Train The Kid’s Brain At BrainFit Studio

The other day when we were at  The Curve for lunch with our usual group of friends, we came across a studio that trains kids’ brains to be FIT!  As the moniker suggests, BrainFit is all about training the brain’s fitness.  In other words, the kid’s cognitive and learning skills such as memory and attention.  My friends and I went in to check out the studio and the programs it offers and we were pretty impressed.

BrainFit Studio is founded by a team of child developmental professionals passionate about maximizing human potential,  it has been dedicating itself to bring up the most up-to-date and scientific brain fitness training programmes since 2001.

BrainFit Studio originated in Singapore and is already 14 years in the region with over 5000+ databased results from programs conducted across Asia. It has established foothold in other countries like Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, and Turkey.

BrainFit Studio aims to transform lives by improving learning capabilities, boosting performance, shaping behaviours and increasing intelligence through high-quality evidence-based neuro-scientific cognitive training programmes.

BrainFit’s fitness programs seek to enhance the child’s learning capacity by addressing opportunity areas across:

(i) Attention/focus
(ii) Auditory processing
(iii) Visual processing
(iv) Sensory-motor
(v) Social-emotional

This is a company built upon by the hopes and joys of children and their parents, whose lives have changed dramatically through the understanding of how brain fitness training works.

 

 

Programme

BRAINFit® Scholar SMART Programme (6 to 18 years old)
This fully personalized brain fitness training programme aims to give school-going children a learning advantage through “mental work-outs”. To achieve rapid, enduring results, we use the following programmes to build key mental “muscles” intensively over a 4-month term (1-hour session, twice a week):

SMARTâ„¢ Moves
This aims to strengthen a student’s sensory-motor brain fitness and accelerate learning speed using a proven and personalised gym-based program. Sensory-motor brain fitness is critical in the classroom whenever a child needs to put pen to paper (e.g. for drawing, colouring and writing), participate in activities with other children or execute any response with a movement element.

See improvements in:
Focus and organisation
Rhythm and timing
Learning speed
Body and spatial awareness
Advance visual skills
Gross and fine motor skills
Confidence

 

SMARTâ„¢ Vision
SMARTâ„¢ Vision aims to rapidly improve a student’s visual brain fitness by using a proven and personalised program comprising gym-based exercises, table-top as well as computer-based visual activities.

Our visual brain fitness helps us to quickly and accurately interpret the information received through our eyes, especially important in the classroom. Having strong visual brain fitness helps students to excel in “visual” subjects such as Math, geometry and have neat, effortless handwriting.

During each SMARTâ„¢ Vision session, your child will participate in a series of movement activities, as well as table-top and computer-based activities that strengthen visual spatial perception, directionality, eye control and eye-hand coordination.

See improvements in:
Handwriting & copying
Learning speed and abilities
Focus and attention
Visual perception and memory
Accuracy in detailed work
Visual spatial awareness and organization

 

 

SMART Listeningâ„¢

SMART Listening™ utilises the Fast ForWord® family of products (computer-based), proven for its effectiveness at MIT, Stanford and Harvard Universities. The result of more than 30 years of neuroscientific research, this software has helped over 2 million students boost their auditory, reading and language skills for improved scholastic performance, as well as increased their self-esteem.

Auditory brain fitness is a vital foundation for almost every learning task. Children that are able to process sounds rapidly and accurately allows them to not only become proficient with their oral language, but also achieve excellence in decoding and reading comprehension, the very keys to learning and academic success.

During each Smart Listening session, your child will be trained using the Fast ForWord® software. It accelerates learning by developing Learning MAPS™, key cognitive skills comprising Memory, Attention, Processing, and Sequencing.

See improvements in:
Auditory processing
Ability to follow instructions
Auditory memory
Receptive and expressive language skills
Reading and comprehension
Learning speed
Attention and focus
Communication and social skills
Confidence

 

SMARTâ„¢ Focus

SMARTâ„¢ Focus aims to build on children’s attention and working memory brain fitness utilizing computer-based working memory activities and a scientifically proven computer-based software, emWave Pro that uses a real-time heart rate variability monitor to teach children on appropriate breathing and relaxation techniques.

BrainFit’s attention system is closely associated with their working memory system. Working memory is used to remember and manipulate important information, and it requires the simultaneous storage and processing of information using our visual and auditory brain fitness systems. Without paying adequate attention, it is impossible to acquire information accurately or execute without error. Our attention brain fitness is vital to helps us remain focused on task-relevant information, ignoring distractions and control our impulses, without which success in school and learning becomes impossible.

