CURRICULUM

The Continuum Movement Teacher Program (CMTP) is a 2 year, 500 hour professional development curriculum.

Prerequisites to the Training Program:

    • 10 Teaching Modules:
      • Consisting of ≥500 training hours
      • In person modules are 5 days each, with homework to be done on student’s own time between classes. By request of the students, we will be offering two Modules taught back to back to minimize the time commitment and reduce the cost of travel for the students.
      • The hybrid module series. Classes will be taught both on-line (virtually) and in person. Students must be able to do some in person classes to fully meet the requirement for completion of the CMTP.
      • Modules will be a process of deepening the student’s understanding of the philosophy and concepts of Continuum Movement, incorporating elements of anatomy/physiology, theoretical physics, and psychology that are the underlying framework of CM.


MODULES OVERVIEW

This program is a 500+ hour program – each module is 40-45 hours of in-class time with adjunct work done of individual assignments, peer collaboration projects, and other virtual workshops of Continuum Movement.

Module 1: CONTINUUM’S ESSENTIAL (In-person)

  • Focus – Breath, Sound, Movement, Sensation, and Innovation 

In this module, students will explore the Essential Elements of Continuum Movement which are at the core of every Continuum Movement class.

  • BREATH – All movement originates with breath.
  • SOUND – Sound is audible breath, penetrating the density of locked tissue. Sounding further connects us with each other and to the resonant whole, providing another source for communication.
  • MOVEMENT– Continuum’s movements are designed specifically to enhance the undulating spirals and circularity of the fluid system. Wave motion is the primary access to our bio-intelligence that is not bound by time, space or condition.
  • SENSATION AND PLEASURE – In Continuum, we use sensation as a guide for awakening the body’s mysteries and the activating principle of the life force that feeds and nurtures the entire system. Sensations of pleasure create an inviting climate for self-renewal.
  • Innovation – We learn the importance of being an open system that is able to be creative and adaptable to life and its changes.
  • The student will understand how all five of these Essential Elements are needed to be present in a Continuum Movement class for it to be a CM class.
  • Somatic teaching – Understanding how to teach somatically and how it is different from the common way we think of teaching.


Module 2:  PHILOSOPHY OF CONTINUUM (In-person)

  • Focus – We are a fluid system and the three Anatomies

This module looks at the fact that the body is a fluid system and therefore needs a fluid model for its exploration of movement and healing. Conrad’s Three Anatomies will be introduced as a way to understand our body and its imprints.

  • The human body is a fluid system. We are made of approximately 70% water and yet we do not often take this into consideration when we move or think of the body. Continuum proposes that the primary characteristic of any fluid system is its ability to keep transforming itself.
  • Inquiring into our Fluid Nature, students develop the capacity to understand a potentially dynamic, multi-dimensional perspective of human awareness and omni-directional movement.
  • Study is designed to deepen the student’s ability to notice and sustain sensory awareness and track experiences of flow which invoke the fluid system internally by creating a mix of interpenetrating cues and signals.
  • Students learn the significance that all fluids, whether in the cell, the body or the planet, function as a resonant intelligent whole and can never be separated. In Continuum, we refer to this entirety as the fluid system and recognize its essential and ancestral role in healing, movement, and fundamental wisdom.
  • Students learn that by amplifying wave motion through movement, our entire body resonates as a fluid, vital whole.
  • Class will include an introduction to Emilie Conrad’s concept of the Three Anatomies: primordial, cultural and cosmic. These are the lenses that we look through in CM to develop our understanding of different states of being.
  • Baseline and Open Attention, two essential concepts of all CM classes.

Practicum – Students will present a class and receive feedback first from peers and then teachers.


Module 3:  ANATOMY I (Virtual)

  • Focus – A biological and cellular overview of the human body as a fluid bio-system existing within a biosphere

As students deepen into the experience of conventional perspectives of anatomy, they will also learn the transformational aspects of tissue and fluids.

  • Continuum explores anatomy as a dynamic fluid system instead of the more common mechanistic model that is often taught.
  • Our study of anatomy is one of the living body, the flowing, ever-changing body.
  • In addition to studying the “body” as a defined boundary that features a head, two arms and legs, and body systems that encompass very specific locales, students will recognize that the body is mutable, multi-functional, and contains a process that is not defined by boundaries.
  • What Continuum calls a “body” is movement – a fractal dance of cells, molecules, and interpenetrating wave motions.
  • All of these movements stabilize in order to function in the environment of planet earth. Beyond conventional functioning exist domains of an unfathomable fluid mystery. Students will learn how this legacy of our primordial pulsating, undulating environment of blood, organs, membranes, and connective tissue has been largely forgotten.
  • Students will learn an overview of the three different groupings of our human bio-system, often called levels of cellular organization, where one cell is the basic level or unit of cellular organization, tissue is the second level, then organs. Cellular and subcellular consciousness will be explored in class.
  • The body’s four basic types of tissue will be covered; connective – muscle – nervous – epithelial tissues, including their basic roles, location, and their relationship to form-dissolve and structure-tensegrity.
  • Plus, a technical and experiential introduction to the organ system through the lens of fluid dynamics will be explored.


