21 Sep 2012

Andy Goldsworthy Inspiration for Nature Sculptures

Go to a beach or area with lots of rocks and look for ones with holes. Gather those ones, then also make sure you have some circular candy (I think here we used peanut M&Ms) and make a sculpture to photograph! Mom and I had made this one years ago. I recommend highly you find a picture book or images online of Andy Goldsworthy’s photos, for ideas and inspiration. I’ve loved him since I was a child. 🙂

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21 Sep 2012

whoops

I quite literally (and by literally I mean figuratively) have like ten bajillion posts I want to do right now. And a lot of picture posts. Plan is for this weekend! 

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17 Sep 2012

Winner of our Magic Weighted Blanket Give a Way :)

Congratulations to Lesley P! I used a random number generator off random.org and she was our winner of the magic weighted blanket giveaway!! Lesley, if you could please send me your e-mail address, I will pass it on Keith and he will help you pick out what you want! (Keith offered to give a blanket to a lucky reader via a give-a-way to promote his blankets).

Thanks all for writing in!  I will have a review of the magic weighted blanket soon – he also sent me one in exchange for an honest review. So far, so good – I have it at one of my schools and by next weekend will be ready to write a review after it being there a few weeks. 🙂 
I also need to write a guest entry for a site, post a contributing article from a site, and do some other reviews. I need to find where I put Tonya's super awesome writing charms she developed – off TherapyFunZone.com – I want to try those ASAP and I put them somewhere safe – too safe.
Have a good week all 🙂 I am at 25 new mails and under 200 old on my gmail (all related to blog), so it could be a lot worse, but still behind. My new thing is that  if you ask me a lot of questions, I think I'd rather try to answer them on the phone rather than write long e-mails. Also, would anybody be interested if I hosted the occasional chat on Google Plus? Let me know if so. ::crickets::
Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 3

15 Sep 2012

Give the corkboard dog his pushpin shots :)

Give the dog his shots.

This was a small fine motor rotation I did recently, six kids, six mini centers where they did one thing for 3 minutes, then moved onto next.  In this case I had a $2 corkboard dog I had gotten from Target, plus push pins. They had to give the dog his shots and then take them out. They were all fans. And they’ve all swallowed the immunization kool-aid as they commented that all those shots would make him “super healthy” 🙂 They can put the shots where ever they want, one of my little dudes made sure he helped out the “butt infection” 🙂 
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11 Sep 2012

Way to work on a million OT skills at once :)

My brain has been in overdrive lately. Based on my time going through visual motor stuff, plus a binder incident today, here is my new plan.

1. Get those “dot” stickers you can write on.
2. Have child use best handwriting to number the dots, 1 through 15 or so
3. Have child place dots on themselves, mostly on arms, legs, a few on torso perhaps as appropriate. In random order, where-ever. 
4. Have child sit or stand on unstable surface while guarding them for safety, and have them take stickers off, in order, so scanning themselves to find them. 
5. Have the child replace them on the original surface or something where they are able to re-peel them.
6. Show the child how to hole punch 15 pieces of scratch paper.
7. Show them to label each page with the dot sticker, in order, turning over each page, so its organized.
7. Have them put the organized, sorted pages in a 3 ring binder. 
8. Profit???? 
9. Just kidding. But lots of our kids need work on hole punching, organizing, opening/closing binders, etc. I think this would be a great activity for a 3rd or 4th grader for sure. 
Next step/next time could be taking out the papers, placing them in folders, or scattering the papers in the air so they need to be re-sorted, working on folding, stapling, etc. 
Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 2

11 Sep 2012

Stickers for vestibular-ocular work and stickers for peaceful decorating

Today a child with autism in the learning center (not one of mine) approached my red rolling “teacher box”, staring at the Super Mario stickers all over it. It was free choice time and I happened to have the super mario stickers with me, so I offered them to him as an option. He spent his time peacefully placing the stickers on my rolly box. For those of you in pediatrics, you could consider placing the child in a certain functional/strengthening position (ie tall kneeling, or balancing on one knee, or on a T-stool, etc) and then allow them to decorate an item with stickers while doing so. 

