Fine Motor Coordination and Strengthening Ideas for Children Struggling with Handwriting: School OT

I did a presentation on Friday to kindergarten and first grade teachers and this is the hand-out. I don't know how to place documents on here so I am just copy-pasting the three page thing, sorry. Hope formatting doesn't screw it up too bad. I asked Tonya of TherapyFunZone.com to consider posting it there. 🙂

Occupational Therapy: Ideas for Fine Motor Centers and More!

http://pinterest.com/funkist/ot-ideas    < -- tons of fine motor craft ideas I collected

Please note that many of these activities fall under multiple categories!

Things to work on to help children improve their fine motor coordination and strength, which can help their handwriting:

·      Precision (carefully manipulating tiny objects)

o   Cut up straws, then bead onto pipe cleaners

o   Beading onto pipe cleaners or tiny strings, or through colanders

o   Placing marbles on top of golf tees that the child has stuck into Styrofoam

o   Place beads/items on skewers placed in Styrofoam in various directions

o   Stack very small blocks

o   Match a bead pattern on a skewer to another skewer (on Styrofoam)

o   “Tight rope” – have them place small items on thick taut band that has been wrapped around a box, and/or have them hold a popsicle stick in the air in one hand, and place tiny objects

o   Folding paper, ie very basic origami

·      Tripod grasp (holding items with 3 fingers, not all five)

o   Clothespins [wolves] and cotton balls [sheep] game

o   Any type of tweezers or tongs, picking up objects and transferring them [I use ice cube trays]. Ensure only using 3 fingers by giving them something to hold curled up in their last two fingers if necessary.

o   Push pins and corkboard – with supervision

·      Open web space  (“OK” sign) – look at thumb to index finger

o   Making the OK sign, pulling the OK sign apart, finger exercises

o   Picking up tiny objects using small eraser ends (those little rubber erasers you can put on the end of pencils – using those as tiny tongs!)

·      Strengthening of hands, upper arms/extremities  (strong core/arms helps with fine motor coordination)

o   Arms: Do a lot of “crawling” or “animal walks”, weight-bearing into arms, while moving from center to center or during physical education

o   Arms: Wheelbarrow walks

o   Squeeze stress balls

o   Use play-doh to roll out logs, circles, squish thin on table, etc. Also remember they love “adult” tools – cheap 50 cent putty “knives” [make sure they aren’t sharp!] at hardware store, etc

o   Stamping – make it harder by having them repeat a pattern of some sort, and or stamping into a small area for precision

o   Turkey basters/eye droppers for water to “wash” things or to melt colors etc on coffee filters

o   Tear out of a piece of an old phone book, crumble up the paper in ONE HAND with the hand in the air, then throw to “hungry shark” aka recycle bin

o   Rip paper into wading pool or tray

o   Use “tennis ball heads” (tennis balls that you put a “mouth” aka a gash on – (be REALLY careful when cutting it! I use a clamp!) Then squeeze their sides to open their mouth to feed them, then – the popular part – make them throw up. Small sizes from pet stores best for smaller hands.

o   Wrap rubber bands, or hair bands, around boxes or containers

o   Geoforms – pegboards where you stretch rubber bands to make shapes or letters

o   Place golf tees into left-over Styrofoam

·      Man
ipulating a pencil   (Twirling it in dominant hand, “walking” fingers from tip to eraser and back, and turning it over to erase using only one hand.)

o   Practice ERASING. Kids struggle with the act of turning over the pencil with one hand to erase (they either put it down and pick it back up, or use their chest, or other hand, etc) – Practice this move but also practice the act of erasure itself. IE draw a line, flip over pencil, erase. TEACH how to erase. A lot of kids don’t do it very well and need guidance.

·      Shifting items within hands  (picking up tiny items, placing into hand, then picking up the next item, etc, with 1 hand only) – I call it “squirreling”, ie storing nuts in a cheek – storing items in part of the palm)

o   Coins for piggy bank or tiny items into ice cube trays

·      Isolating fingers on command (ie show me your index finger, show me your ring finger, etc)

o   Make each finger “bow” or place fingers flat on desk, lift one at a time

o   Put a smiley face or drawing in a laundry detergent cap or on a tennis ball, then have the child use just the fingers of one hand to rotate the “face” around.

