About SIM
Move better through speech
Discover Sound Informed Movement.
About SIM
What is SIM?
Sound Informed Movement (SIM) is a method for optimising movement through speech.
Articulation and movement
The production of vocal sounds is always based on a speech-motor “movement gesture” that has an equivalent in gross-motor movements. There is a common dynamic matrix for gross-motor movements and speech-motor skills. Thanks to this neuromuscular matrix, speech can be used to optimise and harmonise training movements.
Movement flow through speech sounds
Sound Informed Movement uses individual consonants, vowels, and syllables spoken aloud to harmonise or modify gross-motor movement sequences. Each vowel or consonant shapes the exhalation both in the body and in the surrounding air by resisting the flow of breath. This specific way of guiding the breath can be transferred to the whole body to improve the coordination and flow of movements.
SIM utilises the close connection between the entire musculoskeletal system and speech, which is well documented in neuropsychology for both speech production and speech perception (→ Literature).
Who developed SIM?
Sound Informed Movement (SIM) was developed by Swiss drama and speech therapist Dietrich von Bonin together with colleagues in Switzerland and abroad.
Dietrich von Bonin
Dietrich von Bonin is a certified arts therapist (ED), specialising in drama and speech therapy, and an SVAKT arts therapist for Anthroposophic Therapeutic Speech. He runs a practice in Bern, is president of the Quality Assurance Commission for the Higher Professional Examination in Arts Therapies, and regularly holds courses and lectures at international seminars. He is also the author of various publications on arts and speech therapy.
Dietrich von Bonin is father to three adult daughters and lives in the Bern region of Switzerland.
Further information
Would you like to learn more about SIM? Interested therapists are welcome to contact us directly. If you have any questions as a client, our certified SIM practitioners will be happy to help.
Video tutorials on SIM exercises
Use the practical video tutorials in the public exercise portal to discover and practise SIM exercises.
Many thanks to Brenda Ratcliffe, Sibylle Eichstaedt, Beatrice Voigt and Helen Lubin for the English translations and improvements.
Are you a therapist and would like to practise SIM?
Get in touch. We will gladly provide you with information on our training opportunities.