Also, I have spent the evening organizing my visual perceptual/motor box, by the time I am done I will have two gigantic binders (to be fair like an entire one of those binders is duplicates), with visual motor, spatial, visual closure, discrimination, laterality, blah blah blah etc. Also a ton of special random books. I have generically organized it, hole punched, divided, placed in binder, etc for now. It needs more refinement, but I'm trying to tell myself to focus on big picture for now, just getting it all accessible and generally organized, and then I can go back and weed out or re-categorize things as my next step. I tend to obsess over little things and then nothing gets done. I also have a lot of book resources where I either need to make copies (pretty sure Hell consists of making copies, I HATE IT), or make my own versions. One thing I thought of is either making or buying number stickers or alphabet stickers, small, then placing them all over (appropriate) parts of a child's body like arms, torso, legs, etc. Then having the child sit on a T stool or ball or some other unstable surface and have to find stickers in order – whethers it 1 through 10, A-Z, shapes/colors/items you call out, whatever. The child then has to work on staying stable, scanning their body for the stickers, sequencing, crossing midline (ie using L hand to take sticker off R arm), you can put them on forearms etc to encourage supination (holding hands facing upwards like holding a soup bowl), or even on bottom of feet or near bottom of feet to further destabilize…..
As always use discretion, careful supervision with contact guard assist or more as necessary, stay away from areas they could hit their head, etc etc etc, blah blah blah, legal disclaimers, etc, use your best judgment….
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7 Sep 2012

More pictures thanks to a scary bug.

A giant bug scared me at 1am so I’m posting pictures from my cell phone in random order.

Suspend, balance game Interesting, tried it at friend Orli’s house. (Orli is a super awesome famous low vision therapist!!) 
Fine motor toys in Norway that came originally from USA Denny’s
Beads used in weighted blanket 
Painting and drinks go together…right Orli. 
I think people in Norway have more advanced sensory systems because their stairs are super steep. 
I want this. I took this picture in Norway or Denmark and I want to make a version. 
This pic just made me laugh. 
A reminder to myself to maybe try this craft. 
cool ergo spatula in Norway
Super awesome weighted blanket an amazing friend donated that she made for me. So I donated it to one of my SPED classrooms. It’s 12 pounds. Using the beads showed above so washable. 
I want to do this. You get holey balls and stick a light scarf in them, have to pull it out. 
My professional friends with graduate degrees enjoy hanging out with me trying out new toys for my kids, sorry the pic is so dark. 
Norwegians and me. 🙂 Super cute. 
An app I wanted to look into, I took pic with phone while reading magazine in a waiting room. Um, I still haven’t checked it out. 
Some of my recent new stuff we got from district…well not the dominoes. 
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7 Sep 2012

What happens when a giant flying bug is in your room

A giant bug scared me so I’m self-soothing with blog pics.

My sad lonely car at 8pm in the parking lot. Notice the gigantic spiderweb in the lamp, kinda blurry in cell phone pic though
Handwriting without Tears Wet Dry Try App
Feeding hyperflex monster cheese
Thanks, Adapted PE teacher, Callie, for modeling our T-stool. I guess it looks rather alarming without context, but it’s essentially a normal stool on top, just with only one leg instead of 3 or 4 so you have to balance. 
Showing off the HandiWriter
The giant bug, HoneyBooBoo, that came to visit me tonight. :O Next to my bed. And it flies. 🙁
A child performing the VMI, I add the non-identifying picture to the child’s individual evaluation report. 
Handi Writer in action 
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7 Sep 2012

