Jumping into new OT role!

I can finally share my "secret"…I had to wait until my fish were in a row… 😉

I’m transitioning out of my position as an elementary school-based occupational therapist. I’m actually only about a week away from being finished. I’m going into independent consulting and also hoping to build up the virtual resources/consultations. A big piece of that is finally getting resources/pictures done like I’ve wanted to for so long and not had the energy and/or time. Including going back into the blog and tidying up things to be more useful.

And now back to a report, so I can’t go into as much detail as I want! Hoping that by March 18th I am getting to do a lot more focusing on online resources, online and local consultations! Big life change!

Volunteer "Cuddler" in the NICU (neonatal ICU)

I was a baby “cuddler” over a year in Memphis at a large hospital, and when I moved to CA I had to spend two years on the cuddler waiting list at a large hospital. Now I’ve been a cuddler here 1.5 years and I love it, especially with my occupational therapy knowledge that helps with developmental play and most of all, calming babies undergoing drug withdrawal.

Obviously due to confidentiality we can’t share pictures or too much information. However, my friend had a baby at “”my” NICU for nearly six weeks, so I got to cuddle their baby when they couldn’t be there. My friends had a small cubicle-room to themselves in the step-down unit, so it was relatively calm. They gave me permission to post this picture of us cuddling! 🙂 Their baby is now doing absolutely fabulous, by the way. It helps when the baby has AMAZING parents. Plus the baby’s parents both work in special education, so they essentially have a black market rehab team available to them at all times… 😉

Many times, people who want to be cuddlers have a vision of gently rocking babies in a quiet room. In reality, you’re often in somewhat chaotic environments (depending on many factors) with a baby screaming in drug withdrawal, or a (stable) preemie covered in tubes/wires. It’s still lovely, it’s still exactly what I want to be doing, it is exactly what the babies need and the parents and nurses appreciate, yet it can be stressful. Every once in a while though, you end up in a rocking chair with a sweet little baby in a cubicle room, and it’s quiet and dim, and the baby only has a basic three-wire monitor cord meaning it’s easy to maneuver, and the baby just wants to be held, and then you can hum and rock and meditate and love, just you and the baby. That’s peace.

Letter Games and More

I was responding to an American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) school list-serv about a child who seems to always add an extra fourth line to the "E" for many possible reasons. I responded with a suggestion and then just kept going, because that’s how I roll, yo!!! I’m slightly editing but just to make it not so personalized as I don’t have a lot of time to mess around with it. I’m hoping to eventually break this up into multiple blogs with pictures, but for now, time wise, just have to get it on the blog. Sometime in middle March I’ll be able to get more of this blog in order!!

1. AN OVERLY ENTHUSIASTIC "E": For an E with too many lines, maybe try having four cool writing utensils that each get to do one line. You keep charge of them so they aren’t lying around. "Each of these pens gets to have a turn at a line so that its fair." Then give one color for spine, then a new one for line 1, another line 2, another line 3. He may actually stop at line 3 when each pen has had a turn at a line with a specific color/utensil for each and he’s not handed a fourth. If you don’t have tons of cool pens around, maybe just switch out a pen, pencil, marker, and crayon (end with his least preferred so he’s less likely to add an extra line), or highlighters or pen colors or whatever. (When I say cool pen, I’m thinking of weird-stick-looking pens, giant pens, baby sized pens, oddly colored pens, etc).

2. TRACING While I prefer imitation, if you do need/want to do some tracing: Letting the child be a teacher for turn-taking can help. For example, you as the teacher, using those large box grids, and you can use the yellow highlighter to write "A" and then he traces with pencil or pen. Then HE writes with highlighter (and maybe gets to choose which color highlighter) and then YOU have to trace his. As long as the letter is carefully done (ie clear effort) even if not correctly formed, just go with it for the time being as the tracer, if you’re trying to build activity tolerance most of all.