Module 4:  ANATOMY II (Virtual)

  • Focus –Further inquiry into the relationship of physical systems to states of being, moving, perceiving, and other clinically important areas

Further exploration of anatomy and neurophysiology.

  • Neurophysiology will be discussed as it pertains to the practice of Continuum, including an overview of the Nervous System, Neuro-Muscular System, the Polyvagal System, and Psychophysical Integration.
  • Students will deepen their understanding of body-mind connections, becoming attuned to the story that people’s bodies are telling, and possible correlations between the body and past physical–emotional-environmental trauma that may be stored in the tissues.
  • Continuum’s concept of the Three Anatomies: primordial, cultural and cosmic, will be further explored and its relationship to our anatomy as well, and its implications of species inclusive movement within our bodies.
  • Emphasis is placed on helping students access the different levels of trauma and to be able to help them understand how to work with trauma, or when needed, how to refer students to seek professional medical support.

Practicum – Students will present a class and receive feedback first from peers and then teachers.

 

Module 5:  READING THE BODY AND BODY PERCEPTION (In-person)

  • Focus – Understanding what the body is saying

Through movement expression of tissues/fluids, students will learn principles of witnessing movement as a fluid re-mapping of the body, an ever-shifting process as an extension of a bio-planetary process.

  • Students deepen their capacity to embody and to observe in others, micro-movements and interpenetrating layers of fluid/cells/tissues.
  • The groundwork is laid for a more sophisticated perspective of body and mind as being plastic in relation to context. Exploration in physical, perceptual, and conceptual phenomena become bio-creative events that interconnect with the unified field.
  • Students will be introduced to thinking/feeling concepts that are important to somatic psychology, learning to assess basic elements of psychophysical processing and emotional expression, what it means to be self-referential and self-responsible.

Practicum – Students will present a class and receive feedback first from peers and then teachers.


Module 6: WORKING WITH CLIENTS & STUDENTS (In-person) 

  • Focus – Teaching Continuum to individuals
  • Students learn the practical implementation of a somatic practice and how to apply Continuum concepts in a one-to-one situation.
  • One learns to see how actual physical challenges and restrictions that might arise in breathing and other physical activities in daily life can impact one’s emotional and physical wellbeing.
  • Through aspects of Continuum’s embodiment and facilitation of movement, breath, and sound, students will learn distinctions between active and passive movement that help to bring clients to various depths and states of awareness.
  • Conscious awareness and empathy are developed through movement and observation methods, growing the capacity to sense into one’s own and others’ bio-systems. This helps develop an awareness of an inner bio-intelligence.
  • Open Attention, a state of non-judgmental awareness, is emphasized.
  • Wave motion is encouraged through movement in the fluids and tissues to allow fixations and structures to release.
  • Continuum’s gentle, non-invasive approach to movement promotes a philosophy of cooperation and respect in all of our interactions.
  • Ethics of touch are addressed, regarding how and when to use touch in an ethical and therapeutic manner, including appropriate boundaries, respect, listening, and informed consent of touch. Emphasis will be placed on experiential activities and safety.

Practicum– Students will present a private class/session geared toward an individual and receive feedback first from peers and then teachers.

Module 7:  RESONANT STATES (Virtual)

  • Focus – The science of theoretical physics underlying Continuum Movement’s understanding 

“Movement is not something we do; it is what we are”, said Emilie Conrad.  In this module, we will explore somatically the ideas in quantum physics of wholeness of the universe versus fragmentation as well as life being an ongoing moving living process. We will look at how this relates to our somatic understanding of ourselves.

  • Students are encouraged to examine the experience and meaning of resonant states through the lens of nature and scientific interpretation.
  • The fractal nature of existence is considered in terms of how the spiraled movement of water mirrors our organic developmental and evolutionary process, and how that can creatively alter our way of seeing and experiencing life. This mutable and fractal model of the human form can be useful for dynamic postural analysis as well as an observational tool for injury rehabilitation and physical restoration.
  • Students learn to see how fluid re-patterning is orchestrated with the movement of human awareness within the body-mind.
  • Students learn how this awareness can change the quality of our internal processes— i.e. of pain, of movement, of shaping, of emotion, of thought.
  • Students learn an overview of the 5 basic senses and sense organs, plus proprioception and interoception, and how to work with language that supports the tracking of sensory-motor experience and self-regulation.