·      Directionality (up, down above, beside, etc) and lefts/rights

o   Incorporate “I Spy” and scanning games where child has to look for items by directions, ie “Look below the X”

o   Consider placing a small L and R on the children’s desks or on their hands each day with water-soluble nontoxic markers.

o   When walking places around campus, stop at turns and ask them which way to turn.

o   Great game called Left, Center, Right, for about 7 dollars you can buy at many toy stores or Target/Wal-Mart etc

·      Visual motor (using their eyes with their hands more so than in some other tasks)

o   Bendaroos/WikiStix – they can work on copying a design or writing own name or spelling words

o   Stacking up cubes of different colors/sizes then have child copy design

o   Marble/cup game, rolling across a table

o   Lacing & buttoning – big buttons are easier. Big laces too.

o   Sign language alphabet

o   Sort cards by suite

o   Balloon tapping – blow a few up, have the children keep in the air without touching ground as long as possible

·      Proprioception/tactile – knowing what their hands are doing/feeling without looking

o   Hiding objects in a bag or box game, figuring out what it is/manipulating it without looking. Start with easy discrimination such as long skinny cylinder versus fat round ball, then make more difficult as child has success

o   Moving or isolating their fingers with eyes closed

·      Cutting

o   Consider different types of scissors for struggling kids (scissors requiring less fine motor skills – ask an OT)

o   Start with snipping, cutting straws, and business cards and manila envelopes

Contact me at otstudents.blogspot.com or karen.dobyns *** at *** gmail.com  with questions. Thanks!

OT randomness..aota conference coming up, OT in schools, etc

It's been an interesting week…..I just combed the news and don't see any mention of what happened at one of my schools so I guess I don't know if I am allowed to share. Also, one of my favoritest co-workers, ever, lost her 25 year old daughter over spring break. 🙁 Very sad. That same co-worker and special ed team gave me a beautiful plant, affectionately named Leroy, for when my grandma passed away. I'm going to the funeral on Saturday. I have never met the daughter, but I love her mom.

I had shoes hurled at me, full-force, during a group session the other day by a 3rd grader…I dodged it and didn't think about it again….funny what becomes “normal” lol.

Tomorrow I am giving two 30 minute sessions (one to kindergarten teachers, one to first grade teachers) at one of my schools, to teach them cheap/easy ideas for fine motor centers. I'm working on a hand-out, when it's done I'll share it, but I can tell you a ton of the ideas can be found at www.pinterest.com/funkist/ot-ideas

Today when one of my little guys saw me in the learning resource room, his eyes lit up and he said “Miss awesomeness miss awesomeness miss awesomeness” like ten times in a row. It was so cute. I love when kids ask to work with me, or come up to ask me when they get to work with me again, etc etc. Makes me so glad. I spend a LOT of money and TIME and ENERGY thinking of new ways to entertain/teach/help my kids and I have new stuff almost constantly, so I am glad it counts for something, lol. Like right now I am doing a lot with these tiny figurines I got as well as these funky androgynous beads….gotta take some pictures. And we are working on handwriting a lot with GIANT LETTERS versus teeny tiny letters, and lately I've focused on kid's names…it drives me crazy when I see my kids who are working on their handwriting, do a good job, yet jot their name at the top sloppily all in one size (typically they are writing their name without lines, of course). So we focus on the sizing of their name, explaining the proportions when there are not borders to guide them. IE tall letters should not be same size as short letters, blah blah.

Vision therapy comes up a lot in our district…would love to hear how other districts handle requests for vision therapy (by developmental optometrists)….

This is my one-year anniversary of working in the schools….if you don't include the fact that summer vacation and breaks means it's really more like 8 months, lol. I have learned SO FREAKING MUCH in this past year and I love it. I feel so much more confident. I still have my moments and days where I get confused or frustrated or stressed or don't feel like I quite have a grasp on something, but OVERALL, I am confident in my abilities as an OT in the elementary school system (notice I'm being specific here lol). Believe it or not I am pretty insecure in general so that's a big deal for me to be able to say that!

