OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY at a Glance
At Firefly Therapy Clinic our OT’s work to increase your child’s independence in activities of daily living as well as to improve body function, fine motor skills, visual motor skills and functional cognitive skills. Our OT will also address the need for upper extremity adaptive equipment and home modifications if needed.
EVALUATION assesses the child’s:
- Fine motor skills (grasping and controlling a pencil, using scissors
- Upper body strength and coordination
- Balance
- Self-help and self care skills, such as feeding, dressing, and bathing
- Attention difficulties
- Planning and organization
- Gross motor skills (doing jumping jacks, work on core muscles strength for sitting and posture
- Sensory integration disorders
- Personal behavior modulation
- Hand eye coordination
- Following directions and problem solving
- Positioning and adaptive equipment
- Upper body splinting to prevent poor posturing and improve functional mobility
THERAPY
Occupational Therapy at ATC identifies your child’s strengths and builds on them to promote further function. Through specialized treatment, Our OT builds on these strengths and helps your child compensate and improve their weaknesses.
- Your OT will create a program of activities for your child to work on. They’ll address things like strength, focus, coordination, sensory reactions, and organization.
- For example, if your child struggles with focus or attention, your OT may have him do full body exercises before he does his schoolwork. If your child has handwriting issues, our OT may use multisensory techniques to help. For instance, your child might trace a letter in sandpaper or form letters in shaving cream.
- Your Occupational therapist can help children with learning and attention issues such as dyslexia, visual processing deficits, executive functioning delays, and dysgraphia.
There are many benefits of occupational therapy, overall many children improve concentration, and have increased self confidence as they learn to do more tasks on their own.
Children may benefit from occupational therapy for a variety of reasons, for example…
- My son seems to have difficulty playing with other children. He seems to be hitting out at others for no apparent reason.
- My daughter has difficulty tolerating certain clothing. She also doesn’t like to have her teeth brushed.
- My son is such a picky eater. I don’t think he has more than 5 foods that he will eat.
- My daughter just got diagnosed with CP. You need some help understanding what this means for both her and her family.
- My son seems to have difficulty with his fine motor skills. He dislikes coloring and doesn’t seem to hold his pencil like other kids his age.
- After surgery, my daughter needs help to be able to dress herself and help herself in the bathroom again.
- My son doesn’t have a diagnosis, but seems to be having difficulty meeting his developmental milestones.
- My daughter has difficulty focusing in the classroom.