| First published in STATNews, vol. 5, no. 6, January 2000. |
This 3 hour video is a straightforward record of a one-day workshop given by the affable Ray Evans on primitive reflexes. There is just one camera angle and variety of shot is achieved by zoom and pan. The workshop itself falls into several sections but these are not distinguished in the video. Viewers will be impressed by the way Ray exposes how understanding primitive reflexes can help us in our Alexander work, particularly with understanding some “strange” behaviours in pupils.
Ray is not only an Alexander teacher and teacher trainer, but also a Yoga teacher and badminton, coach and, as an engineer, has taught engineering. With this background it is not too surprising to find he became fascinated when he discovered that primitive reflexes form the basis of our movement behaviours in life. Fifteen years ago he studied under Peter Blythe at the Institute for Neuro-Physiological Psychology in Chester and is a graduate of their training in the processes of inhibition of persistent primitive reflexes. If pupils or students display “difficulties” - emotional outbursts, clumsiness, phobias for example - these, can often be traced to persistent and not fully integrated primitive reflexes.
The first hour of the video is taken up with a wide-ranging talk that covers basic information concerning the basis and implications of these “survival reflexes”. This is the most engaging section of the video. Ray talks about the three levels of control in the nervous system, how the primitive reflexes underlie and form the foundation for the postural reflexes and how many phobias can arise from reflexes not being correctly integrated.
Nine primitive reflexes are shown on a chart and Ray explains that as each reflex naturally occurs so it is naturally inhibited by the succeeding reflex in the hierarchical series and then becomes integrated into our movement patterns. The Fear Paralysis Response (or “playing dead”) - reflex number 1 - is superseded by the Moro reflex which is the known as the “clasp response”. The Moro can be seen as a trace in the adult when the “startle pattern” reflex is elicited. Obviously one needs both responses to work and Ray explained how the reflex movements themselves stimulate the nervous system to grow.
In the next section, Ray launches into a description of the background to Peter Blythe’s work and brings out several issues that could benefit from further development - a fuller explanation of the operation of the Reticular Formation, for example. A series of short excerpts on a variety of points leads eventually into another practical session for the class concerning varieties of walking which has everyone amused.
In the final section, as well as a quick showing of drawings indicating the possibility of-unresolved reflexes as revealed in postural sitting attitudes, a chart reveals how six areas of malfunctioning in adult human behaviour are linked to nervous system development (1.vision / dyslexia; 2. cortical / poor attention; 3. vestibular / poor co-ordination; 4. vestibular / dizziness; 5. lips & mouth / poor pronunciation and speech; 6. “stimulus bound” effect / poor auditory). It would have been good if more time could have been spent on this.
Ray was unable in this workshop to go very far into how the primitive reflexes might be related to our actual teaching practice in detail - excepting “all-fours” position as a good training for having an integrated experience for putting hands on pupils. He emphasised that touch is the first sense to be innervated and questioned whether Alexander work would be valid if not conducted through touch contact. Ray admitted that he really needed a week to cover all the material he wanted to speak about and by the end of the video it seems that it might have been more appropriate to devote a whole weekend to the workshop as some questions raised never get fully resolved and many potentially fascinating topics get little time devoted to them. Nevertheless this is a vital record of a unique event and anyone with a strong interest in embryology, growth and development, Dart-work and “strange” behaviour in people cannot fail to benefit from studying this video. If as Ray says, our general behaviour is dependent upon on nine month ride in the womb we all of us owe it to ourselves to find out as much as we can about that ride we took all those years ago.
© Robin Simmons. Reproduced with permission.
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This edition © Mouritz 2005. All rights reserved. |
