What is OT?

Occupational therapists are trained developmental skills that affect a child’s everyday life, these will include academic’s skills, play and social skills and activities of daily living like dressing, eating, bathing, brushing teeth, etc. The therapist will look at a variety of sensory, neuromuscular, perceptual and development areas that influences the child’s ability to perform at their maximal potential. The therapist would assess the child’s current performance and ascertain the impact of factors affecting their academic/ functional performance.

Who can benefit?

Sensory Processing difficulties

What are some the signs of Sensory Processing Difficulties?

Fear of loud noises and often overacts to unexpected sound. The child may cover their ears or hide under the desk.
Hypersensitivity to smells or tastes
Overreaction to touch and will often struggle to stand in lines or in crowded areas like assembly or the cafeteria
Have meltdowns when expected to do messy tasks like finger painting during art lessons.
Crave movement activities an appears constantly ‘on the go’
Impulsivity and dangerous behaviours especially on the playground
Short attention span and is easily distracted
Difficulty with change in routine
Has difficulty with fine motor skills like cutting, tracing, colouring in, handwriting, etc
Has difficulty with gross motor skills like climbing, ball skills, balance, learning how to ride a bike,etc
Poor visual perceptual skills like reversals of letters/numbers, poor tracking, building puzzles,etc
Poor directional concepts like understanding left/right, up, down,etc

Developmental coordination disorder/Developmental Dyspraxia

What are some of the signs of DCD?

Difficulty adapting to the classroom routine
Poor fine motor skills (pencil grip/use scizzors, building with legos, etc)
Difficulty eating with knife and fork, tying shoelaces/buttons
Illegible handwriting
Poor listening and language skills
Difficulty with sequential instruction
Immature copying/drawings
Slow completion of schoolwork
Lack of imaginative play &limited creative play.
Forming relationships
Difficulty forming relationships and possible Isolation/rejection by peers
Becomes stressed/emotional often.

Developmental Dysgraphia and Handwriting difficulties

What are some of the signs?

Illegible handwriting.
Poor posture and difficulty grasping the pencil correctly.
Frequent erasing or written errors noted.
Written letters are poorly formed, inversed, reversed or inconsistently spaced.
Writes slowly compared to peers.
Unable to keep up with written demands.
Switching between cursive and print.
Inconsistencies with writing and spelling that cannot be explained.
Child may switch hands while writing.
Difficulty with written organisation of thought
Previous intensive therapy with no real progress in handwriting.

Visual processing difficulties

What are the signs of visual processing difficulties?

Child does not pay attention to visual tasks.
Has difficulty with tasks that require copying (taking notes from a board)
Reverses or misreads letters, numbers and words.
Has difficulty writing within lines or margins.
Has trouble spelling familiar words with irregular spelling patterns.
Skips words or entire lines when reading or reads the same sentence over.
Has weak mathematical skills; frequently ignores function signs, omits steps, and confuses visually similar formulas; and
Routinely fails to observe or recognise changes in notice board displays, signs or posted notices.

Occupational Therapy

What is OT?

What to expect?

In depth and comprehensive assessments

Pre and post assessment consultations

Individual one to one sessions: 30 minutes – 45 minutes

Parent and teacher support via workshops

Facilitating support of parents and teachers at home and school