Occupational therapy self-reflection/rambling/thinking out loud

I can't even begin to tell you guys how many general education teachers come up to me these days, even those I've never had, to ask me questions, talk to me, tell me what they are doing, mention another teacher showed them something, etc etc. I love it. It makes me super happy. Having general education teachers aware of issues and working on preventing them/catching them early makes OT lives – and the lives of the kids – so much better in the long run. One kinder teacher told me she had all her kids cut straws the other day and how quiet they all were and how much they loved it. Another kinder teacher told me she was doing her fine motor centers – which she implemented after our inservice – and the assistant superintendant came in during some school rounds and was quite intrigued and asked her a lot of questions and she told him about the OT inservice. Another 1st gr teacher at another school told me about how they went out and bought a bunch of (cheap) items after the inservice to use in their room, another 1st gr teacher told me how she has her class do the finger exercises (things like touching each finger to their thumb)….On and on and on. 
I've been asked what we did. Basically we just did three or four stations, lets say each table holds 10 teachers. (A combination of gen ed, special ed, psychologists, APE, speech therapists, etc). Each station was 15 minutes. One was fine motor, one was handwriting, one was sensory motor and/or self-regulation/movement in the classroom depending on if there were 3 or 4 of us OTs. We did this same inservice for our special ed instructional assistants and they all talked about how it was by far their favorite session of the YEAR. None of us had Powerpoints or a set presentation, rather we each had a few hand-outs at best and then talked through them, demonstrating with hands-on. I had my teachers beading straws on pipe cleaners, sticking golf tees in styrofoam, “squirreling” coins, using clothespins and cotton balls and how to use them in math centers, etc etc. All of us focused on fast, quick, easy, cheap, efficient, INSTANT things to do in the classroom, no thought process needed. They all left ready to incorporate things they had learned at each of our tables, the next day. I know in my case I had about 45 minutes of stuff to show in a 15 minute session, so I warned them at the beginning that we were going to go super fast because it was all such straight-forward ideas.  A lot of them had their own great ideas they had learned/implemented.  If you have access to a great polished Powerpoint that's interesting, great, use it, be merry. But if you're just an OT or two on your own and struggling…Be casual. Invite a bunch of staff on a good afternoon to meet you in a conference room, bring a crapload of stuff to touch or look at, and a handout or two, and just give them some easy tricks you use every day that many of them just don't know. Don't let it stress you out. And the more gen-ed staff you “touch” now, the easier your life will be when you have kids in those classes in the future as they already know and trust you. 
I have definitely noticed there tends to be a special ed – SPED – group and gen-ed group….And always a few teachers/staff that are bridges, but typically the groups mostly segregate. I love both groups and love how many gen ed teachers consider me their friend. Makes my job so much easier in the long run. (Yeah yeah, boundaries are important too…) 🙂 But a lot of gen ed teachers get nervous when you push-in or come observe, when you are just a random staff person…When they know and trust you, they relax and let you into their environment much easier. 
Other things. The other day I was in an IEP meeting and we discussed how a hallmark of neurological dysfunction is being inconsistent. Pretty sure I'm basically quoting that but I forget from what book, maybe Out of Sync Child. Sorry. Anyway, one of the special ed staff stopped and looked at me and at the end, she wanted to talk about her aging mother and her inconsistency. We talked a lot about beginning dementia, neurology, aging in place, validation theory, etc, from the OT standpoint and how to explain things to her siblings. Today, she stopped me to let me know how helpful that discussion was, and how it was so amazing to realize how much more I knew as an OT than just what she normally saw in the schools. IE, she thinks of me as an OT, but thinks of me as a school OT, therefore knowing about things like fine motor skills. She hadn't realized the extent of my knowledge base as an OT and it made her also realize that as a school team we often don't realize how far-reaching and extensive ALL of our knowledge bases are in topics not related to school! I was very pleased it meant so much to her and it made me happy too, dusting off rusty neurons from my OT geriatric days…..
Moving onto a randomosity: 
My favorite conversation of the day. 
Scene: Phone call, my school's director of special ed has just called me back. 
Me: Hi! Have you missed me?!! 
Her: Do you really want me to answer that? 
Me: Only if you lie…

=====
So today, I went into a school and saw a group of my little kiddos from last year, who always referenced me as “Miss Awesomeness”. We had a new kiddo to the group who has been hearing about me from the other little boys for the last few weeks who have been asking about me (I start two weeks into the school year because of scheduling, getting kids routines established, etc). So he finally meets me today – the kids come in to their learning center as always and are shocked to finally see me standing there, and they surrounded me with hugs and cries of Miss Awesomeness. The new little boy looked at me with wide eyes and practically whispered, “Are you Miss Awesomeness?”. It was so adorable. I knowww that had I just been “Miss Karen” it wouldn't have been nearly as exciting. I LOVE these little ones! The main kids I use Miss Awesomeness with are the ones who have trouble remembering names. They need something outlandish to help them remember. One of my little spunky girls recently told me, “You can call me Miss Awesom
eness too”. I was happy to do so. 🙂

