The Importance of High Fives in Personal Brain Training April 21 is National High Five Day, which was started in 2002 at the University of Virginia when a group of students on the main quad of the campus gave out high fives all day. The simple gesture is designed to encourage others, spread good vibes, and/or demonstrate positive feedback to indicate that a task has been done well. At LearningRx (www.LearningRx.com), the largest personal brain training company in the world, we use a lot of high fives with our clients. In fact, positive feedback—along with loading, targeting, practice, intensity, sequencing, and a one-on-one approach—is one of our seven key ingredients for effective brain training. “More than three decades of research have gone into the development of LearningRx’s personal brain training programs and one of the lessons that have stood out most to us is that feedback is a vital tool of any training process,” explains LearningRx CEO Kim Hanson “You’ll see a lot of high fives between our personal brain trainers and students because the positive reinforcement encourages growth and boosts confidence.” LearningRx personal brain training programs are designed to target and strengthen the core cognitive skills that help us think, remember, learn, and read. To date, more than 100,000 students—from children and teens to adults and seniors—have graduated from their programs. What’s the difference between personal brain training and tutoring? When new clients come to LearningRx, one of the most common questions we’re asked is how personal brain training differs from tutoring. Many parents have tried tutoring—with little or no results—and worry that one-on-one cognitive skills training will simply be more of the same. But the two solutions are very different, both in terms of how they are implemented and the problems they address. That’s because learning is made up of two components: educational content and the cognitive ability to learn and apply that content to school, work, and life in general. Tutoring is a resource for delivering or redelivering material that was missed the first time. If a student missed a chunk of school due to an illness, injury, or family move mid-schoolyear, for example, tutoring can help get them “caught up” on the material they missed when it was originally presented. For students who are frustrated and falling behind in multiple classes year after year, tutoring probably won’t help—or it may provide a temporary fix. Instead, it’s likely that one or more brain skills need a boost to help the student learn, understand, and remember the information the first time. Instead of reteaching the same material in hope that it will “stick,” personal brain training addresses the root cause of the problem by targeting and strengthening the foundational tools that make learning fast and easy. How does personal brain training work? Most learning struggles occur when one or more cognitive skills aren’t as strong as they could be. Sometimes referred to as “brain skills,” these foundational tools include logic & reasoning, memory, processing speed, attention, and auditory and visual processing. Some of these skills can be broken down into sub-skills. For example, there are two types of memory: long-term and working (a.k.a. short-term). Likewise, there are three types of attention: sustained, divided, and selective. Every initial consultation at LearningRx starts with a Brain Skills Assessment. The results of this one-hour evaluation help us pinpoint which cognitive skills are strong and which can be strengthened more to bring out the student’s full learning potential. If you choose to enroll your student in a LearningRx program, our team will use the results of the Brain Skills Assessment to create a personal brain training program designed to target and strengthen the skills most in need of a boost. Because we have found that human-to-human interaction far outperforms training on a computer, students are paired with a personal brain trainer for the duration of their program. Their trainer will use fun game-like mental exercises to challenge specific cognitive skills, strengthen them, and build confidence for learning. Our programs use 35+ years of research and development to help our clients improve their performance at work, school, and life! To learn more about personal brain training or to find a LearningRx center near you to schedule a Brain Skills Assessment, visit www.LearningRx.com. There’s no obligation to sign up for a brain training program and the results of the assessment will likely provide you with a wealth of information to help you determine the next steps to help your student. About LearningRx® LearningRx, headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colorado, is the largest one-on-one brain training company in the world. Their training programs are delivered through more than 200 locations in North America and in 48 countries around the globe (as BrainRx®). LearningRx has helped more than 100,000 individuals and families sharpen their cognitive skills to help them think faster, learn easier, and perform better. In addition to their in-Center training programs that partner every client with a personal brain trainer to keep clients engaged, accountable, and on-task—a key advantage over digital brain games—the company also offers online training through real-time videoconferencing. This virtual delivery method allows clients to train from the comfort of their own home while still receiving the benefits of one-on-one brain training with a personal brain trainer. LearningRx’s pioneering methods have been used in clinical settings for over 35 years and have been subjected to peer-review in more than a dozen scientific journals. To learn more visit https://www.learningrx.com