The heart does not beat like a clock, and the small irregularities in its timing are one of the clearest windows we have onto how a body is governing itself. Heart rate variability — the moment-to-moment change in the gap between heartbeats — reflects the balance between effort and recovery, mobilisation and rest, that the autonomic nervous system maintains without our asking. Reading it well is a genuine skill, and this series teaches it.
The series is built around the four-page report produced by the Sound of Soul heart-rate-variability system, but its lessons apply to any HRV reading. It is written for two readers at once: the practitioner who wants to use HRV confidently in their work, and the curious patient who wants to understand what the numbers on their report actually mean. It stays on the solid ground of measurement and physiology throughout — what the instrument reads, why, and how to read it honestly in return.
Like the other series on this site, it is taught not from definitions but by building one concrete thing up from every side, with each module ending in challenges in the teachback tradition of Gordon Pask's Conversation Theory.
Modules
How to use these modules
Each module stands alone, but they are written as a series, and concepts introduced earlier are extended later. The recommended path is in order — the report first, then the physiology beneath it, then the breath that moves it, then the discipline of reading it well, and finally the synthesis that ties them together.
Each module ends with challenges in the teachback tradition of Gordon Pask's Conversation Theory. These are not multiple-choice questions; they ask you to reproduce, derive, or transfer the understanding rather than recognise it. The notes on what a good answer reproduces are not answer keys — they describe the shape of an answer that would show genuine understanding.
If you want to teach from this material, please attribute it. The modules are © Peter Tuddenham and may not be reproduced commercially without permission, but quotation and use in teaching contexts is welcome.