Archive for the ‘Site News’ Category
Wednesday, January 8th, 2014
Art to Life, the art therapy/life story preservation initiative sponsored by Cognitive Dynamics in collaboration with the University of Alabama Honors College, is excited to partner with LifeBio (https://www.lifebio.com/) and The Mal and Charlotte Moore Center for Caring Days (http://www.caringdays.org/) for our Spring semester of 2014.
The program fosters relationships between students and persons with Alzheimer’s disease and their caregivers, while exploring self-expression in dementia through the benefits of art therapy, validating participants in their current lives and honoring their stories.
The program started in 2011 in partnership with Sowing Seeds of Hope Foundation in Perry County, Alabama. Since 2011 the program has brought quality of life improvement through art therapy and life story preservation to approximately twenty participants with Alzheimer’s disease, as well as approximately fifty undergraduate Honors students from diverse backgrounds.
One of the program’s goals is the fostering of empathic, cross-generational relationships between students, persons with cognitive impairment and their caregivers.
Cognitive Dynamics welcomes the opportunity to utilize Life Bio’s structured and validated life story preservation and presentation methods to enrich course offerings. We are also fortunate to partner with The Mal and Charlotte Moore Center for Caring Days, the facility where the art therapy will take place. Caring Days is the longest running adult daycare in Alabama for individuals with Alzheimer’s or dementia of other causes.
Friday, November 15th, 2013
Naomi Feil, founder of Validation Therapy and one of the pioneers in what has come to be known as person-centered care for the elderly with cognitive impairment, was interviewed today by Cognitive Dynamics founder and President, Dr. Daniel C. Potts for an upcoming documentary, “Do You Know Me Now?”
The documentary explores the persistence of personhood in those with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease, as well as ways to tap into the self of such individuals to foster empathy, relationship, dignity and quality of life.
Naomi Feil and Daniel C. Potts
Click the link below to watch a short promotional trailer for the documentary.
Do You Know Me Now?
Wednesday, September 18th, 2013
http://www.alzheimersreadingroom.com/2013/09/can-new-talents-develop-after-diagnosis.html
Click on the link above to read the latest blog from the Alzheimer’s Reading Room, which highlights the creativity of Alzheimer’s artist Lester E. Potts, Jr., the inspiration behind the founding of Cognitive Dynamics. Potts, a rural Alabama saw miller, became an acclaimed watercolor artist in the throes of Alzheimer’s disease, having never shown previous artistic talent. His art has been displayed internationally, and is the subject of research. He started painting while participating in an arts group at Caring Days Adult Daycare Center in Tuscaloosa, AL. http://www.caringdays.org/
Max Wallack, the remarkable 17 year old Alzheimer’s advocate who started Puzzles to Remember http://www.puzzlestoremember.org/ comments about the emergence of new talent in some people with Alzheimer’s disease, and touts cognitive enhancing tools like puzzles as potentially beneficial in fostering such creative expression.
Max has recently written “Why Did Grandma Put Her Underwear in the Refrigerator?” http://www.amazon.com/Why-Did-Grandma-Underwear-Refrigerator/dp/1489501673 to help explain Alzheimer’s disease to children.
Lester E. Potts, Jr. passed away from Alzheimer’s disease on September 15, 2007.
Wednesday, September 11th, 2013
HELP US RAISE ALZHEIMER’S AWARENESS and elder appreciation among our youth! An exciting partnership between The Voice Library and Cognitive Dynamics has produced “Let Me Be Your Memory,” the first-ever language arts/Alzheimer’s awareness curriculum for middle school students. Piloted successfully at the Tuscaloosa Magnet Middle School in 2012, the program is about to go national with your help. Visit our Rockethub site to learn how you can support this worthy educational initiative, and help our youth learn a deeper appreciation for the rich life stories of their elders, all in the name of Alzheimer’s awareness!
http://www.rockethub.com/projects/32008-let-me-be-your-memory-language-arts-curriculum-for-alzheimer-s-awareness
Saturday, July 6th, 2013
Do You Know Me Now?
