More Summer Ideas from our school’s Occupational Therapist!!! “Hands On” and limiting screen time is IMPORTANT!!!
| Notes from your Occupational Therapist | Swimming is usually my TOP recommendation when therapy parents ask me what kinds of activities their kids should do during the summer. Swimming is an AMAZING activity that promotes sensory integration, motor planning, spatial awareness, bilateral coordination, improved core and overall strength, and more. |
| Play gross motor games.Some fun games to get the large muscle groups of the body working include building an obstacle course (indoors or outdoors), playing with bean bagsand playing games like Twister, Balloon Tennis, Bowling, “Ice Skating” in the Living Room. You canNOT play outside enough! Put away the technology! | Some fun FINE MOTOR ACTIVITIES and games for school-age kids might include painting with a squirt bottle, squirting down a tower of cups, building marshmallow sculptures, or playing with LEGOs. Create pictures with a Lite Brite, or play Connect 4, Uno, Kerplunk, Jenga, Operation, or Mancala. Ziploc bags: encourage using fingertips to press and seal. Put together puzzles as a family. For preschoolers, check out Chutes and Ladders , Hi Ho! Cherry-O, Ants in the pants, or Crocodile Dentist. Use tongs, tweezers, or strawberry hullers to pick up small objects for sorting, such as beads, marbles, beans, pompoms and cotton balls. |
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Outdoor parks are the perfect place to build gross motor skills, fine motor skills, visual skills, sensory processing skills, and even social skills! Kids who crave proprioceptive input and need lots of “heavy work” can work their bilateral coordination, hand strength, and core muscles as they climb ladders and cargo nets and play on the monkey bars. Or they can get lots of good vestibular input as they slide, swing, and spin. |
Try different summer recipes with your kids and involve them in the process. Being involved in the food preparation process is not only fun for kids, it can actually be therapeutic for those who are picky eaters |
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Encourage independence with self-help skills! Are you no longer rushing out the door to get your kid(s) to school? Great! Now is the perfect time to take a little longer in the mornings and encourage your child to do more of their self-help tasks on their own.
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Cook up some homemade play dough and spend some time playing playdough with your child. This is my favorite recipe… https://www.the36thavenue.com/kool-aid-playdough-recipe/ Experiment with making different types of slime, including sand slime. Make some rainbow spaghetti. Create soft cloud dough using only two ingredients. Learn how to make your own bubble solution and make GIANT bubbles. Mile High Bubbles Try making different types of homemade paints. Experiment with glowing sensory play. Contain your messy play in a sensory table, large bin, or on a large towel or dollar store shower curtain. There are so many recipes for these things online! |
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Encourage lots of cutting with scissors this summer! |
Have a Wonderful Summer! |