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The first GEKKO was opened
in August 1999
by Csilla Ónodi and Gergő Bordás,
a young couple graduated from ELTE
Bárczi Gusztáv
Faculty of Special Education. |
They invented the Skills Development Playhouse,
created
the dream workplace for themselves.
They saw the huge gap between what we know, and what was actually happening in practice. Experts, researchers, scientists have told us, how to make education much better,
but the entire child-care and schooling system basically remained the same.
They felt it was the time for them to put science into real-world practice. They wanted to
work at a place,
where everything is perfectly suitable for early childhood skills development,
where they can actually use what science has taught them, a place that every child loves.
Where all the latest educational games, toys, tools, tests, accessories are available,
where they can use modern technology, where they can work with 4 children groups,
using an infrastructre that is designed specifically for ECE from the ground up.
Better Skills for Every Child
Experts know hundred years old -and brand new- methods for developing better skills
in early chilhood, that are later required for learning, working, reading, writing,
— and just about everything we do in our lives.
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Attention -for example- is one of the vital skills we need
in school, work, and even in sports and private life.
Some people can concentrate on what they are doing
for longer period of times, others can't.
Some people have a difficulty sharing their attention,
others can easily listen to somebody and also write.
Many children are affected by ADHD,
or attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.
But did you know,
that our attention skills can be
significantly improved
in early childhood
by “spinning in the spaceship?”
(Frequent stimulation of the vestibular system of the brain.) |
4:1 Solution
Attention was a good example, because it has many different properties
(we call them core-skills) and all these properties together basically define
how successfully we can handle challanges in life.
GEKKO education works in 4 child groups, led by a highly professionial instructor
with the highest university degree in special education. We focus 100% attention,
expertise, to every single child based on his or her core-skills profile.
4 functions at 1 place
We provide one complex program, so that parents don't need 44 different places,
with a different expert for the optimal development of every essential skill.
We develop all four core function areas:
- Cognitive
- Motor
- Speech / language
- Social / emotional
Problems Are Not Required
GEKKO puts science into real-life action, into play. Every child's play! We know how
to develop better skils in early childhood, and specialists world-wide use these methods
when
they have to, when it's required.
But why should problems be the condition?
Is sport just for the obese? Is school only 'required'
by the failed?
Is health only value to the sick?
Why do we need the problem in order to develop childrens' skills?
Our answer: we don't. We don't need the problems, we can develop skills without them.
Childen's Day — Every Day
But Csilla and Gergő didn't just create a dream workplace for themselves.
They wanted to create a new educational institute that children really enjoy.
So they invented the 'skills development playhouse' - ECE packaged
into fun.
Children's Play
Let's imagine you had to invent something new in education that children should love.
But not just love like they like a good school, but really, really enjoy. What else could it be?
Of course it's play. And -what a coincidence - it's also the most effective way to learn.
Play is the billion years educational institution of Nature.
Needless to say, it is very, very effective, - it works like a charm.
All we needed to do was to understand our play very well,
get to understand
every single child very well,
and then play very well 60 minutes per week.
Optimal challanges
Every single child is unique,
and so is every single excersice of our development courses.
Experiences
based on the individual skills profile
of the child helps
the brain develop
well
with more extensive and sophisticated neuron structures.
But what the child experiences, is success. Because we know his our her skills inside out,
we can provide challenges that are very motivating, but we make sure the child succeeds.
Everybody loves to succeed, and much success in early ages induces optimal skills formation.
Fruitful Investment in Fun
Problems are not only not required, but GEKKO prevents them.
We can prevent problems that affect 20% percent of children, 1 in every 5.
How? The professional background is
a long story,
but the answer is very short for the parent,
and it's nothing but pure fun for the child:
60 minutes GEKKO per week: bye-bye learning disabilities.
We Can And Do Prevent Learning Disabilities
We can and do prevent:
- ADHD
- dyslexia
- dysgraphia
- dyscalculia
We can and do prevent learning disabilities that are caused by the dysfuncion of one or more
inter-related core skills. If a child comes to GEKKO from birth until school, he or she will not have
any of these problems. This is a fact, something we have experienced after 10 years of practice.
In plain English, your child will:
- listen
- read
- write
- calculate
well in school. Early childhood skills development means an improved chance to every child.
Much less:
- grade retention
- criminal activity
- dropout
Much more:
- chance to graduate from collage
- chance to hold a job
- chance to live a healthy life
New Institution
GEKKO is a new institution beside the existing child-care and educational infrastructure,
built specifically from the ground up for highly effective skills development.
Healthcare has its problems, but modern medicine and the latest technology
is very
effective in treating health problems. But when it comes to
prevention,
especially learning disabilities, healthcare systems basically fail.
Nursery schools and kindergarten will do a good job in taking good care of the child
and even do help a lot in reaching school readiness. But skills development is not possible
in large groups, without the required expertise. Kindergartens have their natural limits.
Elementary school, -whether the most expensive private, or low-funded state owned-,
happens too late for optimal skills development. Even if they had the expertise and resources
for child-specific skills development,
it would still be too late for good enough results.
GEKKO will never replace any of the above. They will always be as neccessary as they have
ever been. But we believe that GEKKO - and other skills development playhouses - are also neccessary. Something new is neccessary, that puts modern science into play.
The Boring Stuff
The first GEKKO in 1999 proved to be extremely successful. Although we had no money to advertise, word of mouth did miracles. Csilla and Gergő had to hire the first employee after
one month, the playhouse reached its full capacity
(200 children) within 6 months.
It was inevitable to grow and we choose franchise as the method.
In 2008 we were the
7th largest franchise network (Budapest Businnes Journal, Book of Lists),
among
the top 50 successful SMB's (according to a major publication: Magyar Hírlap) in Hungary.
We were shown more than 30 times on mainstream national television, featured in countless radio programmes, mainstream press articles. Today we operate
23 skills development playhouses, we are the largest employer of the highest skilled special education experts.
We operate the most sophisticated website about early childhood education / skills development
in Hungary, we publish information materials (fact sheets, articles) to the general public
and child-care related professionals. We are the largest advocates of ECE in Hungary.
As of today, we have recieved a total amount of Hungarian state, European or other external funds of zero dollars. Beside the total absence of financial help, there isn't even a tax benefit
of any kind, - nor to ECE ventures like ourselves, neither to the parents who pay for it.
This tough road however forced us to prove something. The Nobel Laurate economist James Heckman proved, that (state) investment in the very young makes sense from strictly financial point of view. We proved, that it can also survive as a franchise business, on its own feet.
We have created something new in education, we have created a new institution,
a new kind of place for children and their parents. Within only 10 years,
the "skills
development playhouse" indeed has become a new institution in this country.
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