Sea anemones have preferred activities too. :)

I often go walking with some co-workers at the beach/state park after work as it’s on my way home and a nice calming way to get some exercise while admiring beautiful scenery AND getting social time, so it kills like a flock of birds with one stone. 🙂
Our district has an awesome autism behavioral specialist (let’s call her Tootie) and over the course of working in the district I’ve learned to use terms such as “preferred activities” and “non-preferred activities” for the OT kiddos so instead of saying “This kid hates handwriting” we say “Handwriting is a non preferred activity for this child…” anyway.  Now that you have the set-up.
Tootie and I were walking on the beach after work and there is this huge rock called Flat Rock that was accessible due to low tide, so we circled around it, looking at all the crabs, barnacles, mussels, sea anoemeomaoneones, etc. Sea anemone is a hard word to spell, it makes me have to think which I hate. ANYWAY, I grew up in San Diego so I am very used to sea anemoneonanes, so I showed Tootie, who is NOT from this area, how you can put your finger in the sea anemone hole and it closes on your finger and looks weird.  She was fascinated by this.
Tootie: Do you think the sea anemone minds when you do that?
Me: Well I’m guessing it’s a non-preferred activity.
Rather sadly, I wasn’t even saying it to be funny. I’ve just gotten used to the lingo!
Oct 11, 2012 | Category: laughs, Occupational Therapy | Comments: none