“Where Superheroes Are Created”

Fine Motor - As OT’s, we look at how a child uses their hands. This may include a variety of academic tasks such as cutting, letter and number writing and ultimately sharing ideas on paper with appropriate sentence structuring and increasingly complex math problems. A proper pencil grasp, strength, awareness and motor control are needed for a child’s fine motor success. We want to see a progression of manipulative skills that reflect eye-hand dominance and ultimately transition into academic success and the ability to complete daily tasks such as buttoning, utensil use and shoe tying. It is not surprising for our therapist’s to see children who avoid or become easily frustrated with writing or drawing tasks. Our individualized treatment plans address these concerns and assist with making progress forward!

Gross Motor - We believe in a holistic approach and that includes how efficient a child is with his overall body awareness, strength, motor planning skills, balance and bilateral coordination abilities. The brain and body connections are a true reflection of later success in understanding the world around them and making the best choices. We often receive reports from parents that their child is “clumsy” or hasn’t learned how to ride a bike. This can also carry over into personal space issues with others including circle time or stepping on others while walking in line. Children can be quite cautious when engaging in novel activities such as a new park or even birthday parties, appearing to be afraid or not willing to participate. Decreased ideas of how to complete a task is noted with poor problem solving abilities, independence and ultimately self-esteem. When completing our standardized assessments, these areas are assessed and incorporated into our treatment sessions!

Visual-Perceptual/Visual-Motor - Many children go undiagnosed with visual perceptual and/or visual motor integration deficits. Every child should have their vision assessed and corrected if needed. We as OT’s, take a further look into how well the eyes are working together, tracking abilities, and addressing the 7 areas of visual perceptual skills. If a child struggles with having the appropriate mental image of what the eyes are seeing, then we will likely see this carry over into writing, reading and math difficulties. Just as we assess the ocular motor system, we also look at motor performance. There is a developmental progression of learning to draw a horizontal line, circle and then square. These skills lead to ultimately letter and number recognition, writing and on to higher level academic abilities. Children diagnosed with Dyslexia and Dysgraphia also benefit from occupational therapy as they often struggle with visual perception and visual motor skills. Our sessions are tailored to meet the needs of your child!

Activities of Daily Living - As children grow and develop, they learn the ways of the world that evolve into independence. These include self-feeding, dressing, grooming and toileting, but also the ability to organize one’s day or school work. Being able to juggle getting ready for school, transitioning from task to task, and achieving the demands of the day, is truly a part of daily life skills. Many children struggle with learning to tie their shoes and complete homework independently. As therapists, we believe in the power of problem solving, attaining and retaining life skills and encouraging self-esteem, self-worth and ultimately true independence!

Sensory Processing Skills - This is an another area that often goes undiagnosed and misunderstood. As we develop from a baby to a school aged child, many neurological developments are happening. The brain is building sensory-motor pathways that lead to a well-functioning child. Children may struggle with the perception of various input including touch, movement, sound, smells and body awareness, balance and muscle control. There is a maturation process that occurs in each and every developing nervous system. If there is a mishap in this process, we see gaps in development. Many of our children are incredibly bright with poor performance reported at school, home and in the community. We tend to see children keeping it together in the classroom but having meltdowns at home. Children with sensory processing deficits can appear to have ADD/ADHD, anxiety, autism along with social, emotional and behavioral concerns. There are, however, times when the child may exhibit multiple diagnoses in conjunction with a sensory processing delay. Children often experience as if there is a neurological “traffic jam” that makes sorting sensory input and using it efficiently incredibly challenging. Parents fill out the Sensory Profile and we complete our clinical assessments to determine if your child presents with Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD). Further information can be found at www.sensory-processing-disorder.com.

Integrated Listening Systems (iLs) – This listening program utilizes music and movement to encourage improved brain/body connections, processing skills and better communication of the sensory/motor neural pathways. We have seen much success with our younger and older children. Improvements noted are typically in the areas of sensory and auditory processing, attention, emotional regulation including anxiety, balance, bilateral coordination and fine motor skills. All our therapists are certified and our clinic is a believer! It is truly one tool in our OT tool bag, but it’s proven to be an excellent one if the protocol is followed correctly. Feel free to read more at www.integratedlistening.com.

Handwriting/Academics - If your child struggles with learning letters and numbers or has difficulty with handwriting or expressing ideas in a written form, then we can help. Our OTs use the Handwriting Without Tears program to assist our children in learning proper letter and number formation in print and cursive writing. This in turn encourages success academically. We also tend to incorporate activities that correlate with learning in the classroom. We use positive and creative ways to help guide the child in feeling more confident about their written abilities. Improving their self-esteem will ensure better motivation, willingness to complete homework assignments, and make those necessary developmental gains. Evaluations will assess not only handwriting, but look further into how well the sensory-motor systems are working together. There are many reasons as to why handwriting might be difficult, and our team is trained to search for causes and assist with correction!

Behavioral/Social - We are a special group of therapists who believe every child is capable of being happy and achieve friendships! Often we see children who struggle with certain behaviors possibly at home or school, and we want to problem solve as to why and implement real solutions. If you are a child who works hard to pay attention, you might find yourself with decreased frustration tolerance and act inappropriately to a situation. We have many who feel anxious and unsure how to interpret the world around them. This can surely affect their reactions, coping strategies, emotional regulation (i.e. frequency and duration of meltdowns), and ability to have age appropriate, peer relationships. We utilize various positive reinforcement and work with our families to encourage better behavior and happier times at home and school. Our therapists truly believe a positive child leads to a positive future!

Parent/Professional Communication - It is incredibly valuable to have communication between all people working with your child! We believe it is important to have everyone on the same page and working together to achieve success for our children. We tend to collaborate with families, teachers, administration, speech and physical therapists, psychologists, pediatricians, and vision specialists. We assist in providing home programs and classroom suggestions/modifications to further encourage success. Our OTs often attend parent-teacher conferences and observe children in their classroom environment at neighboring private schools we serve. Therapists will also attend your child’s school if requested. We love to help!