I've been getting more and more fun new Facebook friends who I have met via this blog…I enjoy it! Thanks everyone! Can't wait for AOTA conference next week….if you are going, please let me know! I would love to meet you! I haven't put up a very recent picture lately, I guess I should so you recognize me…I no longer look like Miss OTPF on the side, lol. Oh how about this. I'm semi tall-average, have black glasses, dark brown hair with hair tinsel (sparkles), and tend to wear excessive eye make-up. I'm really only going to be there late Friday night, all day Saturday, and early Sunday, so hope I can meet lots of you guys! I want to get a ticket for AOTPAC night so I can see some karaeoke or however you spell that, especially ARMY OT GUY as I hear he is quite the singer. 😉

Alright…I'm procrastinating as always…you guys know my longest posts always come when I should be working on a report…bleh IEP meeting in the morning…..I do love the job but don't always love the paperwork!

Good night all…

Imagination

So if you read the post below about princess letters, you'll see also that I discussed how we co-evolved the idea that I had guards for my imaginary castle. Some kids REALLY struggle with imagination but that little guy was not one of them. He is full of ideas. I encourage as much imagination as possible in sessions…almost anything is more fun with some imagination involved. I've talked before about just referring to the recycling bin as a hungry shark…makes it way more fun to throw crumpled paper in….even though nothing has truly changed besides the IDEA! This includes dealing with very basic tasks such as handwriting or shoe tying…..even letter writing can be a game, even shoe tying can include snakes and loop men….etc etc. Children have so little chance to evolve their imagination anymore….if they want a sword, they can buy one at a store……instead of just using a stick like we did in the olden days (when I walked barefoot both ways uphill, seeing as how I am approaching the ripe old age of 30). So…when working with kids….imagination, imagination, imagination! It will be good for you as well. You are NEVER too old to play or to imagine or to have fun. If you think you have no creativity or no imagination, guess what. I PROMISE!!! on a stack of Bibles!!! – that you do! And that I could pull it out of you. 🙂 And that there are lots of great ways to work on imagination. And that this doesn't just apply to kids…you can use the same ideas with adults, as long as you make it clear you are being playful and not condescending, while working on your meaningful activities!

Blah blah blah, stepping off my soapbox, blah blah blah. I had a personal training session today (just 30 minutes) and it made me want to barf and die. SO HARD! So now I am lying in bed, comatose. Guess tomorrow night I'll finish my AOTA conference presentation?????

Hey, for those of you who have asked me about military OT….go google Army OT guy……pretty enlightening stuff. I just finally went through and read all the FAQ etc, very intriguing! I'm presenting with him (Erik) at conference along with Anita Hamilton, Cheryl Morris, and Christopher Alterio….all awesome people. Thrilled and honored to be part of the presentation as they are all so much more accomplished than I am…they rock.

Princess letters

I work with a young child who likes the idea of monsters eating princesses…and I really want him to work on handwriting (a -preferred task). 

Today we talked about how nice letters are “princess” letters and that monsters love eating them. (Monsters ignore ugly letters). I found a red dry-erase marker and we started at the beginning of the alphabet. He would draw a letter and if it was perfect (or as close to perfect as I felt he could handle), he got to have the monster eat it. Symbolized by scribbling over it with red marker.

Somehow, this co-evolved to include the idea that I had an (imaginary) castle I was guarding, as I had a bunch of small figurines in front of me we had been using earlier. So along with the monster eating it, he would get to take one of my guards to his side. I would plead “Don’t take THIS guard, he is my best starfish! I NEED him! Please draw an ugly letter so I can keep him!” He would promptly refuse and draw a beautiful letter and then gleefully take my guard. As we ran out of guards we used other things including story cube dice, pencils, etc…until we got to Z. So he had taken ALL my guards and my castle was destroyed, boo hoo. I told him next session he better do a really bad job. He just smiled and refused. 🙂

I attached the final picture. I know it’s hard with all the red, but it worked for the first time and I’ll slowly fade that away.

