TOUCH TO INFORM SEMINARS
A FULL CERTIFICATE PROGRAM

a Feldenkrais® Model for Sensory Learning  CE’s for LMTs 

Continuing Education Programs for educators, coaches and therapists (LMTs) using concepts and practical applications from The Feldenkrais Method® developed by Bonnie Kissam, M.A. in Dance/Education, LMT, Feldenkrais Practitioner/Assistant Trainer, Licensed Massage Therapist, FL Lic #MA 36256, Florida CE Provider # 50-1980, NCBTMB Provider # 452056  Collaborated with Nikki Rollason, Feldenkrais Practitioner, Licensed Massage Therapist, FL Lic. #MA 31953 from Miami, FL.

LEVEL I. Introduction Seminars (2 CEs)      

We prefer you experience an Introductory Seminar before enrolling in others.

LEVEL II. One Day seminars (6 CEs)                                           *now offered in one weekend – with an Intro on Friday.

1. Moving from and through Your Core:
2. The Four Corners/Diagonals – Your Walking Engine
3. Moving from and through your FEET
4. Soft Hands/Eyes, Easy Neck/Shoulders

” I loved learning a new way of helping my body balance and function; thank you so much for your kindness and knowledge.” CB

LEVEL III. Two plus day seminars – Clinical Applications

(15 CEs each) Fri. Evening – Sunday

1. Lifelong AGILITY: A Feldenkrais Model/Lower Extremities
2. Release Your Jaw: A Feldenkrais® Model/Upper Extremities

“I enjoy how my body and subconscious allow me to learn in a more  integrated way; each class brings a new level of learning.”  Ann

“I really enjoyed learning to stand on my ‘own two feet’ again and the many years of wisdom and caring for the participants by instructors.” SD

LEVEL IV. Two plus day Advanced Seminars

(pre-request of 28 hours from other seminars)

1. For Better Balance Part I  Planes of Action
2. For Better Balance Part II  Prevent Falling — thru –Walking

FEE:   per Seminar.  Costs will vary according to when, where and time of registration.  Early registration fees are available.

**Special FSMTA Meeting  June 18th in St. Augustine – one day only: Effortless Swing, Power from your Pelvis!

        in ST.PETERSBURG, District Dance Academy, Clearwater/Largo          June 25-27  Regain, Maintain Lifelong Agility  

‘Increase mobility of rib cage and pelvis, not lower back for power — movement.”               

CALL: 941.360.2248 

Webinars – Distance Learning

A Feldenkrais Model

Introductory Wednesdays. 2nd Wed. 6:30- 8:30                                                        April 23-25 Release your Jaw, Your Voice, Your Wholeself,                                 May 21-23  Lifelong Agility- , lower extremities                                                         July 17 & 18 Your Walking Engine Weekend                                                          August 14 & 15 Moving from your CORE Weekend                                                                      

DESCRIPTIONS  of each Seminar:

Level I, Two-hour Introductory Seminars   [2 CEs CEBroker & NCBTMB]

(Intro) Viva la Breathing/A Feldenkrais® Model # 20-301455

Moshe Feldenkrais, D.Sc. created various breathing lessons. He used the action of breathing to bring attention to and shifts to the muscular holding patterns of the rib and diaphragm area. A fully functionally aligned spine/rib area supports breathing while exploring different ways to breath supports alignment. In this seminar, participants will learn ways to engage themselves and their clients with sensory awareness skills that expand the torso for lifelong balanced posture with many useful, practical applications.

(Intro) Freeing the Neck and Shoulders/A Feldenkrais® Model      # 20-297177

Our head follows our eyes. Our shoulders are connected to head movement while our spine and skeleton support our head. Using neurological concepts from The Feldenkrais® Method, participants will develop skills that indirectly quiet excessive tension in the muscles of the neck and shoulders so that the head is freer to move – and the shoulders feel more supple.

(Intro) Regaining a Flexible Spine/A Feldenkrais® Model protecting the lower back.    # 20-301458

Movement requires an ‘even’ give and take between opposing muscles, the agonists and antagonists. When one set of muscles stays tight, then fluid, easy movement disappears. Efficient functional movement of the spine requires ‘even’ muscular tonus between the flexor and extensor muscles of the torso and an ‘even’ distribution of effort throughout the action. This requires mobilization of the thoracic spine.

Level II Day Long SEMINARS

6 CEs with CE Broker and NCBTMB

Moving from Your CORE   A Feldenkrais Model

#20-301460

Support from one’s skeletal system can create more ease in everyday activities. If a person intentionally initiates movement from the pelvis, work load in the low back is reduced and the whole neuromuscular system works with less muscular demands.

Participants will be able to perceive clearly muscles that interfere with easy fluid action either by overworking or underworking. They will demonstrate skills that can help their clients fine-tune the neuromuscular relationship between pelvis, spine, and torso for reaching, sitting, and standing.