Your child will also be trained to learn stress reduction and emotional management skills using the emWave Pro software. Children will learn to control their physiology through breathing along with heart rhythms and focusing on positive emotions to create coherence, which is critical to improving resilience, wellness and facilitating personal growth.

See improvements in:
Attention and concentration
Ability to stay on task
Working memory
Attention stamina
Impulse control
Over-activity

 

BRAINFit® Baby Programme (9 months to 2 years 11 months) 

Build a strong brain foundation starting at 9 months.

Designed specially for infants and toddlers, BrainFit® Baby builds critical brain fitness and intelligence foundations. Parents and carers will learn how to optimise home environments and interact with their child to support this critical stage. Our unique BrainFit® Baby app records your Babies’ milestones and ensures on-track development.

For BrainFit’ Babies, the SMART Workout emphasises on enriching cognitive development. In each 50-minute session, Babies, together with their carers, participate in a complete range of activities:

  • Build control, strength and balance – Gross and fine motor exercises to strengthen sensory-motor skills.
  •  Communicate effectively across various settings – Structured listening, music and language stimulation exercises to enhance receptive and expressive language development.
  • Strengthen memory and focus – Memory and recall activities protect and strengthen the “memory maker” in the brain — the sea horse-shaped structure called the hippocampus, as well as other brain sites.
  • Pick up Mathematical or abstract concepts easily later on – Exercises to sharpen spatial-temporal reasoning and visualisation —that is, the ability to imagine and manipulate the interaction of objects in their minds.
  • Nurture social skills and emotional intelligence – Activities like pretend-play not only increases babies’ creativity but also develop self-regulation, the foundation of social skills and emotional intelligence.

 

BRAINFit® Junior Programme (3 to 6 years old)

Put your best foot forward

While BrainFit® Baby establishes vital intelligence foundations, BrainFit® Junior further consolidates and accelerates these pathways. The goal is for our preschoolers to have a solid and sturdy set of cognitive skills (these are absolutely critical to keeping those learning engines well-oiled!) as they enter Primary One.

  • Get a headstart with SMART Workout – For BrainFit’ Juniors, the SMART Workout emphasises fortifying cognitive development. This sets a sturdy foundation for life-long learning.

Exercises are designed to meet these goals:

• Thrive at learning in a school environment – Focus and listening exercises enable Juniors to follow multiple-step instructions sequentially and sensibly, and stay attentive for a longer period of time.

• Make friends naturally and manage emotions effectively – Activities to nurture social skills and emotional intelligence help Juniors understand themselves and engage in healthy relationships with others.

• Read, remember and comprehend well – Exercises to strengthen phonological awareness and memory build a solid foundation for reading, retention, and comprehension.

• Write and copy legibly with ease – Fine motor exercises to strengthen sensory-motor skills.

• Excel in Math and Chinese – Exercises to sharpen spatial-temporal reasoning and visualisation — that is, the ability to imagine and manipulate the interaction of objects in their minds.

Check out BrainFit website at  www.brainfitadvantage.com

Facebook: Brainfit Studio Malaysia

Instagram: Brainfitstudio

BrainFit Studio is located at Lot 118, first floor, The Curve, Mutiara Damansara and can be contacted at 03-7710 0273 and 012-217 9921.

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FrogAsia – A one-stop shop for all your educational needs

Hear ye hear ye everyone with primary and secondary school kids in Malaysia’s public schools! Your kid(s) may have already told you about this educational website but if they or you have not already known yet, let me introduce you to FrogAsia.

FrogAsia, a YTL company, is the first company in the world to connect an entire nation through a single, cloud-based learning platform. You and your child will not be charged any data costs while accessing Frog on their network, so everyone can enjoy unlimited access to their world of learning anytime, anywhere!

Through the 1BestariNet project, FrogAsia is bringing the future of education to every student, teacher and parent in Malaysia. Combining high-speed 4G internet access, a world class learning platform and access to ‘best-in-class’ resources and technology, Malaysia is the first country in the world to bring its entire education community together on a single converged network designed specifically to meet the needs of teaching and learning.  1BestariNet is a project initiated by the Malaysian Ministry of Education in line with the government’s vision of providing quality, Internet-enabled education for all.  Over 10,000 government schools around the country will be equipped with this awesome solution, bridging the digital divide between rural and urban students.

I first got to know about Frog Asia when Alycia and Sherilyn came home from school one day some time early this year and told me that their teachers had instructed everyone to log into this website. The students were required to explore the website and try out the apps and features at www.frogasia.com.