OT bone

Trying to throw out an OT blog bone here….super busy…need to finish taxes and my conference presentation for AOTA tonight, if at all possible….not to mention prepare for work tomorrow. Sorry for the quiet, I've been on a two week spring break! Love working in the schools. lol. The good news is I got down from 509  new gmails to 243…that's a start…and I'm trying to do better about responding to comments….gonna go shower since I took two Pilates classes in a row today (one was Piloxing – new to me – a Pilates/boxing combo – intense) anyway – then back to work. But we all know that “work” for me means a tiny bit of work, then procrastination on Facebook or my blog, then back to work, etc…..super excited about upcoming AOTA conference…can't wait to meet social media friends/blog readers (who I consider my friends!) etc. Many of my blog readers have become my friends on FB and have been for years, it's awesome. 🙂 I love them.

Anyway. OFF TO SHOWER.

Preparing for AOTA conference presentation

Am on spring break and have a friend in town! More soon!

For OTs/SLPs…

http://psychcentral.com/news/2012/01/29/in-autistic-kids-thinking-in-words-improves-mental-flexibility/34220.html

I felt like this was a really interesting article….not the study per se, but just the idea that these children aren't talking things through internally. I may do this with some of my kids – while working on tasks, closing my eyes and having them explain what they are doing…or…I dunno. Must ponder.

Am working on my part of the upcoming social media presentation at AOTA conference…..

Why no, there are no birds in my hair…

Today was crazy hair day at one of my schools (I didn't know this
until I was already there and saw a kid with a blue mohawk in the
front office). The principal was wearing these massive, blatant, birds
in her hair. They were clips she had gotten from Michael's.

We had an important parent/teacher conference (hence the parent's
presence) and the principal left the meeting after a while. She had
sat there the entire time like a typical principal, nothing out of the
ordinary. Minus, of course, her crazy hair. Once she left, I leaned
over and said to the mom, “It's crazy hair day” and she looked
relieved and said 'I was wondering why she had birds in her hair, but
I wasn't going to say anything” ahahahahahahaha LOVE IT

Loooooove being an OT in an elementary school system! Love love love
it! 🙂 Especially now that we have two weeks of spring break. Time to
focus on finishing up my conference presentation for Indiana's AOTA
conference, taxes (barf), paperwork, e-mails, etc. A friend comes into
town on Thursday.

If you are going to conference, please let me know via comment or
e-mail! Would love to have you all come to our Saturday morning
session on social media and perhaps a get together for coffee/tea/me
(haha I laughed out loud at my own silly self) while there. I fly in
Friday night and leave Sunday mid-morning, SIX HUNDRED FREAKING
DOLLARS FOR MY TICKET. That's freaking dedication right there, love
you AOTA. I am kissing you, Centennial Vision. Cuddling you close. The
Centennial Vision and I are BFF. 🙂

How to get an OT response plus some typical treatment…OT in schools

Today I rushed to school #1 (for the day) for a 7am parent/teacher conference that involved special ed; then rushed to school #2 where I normally am on Thursdays to do as many normal scheduled treatments as I could; then ran to school #3 for a 20 minute conference with special ed involvement; then ran back to school #2 for meeting with parent….busy day of running around.

The good news is I am getting slightly more organized with my car and toys…..