3. POWER OF COOL PEN: Some of my kids will write a LOT more when they get to use a cool pen of some sort versus normal pencil. Sometimes getting to use a normal pen versus a pencil is such a novelty that that in itself will get a child to start working. Once I had a kid where writing JUST his name was like pulling teeth. Then I brought in like 10 super weird pens and he wrote his name 10 times without me even prompting, I had just hoped he’d try a single letter with each pen.

4. SIGN-INS/OUTS: For some of my kids, I sometimes have them "sign in" on the grid paper, focusing on each letter being perfect. We make sure I sign in on their sheet too. Or just our initials. (For kids that elope, sometimes I strategically put a little desk in such a way that while they can technically still get out, it will take an extra step or extra dodge so there is a little bit of extra time to intervene. Not to point of fire safety issue of course! That desk is the "sign out" where they have to do their initials or ideally full name, to leave at the end of the session. I also really like some of the older ones having to copy or compose an affirmation of some sort such as "I am powerful." under their sign-in.)

5. "Letter Doctor" – I have a really simplistic barren Sharpie-letter game on a piece of corkboard. It’s just a path of alphabet letters and each person has a push pin as a game piece. You roll dice and whatever letter you land on, your pushpin gives the sick letter a "shot" (with the pushpin) and then you make it better by writing the letter out neatly. Or something like take out all the letter pieces of a puzzle, put on floor, and be like "Oh no they all fell down, which one can we help first? Don’t worry Mr A, we can help you, we’re letter doctors. Here, we’ll make you a little "A" bed." – Draw the letter, place letter on it. Etc. Whatever. Even my children with autism (high-functioning) like being doctors. I treat all letters like little people. Letter piece falls off table? "Hey Mr A! Don’t jump like that! We’re trying to work with you here!" etc. 🙂 Drama, drama, drama.

6. IMAGINATION LETTERS – I love using letters for imagination and silliness – just add a "Mister" or something in front of the letter and you can use them for a lot of your "games" as characters…essentially any motor skill can incorporate these silly letters. Let me know if you’re interested via e-mail or comment or whatever and I will add in more. Again, hope to break down these blog posts into multiples with pictures, soon, versus one long eyebally-painful one.

Rambling Secrets and Twitter

The title is actually not true. But the compulsive part of me wanted the title to go RST. And it did. So there.

Moving on.
SECRETS: A secret to share next week…check back by the end of next week…it’s exciting…well mostly to me. AHHAHAAHA. But I will give details as to how MAYBE it’s exciting to you too!

TWITTER: I’ve been tweeting a lot at www.twitter.com/msawesomenessOT although I’m re-building up followers as I’ve been at www.twitter.com/funkist for years.

My web designer and graphic designer have been helping me get this website and brand on track. The logo is about to change slightly and the website is continuously being tweaked while in its "emerging" stages.

Looooooooove
Karen

The Love Potato: A Unique Valentine's Day Craft Activity

The “love potato” is an awesomely “delightfully awkward” Valentine’s Day Craft that kids and parents alike think is hysterical and definitely unique.  The front of the card is a potato with googley eyes all over it, and inside it says “Dear X, I have eyes only for you. Be My Valentine? Love, Kid”.

The “Love Potato” Valentine’s Day Craft Activity

Supplies: construction paper, googley eyeballs, writing/drawing utensils, scissors, glue, pipe cleaners or other item for arms/legs, imagination

Visual cuing for every other line – E-Z Edit

I love E-Z edit paper of www.barkercreek.com. Although I don’t use it for editing so much as a great visual cue for skipping every other line. Most of our children who MOST need to skip lines are the least likely to know how to do so and so this type of visual cue is awesome.

Toca Boca Apps: Kitchen Monsters

This is a fan-post of Toca Boca Apps, specifically their Kitchen Monsters which I occasionally utilize on my iPad with my kids in occupational therapy sessions.

