It’s great to end this school week with Fun Time Friday! What a beautiful fall day! Let’s get outside and go on a scavenger hunt! This scavenger hunt is brought to you with permission from http://www.abcdeelearning.com Feel free to print it out from the download icon below and then go have some fun outside!
Happy Thursday! We are almost through the week, so let’s keep the fire burning and get our brains thinking! Here is a word search with all the fun fall things we love this time of year. Go to the Fall-Word-Search link and print out to complete at home. Use a highlighter or your favorite color marker to circle the words once you find them. Once you are finished, make up a sentence to tell a little story about fall time using 4 of the words hidden.
Today for Writing Wednesday I want to focus on good posture for writing tasks. Poor posture when writing means that your child’s body has to work extra hard to maintain stability. This causes excess muscle strain and effort, and can make handwriting uncomfortable and more difficult. It is important to remember the basics listed below when completing writing activities.
This position gives your child optimum core strength and stability, and makes handwriting more comfortable.
One of my favorite tools to use during OT sessions are tongs. There are many sizes that can be used and for a variety of activities. Using tongs are great to help students develop strength and coordination needed in the small muscles of their hands. This in turn will help with cutting, grasp and writing. Here are some activities your child can do using tongs:
Happy Monday! I hope that all of you are doing well in your virtual classes. I know it can be different right now not being as active in school, so here is a fun activity to get you moving at home. Have an adult set a timer and complete each animal movement for 45 seconds with a 15 second rest in between. These animal movements will get both your hands and both your feet moving at the same time to work on your balance and bilateral coordination. Let’s get moving! You can access this activity at: https://hes-extraordinary.com/improve-emotional-regulation-just-7-minutes-per-day?fbclid=IwAR2jw1N3matF9ex6lUco-62uepuSRJsHChX-FDLHDYAlT8Tn7HkE44yY0Bo
This week I am going to start posting again based on our daily activity themes, as I received a lot of positive feedback from doing this last spring. It’s a great way to publish a variety of activities to meet the different needs of my students.
Movement Mondays
Tools Tuesdays
Writing Wednesdays
Thinking Thursdays
Fun Time Fridays
Happy first day of school! Yes, it looks very different this year, but we are still going to make it a great one! I hope everyone had a nice summer and was able to relax and rejuvenate! I will continue to be the OT for Miller, Cotter and McDonald. I am very excited to return to my schools and eventually see all the smiling faces of the students I have missed so much!
This week I will be learning a new teletherapy platform so our virtual therapy sessions will be more interactive, efficient and meaningful as we move forward. I’m super excited to share this platform with all the students I service and their parents as we explore this school year together. Keep a look-out for information on PresenceLearning and how we will be using it during therapy this school year!
We will also be using scheduled face-to-face learning labs starting the week of September 21st. The learning labs are by appointment only so stayed tuned as I compile the OT schedule for your child!
As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to email me at lillyl@dearbornschools.org or call (313)827-7020.
It’s time for the 9th edition of OT Friday Fun Fine Motor Newsletter! This will be the last Fun Time Friday post for the summer. Let’s get busy and create some animal lacing cards!
Without a Printer:
• Draw simple shapes for your child to cut out and use instead.
• Cut out pictures from a magazine to make your own cards.
How to Make a Lacing Card:
• Print each animal onto thick printing paper, like cardstock.
• Have your child cut out each animal.
• Using a hole puncher, have your child punch holes into the white circles along the outline of the animal.
• Using thick string, yarn, or shoelace have your child weave the string in and out of the holes to promote their fine motor skills.
Ways to Incorporate Handwriting:
• Have your child write their name on the back of each lacing card.
• Using lined paper, have your child write about which animal they would most likely want for a pet.
• Have your child copy a few of the sentences from the instructions on how to make the lacing card.
• Copy the words of all of the animals your child laces. Place the words in alphabetical order.
Welcome to the last Thinking Thursday post of the school year as today is the last official day of school! What a whirlwind of a year, but we have made it to summer break! Today I am posting one more Crack the Code with a summer message for all my students!
For the last three Writing Wednesdays, we focused on lowercase and capital letters. Today, I want to share with you a resource created by a fellow OT who made videos of teaching the numbers 1-9. The first set of videos is using the Wet-Dry-Try method that I introduced with the capital letters a few weeks ago. This activity utilizes chalk, chalkboard and a wet sponge. The purpose is to teach and reinforce number formation. It is used for writers with beginning level skills, or to reinforce skills in more experienced writers. This helps students practice correct pencil grasp while using the small chalk pieces. It also helps them practice writing straight lines with the assistance of the edge of the chalkboard. If you are interested in learning more about the Wet-Dry-Try method or an alternate method using an app, visit https://www.lwtears.com/blog/wet-dry-try-showdown-activity-vs-app. The second set of videos is paper and pencil instruction of writing the numbers.
Wet-Dry-Try
Numbers (Writing with Pencil and Paper)