Soft Eyes/Hands, Easy Neck/Shoulders A Feldenkrais Model

#20-301463

The relationship between the eyes and neck and hands and shoulders are a profound example of how one can work indirectly. Using knowledge of how the nervous system develops patterns helps one develop strategies to quiet old patterns in the hands and create new possibilities for the shoulders. Participants will demonstrate an understanding of how the support from the pelvis/skeleton allows the shoulders to rest. They develop a keen awareness to how softening the grip in hands or softening eyes can ease the shoulders and neck. They develop skills that can create shifts in the use of eyes and hands that will ease tension in the neck and shoulders and the neck and shoulders of others.

Your Walking Engine – Working with the diagonals a Feldenkrais® Model  

#20-301461

The torso of the human body, the area between the arms and legs, is often considered the ‘engine’ for walking. The large muscles that surround the torso are designed to optimize one’s posture, coordination and balance. However, when one fears falling, these muscles tighten and often remain held in a habitual state of tension. The more this state of fear/tension remains, the less the torso — the engine for our balance and our walking — gets used.

Participants discover their walking ‘engine’ through awareness to where the four corners of one’s torso are in space and how they move, or don’t move, to maintain balance and posture. They will develop skills to balance flexors and extensors and broaden their ability to support a client’s ability to regain a strong and flexible organization for walking and other daily activities.

Moving from and through Your FEET a Feldenkrais® Model

#20-301462

Hidden postural habits can affect FEET and ankles. Hidden holdings in FEET and ankles can affect posture. Participants will demonstrate the ability to help their clients sense subtle changes in movements of FEET and how it can improve their ability to move with more comfort and ease overall. They will also fine-tune their ability to change posture to support FEET/legs working more effectively. How familiar are you with the 26 bones, 33 joints, and numerous muscles and nerve endings in each foot? Participants will be able to describe or demonstrate the relationship between posture, balance and movements and what FEET have to do with it. They will demonstrate several options for movement in FEET, toes and ankles, to help not only FEET but also posture.

Level III Two plus Day SEMINARS

15 CEs with CE Broker and NCBTMB

Lifelong Agility  A Feldenkrais® Model/ lower extremities

#20-219494

This course is designed to offer LMTs practical clinical strategies from the Feldenkrais Method®, for their clients with low back, spine, hip and knee difficulties in bending, standing and sitting. The focus is on how to make clients more agile. Agility means being able to move easily in any direction. This requires good balance, a brain that senses whole body action, easy joints and an even give and take between flexors and extensors of all muscles working in synergistic patterns.

Licensed Massage Therapists will be able to:

• View tension in muscles as part of a muscular pattern, in the Brain Map
• Look and work indirectly to a problem area.
• Use awareness and movement of bones to find space between joints
• Find support and improved balance and thus functional ability.
• Use TOUCH TO INFORM to support clients in developing long term health

Release Your Jaw, Your Voice, A Feldenkrais® Model/upper extremities

#20-224725

This course is designed to offer LMTs practical strategies from the Feldenkrais Method®, to complement techniques used for those with head, neck, shoulder and jaw joint discomforts. Participants will explore how to use a client’s nervous system to help even and then modulate muscle tone, use the skeleton as support, view muscle tension as part of a habitual pattern for an action and develop skills to interrupt those patterns. Moshe Feldenkrais, D. Sc., a revolutionary thinker about neuro-muscular connections and movement pattern formations. He developed a method that demonstrates that through fine tuned variations to one’s habitual actions, even deeply rooted patterns such as clenching one’s teeth, can be changed. Attention is focused relationally to the jaw joint, with movement explorations of the breath, the eyes, the tongue and voice along with postural support for head, neck and shoulders.

Licensed Massage Therapists will be able to demonstrate an ability to:

• Identify physiological response to fear noticing muscle tensions.
• View tension in muscles as part of a muscular pattern, held in the Brain Map
• Identify possible interruptions to jaw tightening including held intercostal muscles and abdominal muscles, as well as increased use of the eyes, throat, and voice.
• Demonstrate the ability to pause and connect with clients through inquiry and curiosity.
• Demonstrate an ability to use TOUCH TO INFORM

Level IV – Better Balance I & II                                           

Pre-requisites of 24 previous hours from TTI Seminars

TTI Better Balance Part I 15-hour Seminar   #20-671688

Pre-requisite:  LMT, healthcare practitioner or educator who has previously integrated 24 hours of TOUCH TO INFORM Seminars.

TTI Better Balance Part II   From Falling to Walking

15 hour Seminar #20-671696

Pre-requisite:  LMT, healthcare practitioner or educator who has  integrated TTI Better Balance Part I

The focus will be a continuation of Better Balance I along with applications for different populations and conditions;  ie young children, athletes, scoliosis, spondylothesis