As a M.A. developmental therapist and special educator, I offer to all families with neurotypical and non-neurotypical developing infants. toddlers, adolescents and adults a comprehensive fully evidence-based peer-reviewed therapeutic approach based upon the DIR/Floortime model (Developmental, Individual Processing and Relationship based differences). DIR/Floortime was founded in the mid1980's by world renown child psychiatrist and former head of NIMH, Mental Health Study Center and the Clinical Infant Development Program, Stanley Greenspan, M.D.. and Serena Weider, Ph.D. (Clinical Psychologist).
DIR/Floortime is a neurodevelopmental evidence-based treatment model that is used to comprehensively and systematically addresses your child's primary functional emotional developmental capacities or milestones. Beginning in infancy, there are six primary core Functional Emotional Developmental milestones that are typically achieved during the first three years of life. Each developmental milestone represents a critical stage that every child must master before moving ahead with increasingly complex social engagement, thinking and communicating.
Individuals diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder and/or other biopsychosocial developmental and social communication challenges often have varying degrees of difficulty in mastering and/or fully integrating these six primary core developmental milestones. However, all individuals particularly when intervention is begun early can partially to often entirely master and integrate these peer-typical developmental milestones once their functional emotional developmental capacities and individual sensory-affect-motor processing differences are properly biopsychosocially assessed and warmly and systematically engaged. https://www.icdl.com/dir/fedcs
OUR DEVELOPMENTAL DIR/FLOORTIME CHILD/FAMILY SERVICES INDIVIDUALLY AND COMPREHENSIVELY ADDRESSES THE FOLLOWING PRIMARY CORE FUNCTIONAL EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENTAL MILESTONE AREAS:
Self Regulation and Taking Interest in the World: We consistently guide you and your family during each session in your home to learn how to go to your child’s level and engage your child around his/her natural intent or interests. This begins with a focus on encouraging your child’s optimal arousal to begin to naturally and pleasurably attend to his/her environments.
Engaging and Relating toward Purposeful Two-way Communication We guide you each and every moment in helping you facilitate your child’s increased comfort and ability to begin to internally regulate his/her emotional states and maintain simple back and forth shared attention to more complex two-way engagement (i.e., opening and closing simple circles of communication) around needs, desires and requests for food, toys, play, etc.
Complex Communication and Problem Solving: We do not focus on, “child task-compliance” or on, “adult-directing child behaviors” but on guiding you how to naturally begin to understand, connect and shift your child’s autonomic defensive arousal states of fight/flight or shut-down (i.e., All or Nothing responses/tantrums or shutdown/withdrawal) to feelings of felt-safety in engagement which promotes your child’s emotional-developmental foundations. This involves opening and closing many circles of communication with spontaneous facial and bodily gestures combined with simple words to more complex circles of communication (i.e., back and forth two-way social-emotional problem solving scenarios using combined words, emerging phrases and social-pragmatic language/communication with others for requesting, commenting, searching, etc.).
Using Symbols and Creating Emotional Ideas: As your child continues to move up the developmental ladder, the emphasis turns from simple to complex opening and closing circles of communication with gestures, words and phrases to symbolic/pretend play based interactions that support your child's emerging use of ideation/imagination (i.e., your child beginning to use novel ideas to symbolically engage in feeding, sleeping, waking and traveling routines and interactions with his/her favorite toy or character figures).
Logical Thinking and Building Bridges Between Ideas: A further elaboration of using symbols and creating emotional ideas critically involves a more nuanced and complex elaboration of pretend play encounters (e.g., a logical flow and connection of ideas transacted between character figures, such as conveying or being queried, “Where are they going?”, “How do they feel?” “Are they angry, sad, mad, scared?”, “Why do they want to go to the park to play? etc.). This important critical developmental milestone capacity allows for you and your child to explore new and more complex ideas and challenging emotions that are safely and soundly supported, guided and acted out through pretend play scenarios.
Multi-Causal Perspective-Taking to Gray Area Thinking to Reflective Thinking from an Internal Standard of Self: For older children and adolescents who have mastered these above six developmental milestones, deeper critical reflective thinking skills, multi-causal thinking, gray-area thinking and thinking from an emerging set of deeper or internalized values (i.e., more complex back and forth perspective-taking which reflects an emergent foundation of expanded cognitive skills and healthy autonomy) become the focus of the child/primary caregiver sessions in conjunction with more complex social-pragmatic communication language skills.
My practice is also strongly informed by Polyvagal Theory which involves understanding the autonomic nervous system foundations that support optimal mental health-and-co-regulated interactions The focus is on your child’s cues of “felt-safety” with others beneath the words with an emphasis on social attunement to others subtle facial gestures, auditory-prosodic vocalizations, breath and natural movements. Internally (interoceptively) registering and assessing others/environment as safe significantly aids in reducing sensory-processing challenges and, thereby, allows your child greater access for spontaneous two-way reciprocal engagement and sustained social-pragmatic communication/language to emerge. Our core philosophy and emphasis throughout all sessions is on the critical importance of the capacity and resiliency of your child’s autonomic nervous system shifting from cues of defense to cues of registered felt-safety which are necessary for engagement throughout all social interactions. Certified provider of the Polyvagal SSP (Safe and Sound Protocol).
Our focus throughout all sessions and daily activities is on guiding you as well at times when needed other clinicians to support the biopsychosocial foundations that support healthy, safe and nurturing environments and thus developmentally at each juncture engage your child toward peer competent spontaneous receptive and expressive social-pragmatic language/communication skills beginning with simple to complex emotional reciprocal gestures to single and combined utterances; emerging phrases and full sentence usage.
I also regularly consult with developmental pediatricians, pediatric neuropsychologists, occupational therapists, physical therapists, nutritionists, art therapists and other professionals where there is required more specific attention to a highly specified area of concern or challenge. Therapy sessions are conducted not in a clinic but in the convenience of your family home setting which promotes optimal therapeutic outcomes and support. Participation in scheduled school family/child review meetings are a regular part of our services.
For families where distance/travel time is prohibited, Zoom sessions are available as an option. In addition to our regular scheduled in home or virtual sessions, we encourage you to send weekly video during off session times of you and your child implementing what is practiced during our regular sessions. It will be confidentially reviewed with detailed feedback at no additional cost. All initial phone consultations are quite extensive and non-fee based. https://www.dirdirectory.com/united-states/fort-lee/dirfloortime-practitioner/neil-samuels