Your child will first need to register at the FrogAsia website. For Alycia and Sherilyn, they were given a set of log in data by their school (they are in a cluster school).

The website is pretty kids friendly. It is Sherilyn, my drama queen who taught me how to navigate around the website.  And boy was I impressed with what I found in there! Everything that is available at the FrogAcademy is on the left side bar of the Frog Store from resources to documents, books, images, videos, audio, question banks and much more.

Your kids can even gain access to their school text books at the FrogAsia website! So worry not if your kid has forgotten to bring home an important text book for revision. She/he will be able to read the text book by hopping into FrogAsia.

Here is a sample of how the eText book looks like…

 

Alycia and Sherilyn have added over 50 e-books into their ‘My Library’ at the FrogAsia website. They can read them on their iPad or lappie during their free time.

 

This is how the eBook looks like…

 

They were jumping with excitement when they found Diary of a Wimpy Kid from the Fun Brain app, in eBook form!

 

 

Interesting eComics are also accessible for free!

 

Parents can buy questions for their child to work on from the FrogAcademy at a minimal cost of only a few Ringgit per subject. Since the Question Banks is still at its Beta stage, only Form 4, Form 5 and SPM questions can be purchased at the moment. But very soon, questions for primary students and other levels will be readily available for purchase. You can pay via M2U or credit card. There will soon be sample UPSR questions for purchase as well.

 

Parents can check their kid(s)’ work from the questions that they have bought from the Question Banks and monitor them, as shown below…

 

Educational videos can be added to your ‘My Library’ and they are free to view!

 

Under the Resources category, you can add flash cards, free images, free sounds, Funbrain (my girls love this category) and much more to your ‘My Library’.

 

 

FrogAsia has a partnership with Google, which means that your child can assess to a buffet of interesting education materials from FrogAsia, which will bring them over to Google Apps to assess the educational materials. So make sure you or your child has a Google Chrome account as well.

 

 

FrogAsia is probably one of the best and most comprehensive local educational websites that I have come across. If your child’s school has not been introduced to this website yet, you can help your child register now and start letting him/her explore FrogAsia today. This is definitely a must have website bookmarked in all your electronic devices!

 

 

No. of times viewed = 450

Learning Sukukata from You Tube

I have found a fantastic website for my 4-YO baby girl to learn sukukata and it is no other than from You Tube – the place where kids can learn their ABCs, 123s, nursery rhymes, how to draw, how to make origami and I even learned how to make sushi from You Tube! Oh yea, my hubs went to You Tube for tutorial on how to stuff and roast a turkey for X’mas last year.

This site teaches sukukata and how to read simple words in BM to pre-schoolers up to early primary school kids in a very fun and animated manner.

My baby girl is enjoying her online BM lessons from You Tube and it’s a great babysitter for me too tee hee hee!!

No. of times viewed = 717

Learning During Breakfast Works Best

I find that teaching Alycia and Sherilyn works best during breakfast time.  It’s the time when they are seated and eating and their attention span tends to be the highest in the morning.

Sherilyn for one can never sit still during meal times.  Without any activitiy to occupy her when she eats, she will climb up and down from her booster seat.  I either read to her, let her do coloring, flash cards to her and do educational activities with her during breakfast.  During lunch time, I normally turn on some educational DVDs for the gals to watch.  Dinner time is strictly eating time – no activities but just eating and communicating with one another.

Sherilyn now recognizes most of the letters of the alphabet and numbers.   I think she will progress faster if I send her to pre-school now but I am delaying sending her until at least June this year.

Click here to see Alycia’s coloring.

No. of times viewed = 293

eLearning For My Girls

Alycia and Sherilyn’s latest learning method is from the computer.  Lately, Alycia is demanding to be read to from the computer instead of from books.  Almost everyday, I will read to the gals from the computer for about 15 minutes, then I will let Alycia rule the computer for another 15 minutes whilst I put my feet up and lie on the couch to take a power nap. 


Alycia has now mastered the mouse and is quite familiar with the e-books from KizClub and Starfall.  She can now independently navigate around these 2 websites by clicking on the ‘menu’, choosing the level she wants to be in and choose her own stories.  She has even learned to play educational word games at the Starfall website.   If you have a toddler, I would fully recommend these 2 websites for them to pick up their reading skills.  For KizClub, I can even leave the website to read the books to the gals whilst I take my nap.