Cognitive Dynamics is producing a documentary entitled “Do You Know Me Now?” (see the above link to a 9 minute promotional trailer). This is a documentary for families and care givers on how to connect to people with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia and memory loss through person-centered care, the use of the expressive arts and the compelling dynamics of early childhood memories.
As viewer Sylvia Overby said after screening, the video shows “A terrible disease that may hold hidden riches.”
Tax-deductible donations for the completion of the project may be mailed to:
Cognitive Dynamics
P.O. Box 1008
Tuscaloosa, AL 35403
Wednesday, July 3rd, 2013
Changes in painting styles of two artists with Alzheimer’s disease
Cognitive Dynamics Advisory Board member Anjan Chatterjee, MD, FAAN has recently published an article in Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts demonstrating that quantitative methods can be applied to the neuropsychology of art production to determine whether there are systematic changes in the art produced by individuals with Alzheimer’s disease.
In assessing the art of two persons with Alzheimer’s disease (one of whom was Lester E. Potts, Jr.), it was shown that both AD patients produced paintings with more abstraction and use of symbolism and with less depictive accuracy and realism. When these observations were combined with those made recently in three artists with focal brain damage, it was found that conceptual more than formal perceptual attributes are susceptible to change after neurological illness.
Dr. Chatterjee is a Professor of Neurology, a member of the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, and the Center for Neuroscience and Society at the University of Pennsylvania.
To access the article abstract, visit the link above. For more information about Dr. Chatterjee, visit:
Anjan Chatterjee, M.D. FAAN
Sunday, June 30th, 2013
Art and Alzheimer’s
Click the link above to read an article in the Northeast Mississippi Daily News about a lecture given by Dr. Daniel Potts at the North Mississippi State Hospital on June 20, 2013. The lecture was about the use of expressive arts therapies and life story preservation in the treatment of those with dementia, and highlighted the art and life story of Lester E. Potts, Jr.
Saturday, December 8th, 2012
The Voice Library is an online digital library of customized audio memories…stories, poems, songs, and other reminiscences, that can be accessed anytime, anywhere, via multiple means (phone, computer, mobile device).
Cognitive Dynamics has recently partnered with The Voice Library to pilot “Let Me Be Your Memory,” an audio reminiscence project with the Tuscaloosa Magnet Middle School in Alabama as a way to promote Alzheimer’s awareness and intergenerational relationships.
Poetry and bibliotherapy (the use of literary modalities to promote healing) is an effective means of improving quality of life and promoting dignity for the cognitively-impaired.
Please click the link below to listen to recited poems of Dr. Daniel C. Potts. Once on the site, please use the following information, and then follow the instructions to select the recording you would like to hear:
Listen by computer
Listener ID-2304
Password-22084761
You may also listen by phone by calling the following number, toll-free: 1-888-343-2763, and using the same log in information.
Thursday, November 29th, 2012
“Let Me Be Your Memory,” an innovative, first-of-its-kind program bringing audio memory preservation to teenagers for the promotion of Alzheimer’s awareness, is the subject of a video from ABC 33/40’s “Focus at 4” news series. The project was created via a unique collaboration between The Voice Library, Tuscaloosa Magnet Middle School, and Cognitive Dynamics Foundation.
As part of the school’s International Baccalaureate Program, middle school students were tasked with recording audio memories from their loved ones over the Thanksgiving holidays in an effort to raise awareness for National Alzheimer’s Awareness Month.
It is hoped that this concept, piloted in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, will be a model for other schools across the country, as a means to engage teenagers in Alzheimer’s awareness, and to promote intergenerational outreach.
Click on the link below to view the story, and scroll below the initial video to view the piece:
Let Me Be Your Memory
Thursday, November 22nd, 2012
My spirit, a russet oak leaf,
swirls to November’s windy wand,
swept along in a homeward spell.
Brushing by the old ones,
I, again, am green, though briefly so.
For we all change hues in autumn’s breeze.
And the heat of held hands
and thankful hearts
has cut away the cold.
Stuffing ourselves with the gravy of good,
we laugh again at dinnertime,
and for dessert, we cry…
True colors show
around the table
in the fall of the year.
“Now Thank We All Our God…”
for the time of turning.
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