Introduction :
It is clear that scholastic backwardness is one of the major
problems among children. Many child health care takers express their
concern about early identification and prompt intervention of this
condition. However there are no studies and clear guidelines about
the therapeutic aspects on it.
We report here our experience with the Juvenile home girls with
daily meditation as self healing measure for 90 girls from JH based
at Bangalore.
Aims and objectives :
This activity was planned with the hypothesis that Meditation can be
used as self healing for Behavioral disturbances and school
performance.
Material and Methods :
All girls from the
girls juvenile home were started with daily Om shanti meditation for 3 months from the Age group of 8 to 16 years
mean age being 12.8years.
Each girl was evaluated by the Healer, teacher and Aura photography
on day one and day 90th. Every day at 9.15 am /6 days
/week , all girls were assembled in the hall, were asked to stand in
rows, a senior Healer would lead them with the specific set of
physical exercises for 10 minutes, then they were asked to sit with
closed eyes/back straight / without any support / crossed legs
posture . girls were asked to listen to Om Shanti audio cassette
recorded in Grand Master
Choaí s voice 5 minutes , to remain sited for next 5 minutes, then
were made to do 10 minutes set of exercises again.
Results :
Girls liked this
activity and cooperated very well, at any given day 95% girls used
to present , enthusiastically waiting for the activity.
Most glaring changes
were noticed in Behavior ,
discipline, obeying nature, flexibility of the physical body
, cheerfulness on the face, alertness, tidiness and cleanliness of
the hairs and cloths.
Girls expressed that
they are calm, feel responsible for themselves, and hopeful to come
up in life.
Caretakers and
teachers observed many favorable changes in form of
Alertness, less
fighting tendency, better attendance in school,
not sleeping in day time, improvement in grasping the
subjects. According to Healerís evaluation of the bioenergy field of
the girls, most affected chakras were Solar plexus, Heart ,
Sex, Crown , Ajna and Basic. Solar plexus chakra improved
last ( emotional centre), all chakras improved remarkably by 90th
day. Aura Photography changes were consistent with Healerís
observations.
Discussion :
Scholastic backwardness is being increasingly recognized as one of
the important problems in children.
Scholastic backwardness could be viewed in terms of poor
academic achievement or repeated failure in grades.
Several specific aspects of scholastic backwardness have been
studied. E.g.: specific
reading retardation.
Rutter et al. (1976) defined specific reading retardation or SSR as
the attainment of a reading level which was at least 28 months below
that predicted on the basis of age and IQ.
They found that 4% of their Isle of Wight (IOW) sample had SSR and
6-?% had general reading backwardness.
In another study comparing 10 year old children of IOW and an inner
London Borough, (ILB), Berger, Yule and Rutter (1975) found that the
prevalence of SSR in ILB was three times more (9.9%) than in the IOW
sample (3.3%).
Certain significant associations have been found between scholastic
backwardness and school absence and poor concentration {Rutter et
al., 1976), poor school functioning (Minde,1975), large family size
(Berger et al., 1975), fatherís occupational status
(Shepherd et al., 1971) and adverse family conditions (Esser et al.,
1990).
Significant associations have been obtained consistently between
reading retardation and antisocial behavior, in the earlier studies
{Kolvin et al., 1977; Minde, 1975; Rutter et al., 1970), but not
between reading retardation and neurotic disorder.
Recently, Schachter, Pless and Bruck (1991) reported that 43% of the
learning disabled children in their sample also had behavioural
problems.
McGee,
Williams, Share, Anderson and Silva (1986) showed that
in their sample, behavior problems predated reading disability,
while reading failure further exacerbated existing problem
behaviors.
Quay and LaGreca have suggested the association between poor
academic performance and emotional problems such as anxiety,
depression and social withdrawal (, 1986). Links, Offord and Boyle
(1990) found that poor school performance contributed independently
and significantly to the presence of emotional disorder.
Minde (1975) observed that scholastically backward children were
primarily maladjusted.
An emotionally disturbed individual on the other hand, tended
to ëcreateí a non-learning atmosphere around him.
Another possibility considered by Minde is the lack of
motivation to learn, caused by a variety of social or cognitive
reasons.
Emotional factors supposed to play the major
role in behavioral problems and scholastic performance. Specially in
a set of Juvenile home girls it appears to be the major one.
Meditation is used in many
chronic disorders in adult population and is found to be playing a
significant role. Many studies examining the psycho-neuro-cardio
changes with meditation are being conducted ( Vrunda 2001, Harper
1996)
However for children meditation has not been
tried as a therapeutic measure. To our knowledge this study is
unique as addressing the children with emotional disturbances.
Conclusion:
We conclude that the meditation with physical exercises may be
useful for treating the psychological disturbances and improve
scholastic performance.
