Occupational Therapy with Ms. Staci Ollar

OT Tips for Homework Success

Hi everyone! Joe and Staci here! Ready for another fun activity?!

Children develop writing skills as their fine motor and visual motor system are developing.  Often times awkward pencil grips are the result of a lack of fine motor development.  Fine motor activities are quickly disappearing in a world of technology. While screens and video games have a place, it’s important to use our hands/fingers and develop these skills in a 3-dimensional world instead of a 2-dimensional screen. Remember to have your child use his/her hands to develop both eye-hand coordination and small muscles.

Developing two sides of the hand helps with fine motor skills, including holding a pencil or crayon efficiently – a skill needed for development of writing

Here are 5 fine motor activities to help develop the small muscles of the hand, as well as eye-hand coordination.

You can look up more fine motor activities such as these on Pinterest.com.

• Use toothpicks with fruit to make shapes/designs

• Use a small sponge to paint a picture – dip the sponge into cup of water to change colors of paint and squeeze with 3 fingers (the fingers used to hold a pencil).

• Use kitchen tongs/tweezers to pick up various items. – this activity develops the 2 sides of the hand and aids in learning how to use scissors as well

• Use clothespins when practicing spelling words.

• String buttons or beads onto pipe cleaners.  Hold the pipecleaner in non-dominant hand and pick up buttons/beads with thumb/index finger of dominant hand.

Let us know if you have any questions or comments! Enjoy your week!

Hi everyone!

Joe and Staci here! We are two Occupational Therapists lucky enough to be working at Snow Elementary!

Together, we will be providing students, parents, guardians, ANYONE with awesome and fun activities that relate to Occupational Therapy skills such as sensory integration, fine motor coordination and strength, gross motor coordination and strength and activities of daily living.

To start us off, we have attached a picture from Pinterest of a Fall Themed Sensory Bin!

In your clear bin, you can include:

• River rocks (large, medium and small)
• Plastic pumpkins and gourds
• Plastic acorns
• Felt leaves
• Small apple-pumpkin scented candle
• Foam sticker leaves
• Foam sticker pumpkins and apples
• Foam sticker footballs

Once all of your items are in your bin, the sky is the limit!

Examples of some activities you can do are:

• Let your child explore the different textures, shapes and smells.
• Have your child scoop out the rocks with an ice cream scoop or fingers  and place them into ice cube holders.
• Have your child separate the large rocks from the small rocks using tongs.
• You can hide the different items within the sensory bin and have your child search for them.

That is one example of the awesome and fun activities we will be posting each week!

Subscribe to our blog and let us know if you try one of our suggestions!

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