There are three ways to implement this program - (1) Continuing Education Workshops/Seminars for Special Education Teachers and Therapists, (2) hands-on workshops with children in the classroom, and (3) a combination of both of these.
TEACHER WORKSHOP: The HOCUS FOCUS workshop is designed to provide teachers with the necessary tools/knowledge to explore the use of magic tricks in the classroom. Developed with the needs of special education students - ADHD, LD, NLD, SLD, etc. - the workshop addresses eight areas of neurodevelopmental functioning. It provides teachers with a visual, exciting, and motivating way to allow students to safely explore skill levels, improve existing skills, and develop new ones. Spencer also provides the educational foundation for learning these skills by demonstrating the connection with Bloom's Taxonomy of Learning and ways to tie the program to core curriculums.
STUDENT WORKSHOP: Through collaboration with your local school system, arrangments can be made for Spencer to conduct a workshop with students enrolled in special education. This is a highly effective and motivating experience for students and not without educational merit. Learning magic tricks is an excellent way to address attention, memory, language, spatial ordering, social cognition, temporal-sequential ordering, nueromotor functions, and higher order cognition. When employed by the teacher, the utilization of magic tricks may offer a unique and unequaled potential for both academic and personal/social development in a variety of classroom settings.
"Through this educational outreach, teachers saw their students rise to the challenge of critical thinking and problem solving, maintain their focus to give attention to detail, and stay with a task long enough to see the solution. All teachers involved in this special workshop took valuable skills back to their classrooms."
- Charlotte Smelser, ARTSmart & Education Director, TRAHC (TX)
"Our students with behavior disorders have a very hard time with frustration tolerance and task follow-through. Hocus Focus provides an enjoyable experience where they can perfect these skills without knowing it. We need to constantly find ways to reach our students. Hocus Focus is another tool in our belt to accomplish that goal."
Kathy McClung, Behavior Disorders Instructor, IA
