10 Aug 2013

Inflatable Unicorn Horn: Not an OT life hack. But certainly amusing…

Just for all y’all’s information, when it says “Cats Love It!” on the box, they are lying. I show you “Stray Cat”, who is no longer truly stray but that is still his name, showing signs that he does not love it. I was in fact pretty sure “Cats Love It” was a total lie, but still had to find out for myself. Now I know. This concludes “deep thoughts by a curious OT” or “How to Learn From My Mistakes”

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

9 Aug 2013

Slacklining: great for attention, focus, impulse control

I’ve been slacklining 3 hours every Saturday for the last month. I first learned about it in Venice Beach. It is so amazing for posture and strength and most of all focus and also frustration tolerance. It is low to the ground so not too dangerous but it can still cause injury so be very very careful!!! I looove it though. 🙂 I just got to about 30 seconds of balance as my record….need to start more walking and even longer balance.

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

8 Aug 2013

Supine shark?

http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/07/us/new-york-subway-shark/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

“The shark quickly drew a crowd, as entering subway riders began to photograph and pose with the shark, even adding a subway fare card, soft drink can and a cigarette to the supine shark as props.”

SUPINE??? The picture shown of the shark in the link above shows him prone….or am I crazy? I always remember supination as holding a bowl of soup and I even googled it to see if I was missing a definition. What do y’all think? It cracked me up either way. How often do you see the phrase “supine shark” or hear about sharks in subways?

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: 1

8 Aug 2013

OT Life Hack: Use car cup holders for not just drinks

So today I needed to bring a wrap and blueberries in the car with me. Yes I ate it when stopped, etc, not driving on a freeway with a big ol’ wrap in my hands. But the point is, cups don’t have to be just for drinking. Cupholders can be beneficial to hold cups full of food too. I put my wrap in one big glass, and I put a bunch of blueberries in the smaller glass. Yes, this is somewhat of a commonsense idea, but common sense isn’t common.

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

8 Aug 2013

Key caps: An OT's best friend, no matter what age!

My OT kids love them. And it helps me know what key is which. Monster is for work and monkey is my home. Also it can be great for visual impairments if you get very different shapes. Every teacher I have given one to loves them! It makes ordinary things fun. Kids see keys with a new eye. 🙂 Key caps. My favorites are my monsters, but they wear out over time and when traumatically amputated I feel kinda sad. Seriously.

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

8 Aug 2013

Slackline

Category: Occupational Therapy | Comments: none

6 Aug 2013

Work on Stereognosis with food.

The other day I was eating a cup filled with blueberries, cherries, and tiny grapes, while driving. I would reach into cup holder with right hand and keeping eyes on road, so it was all via stereognosis, ie eyeballs on my fingers, that I would know which gruit it was. I realized it was a great way to work with kids on stereognosis in an efficient and motivating and fun way. For example you could fill a cup with items like small twizzler bites and cocoa puffs and have the kid figure out which one he was grabbing if he couldn’t see. You could incorporate a lot of descriptive words and ask questions about whether it feels long and skinny and soft or hard and circular and small, etc. If they are more advanced you could use more objects or more similar ones such as two types of cereal. Think about how often kids need to grab a pencil out of their desk or how often we grab stuff without looking. Most kids learn this naturally but many of our occupational therapy kids need to be taught how to do this skill and how to break it down into manageable chunks. By using food they want or need to eat anyway, you can do things like indirectly incorporating counting or graphing or fine motor skills while also teaching stereognosis skills in a fun OT way. Win win. And a thousand variations are possible. This could be great for a joint OT and speech therapy session! I wrote this on my phone sorry if it is weird. 🙂 ps this pic isn’t quite accurate since I don’t think wet fruits would work on a plate like that but you see the shape variations!!