Practicum – Students will present a class and receive feedback first from peers and then teachers.

 

Module 8:  LEADING GROUPS (Virtual)

  • Focus – Working and developing classes and workshops

Teaching strategies on the practical implementation of a somatic class for group instruction and transmission are discussed and practiced.

  • Class structure, planning, and recording will be topics of emphasis.
  • Students will have the opportunity to lead activities during classroom hours.
  • Students will be given basic templates to deal with various individual or groups situations.
  • Students will also be given opportunities to lead class activities and to discuss real-life situations they may encounter.
  • Explorations in reaching fluid resonant states of thinking/feeling/moving.
  • Students learn to look for restrictions in themselves and other students’ tissue and sensory-motor capacity as it presents within the expression of the movement.
  • We cover the language of Somatic Movement, Somatic Movement teaching tips, and review foundations of Continuum.

 

Module 9: EMBRYOTIC DEVELOPMENT & MOVEMENT (In-person)

  • Focus – Embryological implications, pre- and peri-natal imprints on the body

We begin life in a total embryonic fluid state within our mothers. This time was potent in its imprinting of our first structure.

  • Basics of our early and ongoing potential, as well as our limiting historical imprints, are addressed in class through a lens of biological processes including cellular/embryological development, and the epigenetic or contextual influences that impact our growth and evolution.
  • Students further learn the fluid system’s importance and recognize its primordial/ancestral/cosmic role in healing, movement, and fundamental wisdom.
  • Emilie Conrad stated that “we moderns, now separated from the ongoing living process of our planet, hunger to remember our true origins.”
  • Students learn how the embodiment of Continuum principles provides an opening to the deepest and most satisfying nourishment. Able to release restrictive imprints and access our early potential, with experiences that include such aspects as embodying our embryological midline, we are relieved from our linear mechanical existences and from our hardened beliefs and limitations.
  • Illness, aging, and deterioration take on new possibilities when the experience of the “body” is expanded and sustained by this inherent undulating wisdom.

Module 10:  PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & STEPPING INTO THE MYSTERY OF CONTINUUM
(In-person)

  • Focus – Coursework strengthens professionalism in areas such as business skills, case management, and development of a private practice 

This module is a completion of the CMTP course and preparation for the student’s teachership.

  • The curriculum will include a minimum of two hours of instruction on the Code of Ethics, Scope of Practice, and Standards of Practice.
  • Issues of administration, marketing, and networking will also be addressed.
  • Students learn how to creatively use their Continuum knowledge and apply it in the broader activities in life.
  • Students will do a deep dive into the mystery of life. This will be a time for gathering understanding and clarity around one’s purpose of life and their teachership.

Practicum – Students will present a class and receive feedback first from peers and then teachers.

 

If you have any questions feel free to contact the office.

 

 

Instructors

Continuum Program Director, Donnalea Van Vleet Goelz, PhD.,  is executive director of Continuum Movement, a worldwide organization of somatic teachers, founded by Emilie Conrad-Da’oud. She is also the founder and owner of Cobalt Moon Center, a center for integrative health in Neptune Beach, Florida.  She is an authorized Continuum teacher (1995), and a T’ai Chi Instructor (1990). She is a graduate of the Barbara Brennan School of Healing where she served as senior faculty, as Dean of the third year class in the US and Europe. She is also certified to be a Brennan Integration Practitioner, a graduate degree at BBSH that incorporates psychology and the human energy field. Other certifications include Object Relational Psychotherapy from Center for Intentional Living and Kabalistic Healing from the Society of Souls. She has an extensive training in Dance (ballet, modern, African) and Technical Dance Movement of Irmgard Bartenieff and Frances Cott. She teaches workshops nationally and internationally in Continuum, Tai Chi, and healing arts.  She has her PhD in Somatic Psychology from the Chicago School.

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See All Contributing Program Instructors:

In addition to Donnalea leading class sessions, other Authorized Continuum Teachers will lead certain modules as well as guest teachers significant in the field of somatic movement, wellness, and fitness.

The Continuum Movement Teacher Program, under Donnalea’s direction, has procedures in place that support faculty members in understanding the goals and objectives of the curriculum. The program has policies and procedures in place, with aspects of somatic psychology, to support and contain psychophysical processing and emotional expression by teachers and students as well.