No. of times viewed = 434

Flash Cards Again

When Alycia and Sherilyn’s interest in flash cards were waning early this year, I found it really hard to hold their attention when I flashed the cards to them.  I was practically forcing, bribing and my temper flared too.  I decided the flash cards needed a respite for a few months and kept all of them.

Several days ago whilst rummaging the drawer, Alycia dug out the boxes of flash cards and asked me to read to her.  I gladly read to the gals during breakfast and I also took the opportunity to teach them phonics.  Alycia’s reading has improved slightly over the last few days as I have intensified the reading program with her.  I’ve also resumed the Peter & Jane series books with her.  Her interest in reading is still not as enthusiastic as I would want it to be but she’s definitely improving. 

No. of times viewed = 322

Breakfast Ritual

This is Alycia and Sherilyn’s breakfast ritual each morning – reading or playing jigsaw puzzles or drawing and writing on their Doodle Pro whilst they have their breakfast.

These pictures were taken yesterday morning:

Take a look at Alycia’s serious look as she was deeply engrossed reading this Peter and Jane series book. BTW, this book once belonged to my eldest brother Ray, me and my youngest brother Roy. Now, it’s with the gals.

Sherilyn is a replica of Alycia. Whatever her sister does, she’s sure to follow suit.

No. of times viewed = 241

Tom Tom The Piper’s Son

Today just before lunch time, I read and sang some nursery rhymes to Sherilyn, my 2.5 yo toddler who LOVES singing and loves me reading through singing to her. I sang her a few nursery rhymes like Baa Baa Black Sheep, Rock A Bye Baby, Little Bo Beep Has Lost Her Sheep, Hey Diddle Diddle and Tom Tom The Piper’s Son. She loved the Tom Tom song so much that she wanted me to sing and point out each word to her as I sang to her over and over and over again and she didn’t want me to stop. I swear I sang like around 50 times. When I stopped, she cried. I had spent close to 1/2 hr singing to her till my voice ran hoarse. As I wanted to do some work on the computer, I put Sherilyn on my lap as I did my typing with 1 hand and I continued singing and singing till I told her mummy got to stop to go wee wee. Wah… the moment I put her down on the floor, she wailed and her tantrum flared.

My maid and I spent another 15 mintues trying to placate her. She didn’t even want to watch Thomas & Friends when the tv was turned on. So my maid placed Sherilyn on her lap and fed her her cereal for lunch. After a while, she stopped whining and began to settle down, enjoying her meal of cereal and organic green tea noodles with fish paste in winter melon soup.

No. of times viewed = 278

Alycia My Young Reader

Every morning as the gals have their breakfast, I will be seated at the dining table reading the newspapers as I sip my cup of green tea. Most times, Alycia will climb onto my chair and ask me to read the newspapers to her. I will then quiz her by pointing out familiar words to her. Yesterday, as I walked into the kitchen to get a bowl, Alycia quickly climbed onto my chair and began to ‘read’ the papers, flipping the pages like a pro reader and pointing to the words as if she knows how to read. I think I will be the happiest mommy around if Alycia can finally read a book or the newspapers on her own.

No. of times viewed = 283

Learning Through Singing

Sherilyn has always loved music, singing and dancing. When she was a baby and cried each time, singing and playing soft music had always comforted her and lulled her to sleep.

I have recently discovered a new way of teaching my 2 gals. Since it’s really difficult to make them sit still classroom style with eyes focused on whatever I am teaching them, I discovered by chance some time back that by singing out the word as I read out each flash card to them really helps and they kept asking for more and more and more till I have to say STOP, ha ha..

This is how I sing out my teaching lessons:

Let’s say I am showing them a flash card with the word ‘happy’. I’ll sing out the song “I am h-a-p-p-y, I am h-a-p-p-y” and modify the song a tad bit. They find it so entertaining and now both Alycia and Sherilyn recognize the sight word happy and if I ask Alycia what h-a-p-p-y is (without showing her the flash card) she could tell me the word correctly.

The same goes for many other words. I will try to match the individual word that I am about to teach / sing to them to a rhyming nursery rhyme tune. Eg. singing out the word ‘strawberry’ to the tune of ‘If You Happy And You Know It Clap Your Hands’. After a few times singing out the word, both my gals started to recognize the sight word ‘strawberry’ as well as the spelling of the word orally (without being shown the flash card).

When we go for walks and see a coconut tree for instance, I’ll point to the coconut and tell them that they’ve just seen a coconut and then I’ll sing out the song “c-o-c-o-n-u-t”.

This is such a fun way of teaching my gals and all 3 of us enjoy it so much.