There is (so far) only one app company I truly admire, respect, and enjoy. I’m not a fan of screen-time in general, with the exception of the children who truly benefit/need them to learn, but Toca Boca has won my heart.

I love them. Their kitchen monsters, hair salon, and robots app are my favorites for my children in occupational therapy. I usually use them as an occasional reward activity, although with any luck they will soon do some monster versions utilizing playful letters and numbers so I can use them in a more educational way at times. 🙂

Their kitchen monster one is my personal favorite (Hair Salon is a close second) about feeding these silly monsters. You have a refrigerator filled with food such as meat and brocolli, and you can saute, boil, microwave, chop, blend, whatever you want, to feed the hungry monsters. The monsters like some foods more than others, and may refuse to eat what you make, or even spit it out. It’s so silly and even my children with difficulties with mental flexibility laugh at this game. They LOVE when the monster spits their food out, or occasionally get their feelings (mildly) hurt if they made the monster a masterpiece.

The majority of my children will happily feed the kitchen monsters a single item that they cooked in some manner, such as a chopped up carrot. I have a few budding chefs, however.

One is a 4th grade boy (mother gave me explicit permission to post this) that makes his monster a full-course meal. He’ll saute some meat, boil and season some carrots, find a few other vegetables or items to prepare/cook to make a well-rounded and healthy meal, and then happily feeds the monster his 5-star masterpiece. It takes him quite a while to make the single meal, and he gets very involved in making sure it is delicious. It’s so awesome. I love the care he takes with these kitchen monsters, and his great grasp of cooking as well.

Another budding chef wants to make sure the monster gets to eat a little of every single food available to taste its deliciousness. He put some meat in the processor (if he had processed it just a little it would be ground meat) but processed it to the point that it was liquid, and called it a “meat smoothie” Yum. At the end he was proud he had “made a little feast for the monsters”.

Looove children and their innocent creativity.

Thanks Toca Boca, for amazing apps. I recommend checking all of their apps out and especially Kitchen Monsters and Hair Salon. They are available for iphone and ipad. I love their characters and their absurdity, which is something many of my OT kids need to work on. Although my budding chefs clearly have a lot of creativity!

Another story about my budding chefs who likes to make full-course five star meals,  posted with his mom’s explicit and verbal permission.

http://wp.me/p4btZq-12K

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Bathroom sanitizer pass for students

Child leaves hand sanitizer “pass” on their desk while in the bathroom. Genius.

Affirmations for Children/People with Low Self-Esteem

“Blank” Basic Beat

Multiple affirmations and lively beat

I believe in myself

I feel good about myself

These downloadable mp3s are positive affirmation chants, specifically made for me on request by famed drummer Russell Buddy Helm. I had them made for my children who receive occupational therapy services, children who often struggle with low self-esteem. Although they are great for all children and adults alike. While these “power songs” can be chanted or focused on, the intent is for it to eventually just play in the background, if not annoying to the child.

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Painter Marker, not Paper, for Student Names on Desks

No more name plates 🙂: Pinterest post

Sharpie Oil Based Painter Marker – No more student desk name tags: Amazon’s sharpie, may be cheaper at your local Staples or something

Picture to come soon that I know I have in my camera. By writing a student’s name on the desk, instead of using paper in any form, you have removed some of the visual clutter and literal items on the desk. Ideally the name is neat and reasonably small and in the upper hand corner of whatever is NOT dominant hand. IE a right hander will have theirs in upper left hand corner. Out of way. Only reason to have it is primarily for random staff that need to see whose desk is who. Like, for example, itinerant staff like me who need to be able to skim the room quickly for a desk and not spend 15 minutes searching desk innards for an OT kid work sample.

If you do want a diagram ON the desk, please make sure its neatly taped down or velcroed down as often as necessary for a kid who has some special needs. Please consider allowing it to be kept in desk, or consider whether child even accesses it. The less on the desk, the better.