Thursday mornings always involve one of my favorite little groups (maybe like 7 years old??) where they rush me saying “Miss Awesomeness!!”…to be fair they're usually ready for a distraction from like, fractions. Because their special ed teacher is amazing but fractions will never beat silly games. 😉 We started with a little warm-up where I scattered puzzle pieces to the alphabet puzzle on one side of the room and put the puzzle frame on the other. The first time around they had to do tiny quick steps to gather 2 pieces to place into the puzzle….second time around they had to do a “jello” walk (really wiggly and floppy) which turned into more of a zombie jello walk, lol. Third time around they had to chomp their arms big like alligators….etc until all 26 pieces were in. Then we used Bendaroos to work on b/d/p/q and then to write out all of our names… augh 8% battery left working quick to finish before it dies…..then I got out big grid paper and my stamps and they had to carefully position their stamps in certain grid areas such as the upper left corner (we are working on lefts, rights, directionality etc)….finally we used “Story Cubes” and took turns coming up with a single sentence at a time which we all wrote using the images for inspiration…my favorite one was something like “The bee is swimming in the Earth and the fire is in the scales” or something ridiculously long like that, haha. That was from a kid who normally doesn't like writing…he wanted to write out that entire thing!  I think their favorite image was of the debit card…(we're actually not sure what it is supposed to be so we're going with debit card). While working on our best handwriting of course. 🙂 Fun times. Love my little guys.

7% I am getting nervous augh

okay off to get my charger this is too anxiety provoking lolol….okay phew

A few more sessions working with story cubes, handwriting, directionality/following instructions, etc…..plus meetings with parents….I don't go to all parent/teacher conferences of my kids or it would be insane, but I go to ones that could use a quick OT update or something. I really dislike the phone, I get kind of stumbly, plus I think parents in general do better face to face, so I do try to drive to a school rather than do a phone call, when I can…

Tonight I need to finish some paperwork. And I have so many more pictures to share, but I am trying to space them out instead of doing blogging blizzards so that things are more stable/consistent on the blog.

Tomorrow I need to hit at least 2 schools and possibly up to all four…depends on how things go I guess…last day before spring break so things may be a little chaotic in the classrooms. Guess we'll find out.

This weekend goals: Finish up my part of the presentation for conference, plus taxes….goals for spring break include catching up on paperwork!!!!

Hey, on e-mails….still over 200 new mails and many hundreds of blog emails to respond to….I've started trying to respond ASAP to incoming blog question emails instead of postponing (thinking I'll actually write a succinct thoughtful answer if I take my time later) because I never do get the time for it. (Or to be more fair: I don't end up CHOOSING the time for it when I'm resting). So I'm writing quick immediate answers. But here's the thing. If you ask me a question about something semi personal, ie “Do you think I can work while in OT school,” or “I'm nervous about working with population X, do you think it will get better”, then I can help you out, because you may not be able to find your answer as it's more of an advice kind of thing. But if you write me a very factual question such as “What is the difference between PT and OT…” the chances are high you will not get an answer, because that kind of question frustrates me a little bit, because basic google sleuthery will get you that kind of answer.

So please….contact me if you'd like (I do love hearing from people), but if you are going to ask me a question, the chances are highest you will get a response if A) you include something personal about yourself that gives me at least a basic feel of who you are/where you are coming from (not in the literal sense of location) B) you don't ask fifty million questions or at least prioritize a few above all the rest (ie here are ten million questions but if you could at least answer question X that would be awesome) and C) you ask questions that a google search won't easily answer…ie advice, not basic facts. Oh. And if you write me a single sentence that says “lets discuss OT”…um yeah. You need to write more than that. AHAHAHAHA

If you HAVE done what I have asked and have not gotten an answer and still want/need one, your options are to A) wait…I do EVENTUALLY answer the vast majority of questions that fit criteria above) or B) resend it but note its a re-send.

Finally….if you want to be my friend on Facebook, please make it clear you are an OT blog reader with a few details about yourself so that I'm not randomly friending robbers or something…if you have asked before and it didn't go through feel free to try again with an explanation, maybe I messed up or who knows.

Hope my clarifications above don't offend anyone. I LOOOOVE bringing new people into the profession and helping out, but I can only help so much so I'm starting to learn it's better to prioritize…..good night!!

Tower of bunnies for OT

Tower of Bunnies, OT session, for an older kid. I needed to set the girl up in RapidReader, so while I was doing that I had her mess with my Tower of Bunnies….as you can see she got it stacked high. The carrot hooks are kind of for Jenga-like movements of pulling bunnies out, but it's super hard. What else do you expect for 3 dollars at CVS? I do like the concept overall though, for stacking.