No. of times viewed = 275

Alycia Can Tell The Time

Remember I wrote about Bedtime stories where DH taught the gals to read the clock? Well, I have been teaching Alycia how to read the clock for the last 1 week, though not consistently and last nite when I asked her to tell me the time looking at the ‘Tell The Time’ flashcards, she managed to tell me the time, though she only knows how to tell the time when the minute hand points to 12, ie. she has to say o’clock.

Today, I brought out a book on telling the time which my sil had bought the gals a few months back and tested Alycia and she managed to tell me all the basic ‘o’clock’ time.

Tonight, I shall progress to the next step of teaching Alycia how to tell the time when the minute hand points to 6. I promised her that if she knows how to tell the time, I shall buy her a Princess watch and this has motivated her to pay attention when I read to her. Hopefully she can independently tell the time very soon and be my walking clock.

No. of times viewed = 306

Cool learning method… strewing

A few days ago, The New Parent wrote an interesting article on strewing up…. a method of introducing new things to his little girl through discovery. I thought what a cool fun way of teaching Alycia and Sherilyn to read through discovery.

Yesterday when the gals were having their afternoon nap, I strewed flash cards around their room… one card in their mega blocks tub, two cards in their toys closet and one more card on their bed for them to discover.

Later that night, as they got into their room, they were so thrilled and surprised to see flash cards strewn everywhere. They thought mummy had forgotten to keep the flash cards back into the drawer. As they returned the cards to me, I read out the words and number on the flash cards to them. What fun way of teaching them to read. No coercion on them and they actually looked at the cards. Tonight, I shall strew a few more cards at different places in their rooms for them to discover.

These are some of the pix I managed to snapped candidly of Alycia and Sherilyn when they discovered the cards.


Mummy, the word “fun”. Sherilyn always recognizes this word.


“How come there’s a card here too mummy?”

No. of times viewed = 299

Alycia Can Spell

Alycia can finally spell her first word by memory…. and the word is God!

SIL#2 had recently bought the gals a kids’ bible with lots of colourful illustrations. For the past few nights, Alycia has been pestering me to read this kids’ bible to her as she is so drawn to the colourful pictures in the book. She was so interested in the bible that the following morning when I asked her what I had read to her the night before, she could tell out the entire story. Then when I asked her how to spell the word God, she said GOA. I then corrected her. I was very pleased anyway that she got the first two letters right. The next day, I tested her again and this time, she got it right… she spelt out GOD.

Today, I tested Alycia’s spelling on the word dog. She got the first two letters right by saying DOB. I corrected her. I shall test her again tomorrow to see if she has picked up the word dog. I know I should not be testing her as kids just don’t like to be tested but kiasu mummy me am just too happy and excited that my baby girl finally knows how to spell.


The kids’ bible that sil #2 bought the gals.

No. of times viewed = 227

Bedtime Stories By Daddy Dearest

Once in a while, daddy will be home early to read bedtime stories to the gals. These are considered rare treats from daddy and the gals enjoy every moment of it. As for me, they are long-awaited breather treats for me….


Daddy teaching the gals how to read the clock.

No. of times viewed = 336

I Love Reading From The Computer

My gals’ all-time favourite reading resource… the computer. Most of the time, I will hoard the PC, blogging and net surfing away but when I am in a good mood, my gals rule the PC.


Reading from the Starfall website.

No. of times viewed = 218

Make Good Use Of Thy Time

I always wished there were more than 24 hours to a day so that I can do more for my gals, more for myself & DH and lastly get more SLEEP. I hate to see precious time being wasted, I don’t like me or my gals sitting around not doing anything purposeful. This perhaps, may be contributed by the fact that I once worked at 3 large organizations where time was of the essence and I was constantly put in a pressure-cooker, always rushing to meet deadlines for my bosses and always had to do multiple tasks at any one time. I rarely had the luxury to go out for long lunches with my colleagues and most of the time, I had my lunches behind my PC, one hand typing / checking e-mails and one hand biting a quick and easy-to-eat lunch.

I like to read to my gals when they are having their meals, drinking their milk or sitting on their potty doing their little poopy business. This is what I normally do with my gals to maximise our time :


Flashing cards on shapes to Alycia & Sherilyn before their afternoon nap.

Sherilyn fixing an educational board puzzle whilst doing her little poopy biz on her potty, with Alycia lending a helping hand.

Call me a kiasu, crazy mummy!

No. of times viewed = 404

HEALTH FREAK MOMMY