More Activities for Hand Separation

Today I'll be discussing more activities that promote hand separation. Spinning a top is one suggestion. Tong activities are also great to work on developing manipulation skills on the thumb, index, and middle finger side of the hand while working on stability on the pinkie and ring finger side. To prevent a child from trying to use the pinkie and index to help with manipulating the tongs, you can always have her hold a cotton ball or other small item with these fingers while using the tongs. This ensures that the pinky side of the hand is being used for stability!

There are a variety of tongs that you can purchase, or you may already have some of these in your home! You can work on many different concepts with tong activities, such as having the child sort items of the same color, size, or shape. You can also purchase small beads with letters on them and have the child use the tongs to make words out of the letters. A child can stack blocks using tongs and even string beads! Get creative when it comes to using tongs by incorporating them into craft activities or using them to move game pieces! There's no limit to what you can do, and all the while the child is improving hand separation, which can ultimately have a positive impact on fine motor skills, including handwriting!

Fidget Kit Giveaway

And the winner of the Fidget Kit Giveaway is Carol, from Maryland. Congrats! Be sure to send me an email with your mailing address so that I can send it your way! 

 
Fidget kits are great to have when sustained attention is required in the classroom or during homework time. To win this one, just sign up as a follower on the right, AND send an email to tummytimetips@ gmail.com letting me know that you're a follower. If you’re already following the blog, send me an email letting me know why you would like to win the kit...send all emails to tummytimetips@gmail.com.

Hand Separation

Starting today, I’ll be sharing activities that will improve fine motor skills. Remember the importance of working on foundational skills before you start working on fine motor activities. For example, you’ll want to make sure that your child has good postural control, and is skilled with large and medium motor tasks before moving on to fine motor skills. Control and stability are important prerequisite skills for fine motor activities such as writing and cutting!

Hand Separation: The hand can be divided into 2 separate sides. The pinky and ring finger side is for stability. The thumb, index and middle finger perform manipulation skills.  It is important to be able to separate the two sides of the hand when it comes to fine motor skills. As you can see in the photo above, I am stabilizing two coins using my pinky and ring fingers, yet I am still able to hold and manipulate a quarter using my thumb, index and middle finger. In the video below, I am performing translation skills. When I pick up the buttons and bring them into my palm, this is called finger-to-palm translation. As I bring one button out to my fingertips at a time, while stabilizing the others in my palm, this is called palm-to-finger translation with stabilization. This is a great exercise for working on hand separation! A similar activity is to have your child put coins into a piggy bank.

 

Resource: Exner, C.E. (1997). Clinical interpretation of “In-hand manipulation in children: translation movements, American Journal of Occupational Therapy, (9), 729-32.

Medium Motor Activities

When teaching a child to write, you should begin with the large motor activities suggested on the March 19^th post. You then move on to medium motor activities. Here are some suggestions for medium motor activities:

• Writing in shaving cream that is on a paper plate or cookie sheet.  
• Have the child form the letters using Elmer’s glue on a piece of card stock then sprinkle the glue with colored sugar or colored sand. Once dry, these make nice tactile cards for tracing the letters with a fingertip. Have the child trace the letters with her eyes closed so that she can “feel” the formation.  
• Trace and write large letters on a sheet protector using a dry erase maker  
• Form letters out of play dough or putty  
• Form letters out of wikki stix  
• Fill a large ziplock freezer bag with cheap hair gel and glitter. Smooth it out and have the child trace and write on this using a fingertip.   

 

All of these activities will help children develop automatic motor memories for each letter formation.

Modified from information by Jan McCleskey, MA, OTR, The Handwriting Clinic, Plano,Texas

 

Painting for Hailey

One of my favorite blogs is “Painting for Hailey”. It is written by Janet, grandmother to a beautiful little girl named Hailey who is diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy. Janet started the blog as a way to keep her family informed about Hailey’s progress, and she is on a “mission to help others with disabilities to find resources that they need to help their loved ones, as well as let others know that they are not alone and together we can educate others about how to talk and play with people who are a bit different”. Janet is also an AMAZING artist, and for a limited time she is having a special, offering a 16 x 20 original oil painting (she can paint from a 4 x 6 photo of your choice) for $100.00 plus shipping and handling. All of the money raised goes directly to Hailey's many therapies that are not covered by insurance. Look at Janet's work, and you'll know that this is an awesome deal! Please click here to go to Janet’s blog, check out more of her beautiful artwork, and to contact her directly if you are interested in a painting! 

  http://janetharrold.blogspot.com/

Handwriting: Starting with Basic Strokes and Shapes

I shared in my previous post that there are certain strokes and shapes that a child should be able to form before beginning the process of learning to write the letters of the alphabet. You can think of these as the "building blocks" to learning letter formations. The important thing to remember is that it's not necessary to have your child sit down with a piece of paper and a pencil when it's time to work on writing skills. In fact, that is probably the last thing that you should do! It's best to begin teaching these strokes using large and medium motor skills and slowly transition to the fine motor approach of using paper and a writing utensil. If you're wondering what I mean by large and medium motor skills...I'm going to tell you! 

Large motor skills are big motor movements such as running and jumping (also referred to as gross motor skills). Children can learn shapes and forms using large motor skills, and they usually love it because it doesn't involve having to sit still. Here are a few activities that you can try.

• Take a piece of rope or string (or sidewalk chalk if you're outside) and form the stroke, shape or letter that you want to work on. It's best to begin with horizontal and vertical lines and then move forward on the chart. Have your little one walk or jump along the line. It's good to have them verbalize and describe the stroke while they're moving,  such as "straight line down, straight line across, or a circle is round." This is a great way to work on concepts such as "up, down, across, etc.", and it means more because the child is actually experiencing the concept rather than being told about it. Remember, if your little one isn't walking, you can still do this activity by carrying them or pushing them in a wheelchair or stroller. Children can also use a scooter board to propel themselves along the form.

• Draw a stroke on a large piece of paper and tape it on the wall. Have your child stand back and trace the stroke using a hand, fingertip or toy magic wand.

• You can also dim the lights, have the child move further back, and "trace" the form using a flashlight. Kids love this!

• Draw a stroke in the sand or dirt using a large stick - make sure it's big!

These are just a couple of suggestions. You can use your imagination and get creative! Just remember, the more ways that you introduce the stroke, the better chance that the child will develop a "motor memory" for it... and don't forget to include the verbal component! In my next post I'll provide some suggestions for working on strokes using medium motor skills.

Modified from information by Jan McCleskey, MA, OTR, The Handwriting Clinic, Plano,Texas

Handwriting Readiness

Most children love to draw and write! In fact, many little ones start testing these skills very early. Unfortunately, sometimes it's on our floors and walls rather that on paper! Here are some early skills that children acquire along with the approximate ages that many children start to master them:

• Random Scribble - 1 to 2 Years
• 2 to 3 years - Imitates circular, vertical, and horizontal strokes
• 3 to 4 years - Imitates a circle and a cross
• 4 to 5 years - Copies a square and a cross from an example
• 5 to 6 years - Has established a dominant hand and copies a triangle from an example

Writing Readiness - In order to master the skill of handwriting, a child should be able to identify the letters of the alphabet. A dominant hand should be established and a tripod or quadropod pencil grasp is preferred. The child should follow basic verbal instructions and it is also important to understand terms such as "above", "below", "over", "under", and "between". Most importantly, a child should be able to copy the following strokes before they begin to learn how to write letters.

Reference:  Folio, M. R., & Fewell, R.R. (2000). Peabody Developmental Motor Scales, 2nd Edition. Austin: Pro-Ed