7]

See also

• Kinesthetic learning

References