So for anyone new to this blog, I'm an elementary school OT and *some* – not all – of my kids call me that but it's meant to be silly and light-hearted, I in no way am arrogant enough to truly think that. I think I'm a good OT – most of the time – but I have my moments just like EVERYONE. We all have sessions that miserably fail, whether due to environment, the kid's mood, the therapist's mood, whatever. That's okay…We learn from our mistakes and move on. 
I have SOOOOO much to learn from more experienced therapists. I get so jealous of therapists with lots of experience, you have no idea. I wish I could copy all their neurons, make neuron pancakes, eat them, and be instantly as smart as them. However sometimes inexperienced therapists have the benefit of flexibility in their thought process. Like when I used to do fencing. Sometimes fencing a brand new fencer, even as an experienced fencer, was hard, because the inexperienced fencer was so unpredictable and bizarre in their actions. I recently read a story about a guy who came into his statistics class late in college, wrote down the problems on the board, and solved them as homework. He hadn't been there for the first part of class where they were described as impossible, never before solved problems. Not knowing this was the reason he could approach it so freshly. 

I feel kind of hypomanic – in case you couldn't tell from this pressured writing, haha – just because I'm feeling really overwhelmed with work right now and it's only the third week. So today I stayed at work until EIGHT PM. Just me and the custodian, lol. I knew if I went home I wouldn't work at night. Tomorrow is Friday and I'm going to a show at 6pm in that area, so I plan to stay at work late. I really want to get caught up NOW so that my basic “Start of my 2nd year of school OT” goals could be met. 

Yesterday as part of my new goals for the year, I was asking a child what he thought I did for a job. He thought earnestly for a minute and then brightened, “Make people have fun?”. Yes. That's exactly it. 🙂 LOL. 
The description I used for him is that I wanted to help his eyeballs and fingers work a little easier and quicker so school could be more fun. 

Seriously. ALL OF YOU THERAPISTS. ASK YOUR KIDS IF THEY KNOW YOUR NAME. AND ASK THEM IF THEY KNOW WHAT YOU DO OR WHY THEY ARE SEEING YOU. Their answers will probably shock you. Do not assume. 

So……Every day I have so many moments that pass by that I want to share on the blog. I love my job, but at the same time I wish I could also be a full-time blogger, full time general education and toy store consultant, full-time product inventor, full-time writer, etc etc. A wise person recently commented on FB that a career is not a sprint but an Ironman triathlon…Guess I have a ways to go on some of my ideas. 

Tonight, this incredibly long post is mostly for personal therapeutic value. It helps me to rid my brain of the thoughts swirling around, and to have mementos/memories that I can look back on some day since my memory is horrific, and to remind myself of the good accomplishments for the many, many days I feel lost or fearful as an OT. I can't write SO much about those moments on this blog since uh, I'd like to stay in the good graces of my bosses and schools, but it's nothing crazy, just typical professional angst, lol. I can write more about PAST moments. I do still have a lot of intentions of writing about non-school based topics. Especially considering my love for schools only started when I got this job about 17 months ago. 

Random note – love the new Wet Dry Try Handwriting App – but don't recommend it quite yet as they are working on reducing sensitivity – right now even I can't always trace a letter correctly which is ridiculous. But the new update should be out soon with reduced sensitivity and I'm pretty sure I will highly recommend it at that time. 🙂 
Random other note – I have tons of pictures I need to post including some rather, um, creative uses of things like the Theraband hand strengthener..
Random other note – make sure to find my magic weighted blanket give-away a few posts down, chances of winning are super incredibly high.
Random other note – I rarely edit these or reread them, I just let my brain vomit, so …..Sorry. 
Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

6 Sep 2012

A tu ti ta…Tooty Ta? Song…An amazing motor planning/sequencing song for OT kids

I was recently in a K dual language immersion classroom checking in on a little guy when the teacher was having all her kids do “A tu ti ta” (this was all in Spanish). It was SO FREAKING cool and hilarious. I have NEVER heard of this. It was cracking me up, the kids loved it, and it was SUCH great sequencing, motor planning, following directions, etc.

Essentially it’s a very rhythmic song that has the children following basic directions and it builds upon itself. They start with thumbs up, then move to elbows back, feet apart, knees touching, tongue out, etc. I love all things occupational therapy related and kids related and I am utterly astounded that this is the first time I have come across this. Teachers, parents, therapists…Please. Get this song and do it with your class/kids/students. 🙂

This is a random clip I found of some young children doing it. It’s only about two minutes long – slow going at first but picks up near the end and gets really silly, really quick. LOVE IT! 

Thumbs out
Elbows back
Feet apart
Knees together
Bottoms out
Tongues out
Eyes Shut
Turn Around!
As always…Check the posts a few below for a magic weighted blanket give a way 🙂 
Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 2