About the Alert Program®...."If your body is like a car engine, sometimes it runs on high, sometimes it runs on low, and sometimes it runs just right." When teachers, therapists, or parents use these simple words to begin the Alert Program®, they enter an exciting adventure with children. The journey unfolds easily with the program's clearly defined steps for teaching self-regulation awareness. The book, How Does Your Engine Run?® A Leader's Guide to the Alert Program® for Self-Regulation (Williams & Shellenberger, 1996), describes an innovative program that supports children, teachers, parents, and therapists to choose appropriate strategies to change or maintain states of alertness. Students learn what they can do before a spelling test or homework time to attain an optimal state of alertness for their tasks. Teachers learn what they can do after lunch, when their adult nervous systems are in a low alert state and their students are in a high alert state. Parents learn what they can do to help their toddler's nervous system change from a high alert state to a more appropriate low state at bedtime. Leaders of the program not only learn what they can do to support self-regulation, but how to share the underlying theory so all can understand the basics of sensory integration. By reading the book or attending a conference, adults increase awareness of their own self-regulation thereby improving their ability to facilitate students' optimal functioning. The Sensory-Motor Preference Checklist (for Adults) is a tool used to support this learning process. For example by filling out the checklist, adults may discover that before work, they may drink coffee, take a brisk walk, or listen to jazzy music to get their engine up and going for the day. Or others may find that they drink hot chocolate, rock in a rocking chair, or watch the glow of a fireplace to get their engine slowed down after a busy day. Bringing to awareness what most people do automatically in their daily routines, fosters the understanding of how important self-regulation is for students' functioning. Although the Alert Program® initially was intended for children with attention and learning difficulties, ages 8-12, it has been adapted for preschool through adult and for a variety of disabilities. If children are intellectually challenged or developmentally younger than the age of eight, the program's concepts can be utilized by staff to develop sensory diets (Wilbarger & Wilbarger, 1991) to enhance learning. Join the group of teachers, occupational therapists, speech-language pathologists, physical therapists, adapted physical educators, educational assistants, counselors, social workers, and parents who are enhancing children's lives using the Alert Program®.

Alert Program®

Therapy Works Children's Program: How Does Your Engine Run?®

checkout
listen to sample audio clip
Listen!
Just Right Song:
Emerging Version
listen to sample audio clip
Listen!
Five Ways
TEST DRIVE
Introducing the Alert Program® Through Song This book and CD, with its appealing songs to support children's self-regulation, is full of practical ideas and suggestions. Test Drive is the simplest way to introduce the Alert Program® concepts to children in schools, homes, or therapy settings, even if the reader is unfamiliar with the Leader's Guide or Take Five! books. Listen to a Test Drive song just once and everyone will be humming and tapping their toes to the catchy words and rhymes, perhaps not even knowing they are learning about self-regulation!

All will enjoy the ease with which children learn and remember the Alert Program® concepts through these playful, yet educational song lines such as: "I do my best work and it's a great place to be. My engine's just right, nothing's stopping me!"

The Test Drive book walks you through exactly how to introduce the Alert Program® engine analogy and vocabulary to a group of students at school or to an individual at home. You can't go wrong with the straight forward instructions given in the book and the following songs that outline the basic Alert Program® concepts:
  • The Just Right Song is the main song that teaches students the engine analogy and sample ways to change how alert they feel.
  • The Best Work song, with its bluesy swing, peaks students' interest in learning how easy it is to focus and pay attention when engines are in a just right level of alertness.
  • The song Five Ways expands students' awareness of how to change their engine levels and how to choose from a larger variety of engine strategies.
  • The Engine Song reinforces not only the engine vocabulary and strategies but adds a self-monitoring, social-emotional dimension. With phrases such as, "make a good decision, yes I can!" the song reminds children they can make good engine choices.
  • The Alive, Awake, Alert song offers an ideal movement break for children's engines at school, at home, or in therapy settings.
  • And the Transition Songs are instrumental recordings of selected Test Drive songs that can be used to support engines in times of transition. They are intended to be played as students change activities or focus, perhaps as they finish silent reading and prepare for their math lesson.
We are confident that Test Drive will soon become one of your favorite ways to introduce the Alert Program® to your students, but we have to warn you: you may find yourself singing the songs throughout the day and you can't get them out of your head. And that's just what we hope will happen for your students. Your students may find themselves singing (and learning) a song line such as, "Five ways, we've got five ways to maximize your days" Mouth, move, touch, look, listen and find your way!"

Spiral Bound, 136 pages, published by TherapyWorks, Inc. (2006)

ISBN#: 978-0-9643041-3-0

Price: $35.00 Each

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