HANDLE® is an acronym for "Holistic Approach to Neuro-Development and Learning Efficiency."

A HANDLE® Screening or Assessment is a great starting point to begin tracking down root causes of students' learning difficulties; it can:

•   Provide a good understanding of how and why a person learns and behaves in the particular ways (s)he does

•   Guide selection of simple, gentle, at-home activities to help maximize clients' unique abilities and address any neurodevelopmental delays, and

•   Give indications, on occasion, of when other programs or services may be beneficial.

HANDLE® is based on current learning theory and brain science, including an understanding of neuroplasticity, perceptual integration, Gentle Enhancement® (a registered trademark of The HANDLE Institute), and cognitive loading/task loading. For more information on each of these principles, click the "window shades" below:

"Perceptual Integration" refers to an understanding that a person's learning is enhanced or limited by the extent to which (s)he accurately assesses and remembers the properties, identity, context, and relevancy of sensations, as well as the immediacy of any response required.

Now, what's that mean?

Here's an example: a woman with impaired sight (i.e., blindness) may not be able to effectively assess the size or mass of a rapidly approaching object (impaired evaluation of properties). She may not identify the rapidly approaching "blob" as a car (impaired identification), grasp how fast it is approaching (impaired awareness of context), or quickly decide if it merits her attention (impaired evaluation of relevancy). If she can't make these assessments, the woman in our example may not perceive the "blob" as a threat. Or, hunkered down in her apartment after several near misses, she may perceive every "blob"—even kind Uncle Henry—as a threat. And she may demand that blobs "go away."

It's fairly easy to understand how visual acuity (or the lack thereof in blindness) can affect a person's ability to accurately assess and remember the identity, properties, context, and relevancy of stimuli, as well as the immediacy of any response required. It's more difficult to understand how some of our other senses might play a role.

Thinking and sensing are innately connected. Both are complex, and both function largely outside our conscious awareness. It's thus easy to take for granted such common sensations as:

•   The "Vagus Sense": Attention to potential threats or stressors.

•   Olfaction: Perception of smell.

•   Gustation: Perception of taste.

•   Neurogenesthesia: Perception of neuro-electrical activity.

•   Thermoreception: Perception of non-painful temperature.

•   Nociception: Ability to feel pain, both in general and as distinct from non-painful touch and non-painful temperature.

•   Tactility: Perception of non-painful touch.

•   Kinesthesia: Perception of muscles-in-movement.

•   Muscle Tone: Maintenance of partial contraction of skeletal muscles to facilitate posture, to preserve joint integrity, and to move.

•   Vestibulation: Perception of inertia (initiation or cessation of movement), also called the "sense of balance."

•   Proprioception: Perception of body in space. Distinct from a person's "body schema," proprioception combines input from vestibulation, kinesthesia, muscle tone, and deep tactile receptors called "proprioceptors" to perceive a body part's spatial position.

•   Audition: Perception of a wide range of sound-wave frequencies through air and bone.

•   Auditory-Linguistic Integration: Ability to instantaneously distinguish between spoken language and non-lingual sounds.

•   Ocular Motility: Ability to move the eyes in tandem to track a foreground object.

•   Vision: Sense of sight, including visual acuity (accuracy of foreground perception) and visual accommodation (rate of adjustment to changes of foreground distance).

•   Binocularity: Ability to integrate perception from both eyes into a single, coherent image.

For more information on the interplay among some of these sensory systems and learning, check out our Integral Learning™ model.

"Gentle Enhancement®" refers to the belief that when perceptual systems are overwhelmed, a person requires an extremely safe and supportive environment to make sense of what has happened. Many times, what people think is "safe and supportive" simply isn't to a person with perceptual difficulties. And even a "safe and supportive" environment is no guarantee a person with perceptual difficulties will make sense of a sensorially overwhelming experience. It's possible to detect cues of when the nervous system is becoming overwhelmed. These cues, called "State Changes" by HANDLE®, are warning signals to reduce the intensity of a stimulus. Honoring these warning signals can enable a person with perceptual difficulties to gradually "let in," accommodate, and integrate more information. Gentle Enhancement® involves remaining sensitive to these State Changes while using unified, targeted, and sequenced learning activities to improve the reliability of a person's perceptions.

For more information on Gentle Enhancement® and State Changes, click here to download a helpful fact sheet.

"Cognitive Loading" or "Task Loading" refers to an understanding that as perceptual systems improve, a person who is learning to trust them is still—on some level—consciously trying to make sense of their input. Since the brain can only do so much consciously at any given time, "thinking tasks" are added to HANDLE® Activities as a person progresses through a HANDLE® program. The more resources the brain devotes to the new "thinking tasks," the fewer resources it has to devote to accurately assessing and remembering the identity, properties, context, and relevancy of sensations, as well the immediacy of any response required. Thus, the brain tries automating some perceptual integration. The more this happens, the more the brain "lets go" of the need to consciously regulate perception. State Changes are apparent whenever the brain isn't "letting go." Thus, State Changes are signs that thinking tasks or sensory input ought to be reduced.

Ultimately, as perception becomes more reliable through Gentle Enhancement®, perception becomes more automatic through Cognitive Loading.

"Neuroplasticity" refers to the ways the brain changes in response to specific stimuli. Specifically, neurons in our brains grow in response to stimuli that are:

•   Are done often (frequency),

•   Are sufficient to require attention but not overwhelming (intensity),

•   Are done consistently (regularity),

•   Last only so long as holds attention (duration),

•   Are purposeful (intentional, goal-directed), and/or

•   Are novel (surprising).

Because of neuroplasticity, we can keep on learning. The structure of the brain isn't set in stone by the time a person is age six… or nine… or twenty-nine… or even seventy-nine. Though parts of our brains are generally "hardwired" by certain ages, the brain organizes itself in response to patterns of thought and sensation. We can always hope for change.