By: Annie Wade, OTR/L

self-care skills

If your child has difficulty completing self-care tasks such as brushing teeth, getting dressed, brushing hair, getting haircuts, or taking baths/showers due to physical reasons or for sensory reasons, occupational therapy can help! Some indicators that occupational therapy services may be beneficial include:

• Unable to do fasteners such as zippers, snaps and buttons by 5 years of age
• Unable to dress/undress self by age 4
• Becoming distressed during brushing teeth, brushing hair, hair cuts, or during showers/baths at any age
• Becoming distressed with certain textures of clothing, tags or socks



FINE motor skills

Occupational therapy can address use of hands and fine motor skills! At any age, fine motor skills are a crucial part of development and can impact skills later in life, such as handwriting. Indicators that occupational therapy services may be beneficial include:

• Holding crayon/pencil with full fist by age 4 (should be holding in fingers by this age)
• Unable to snip paper with scissors by age 4
• Unable to hold small objects between pointer finger and thumb by age 1
• Unable to string/lace beads by age 4
• Difficulty opening snack containers/water bottles/lunch boxes after age 5

Visual motor skills

Visual motor skills are using hands and eyes together to complete a task such as catching a ball, drawing, handwriting, reading and completing mazes. Indicators to seek out occupational therapy services for visual motor skills include:

• Unable to copy horizontal and vertical lines by age 3
• Difficulty copying/writing letters by age 6
• Not reaching for toys by 4 months of age
• Not able to complete simple puzzle by age 3

sensory processing skills

Sensory processing is a HUGE part of what occupational therapy services address. Sensory processing is how our bodies and brains take in sensory information, process it and respond to that information in a meaningful and purposeful way. Indicators that your child may benefit from occupational therapy services to address sensory processing difficulties include, but are not limited to:

• Child constantly seeking out movement or actively avoiding movement (swings, slides, etc.)
• Becomes significantly distressed with hands or clothing being dirty
• Avoids places with loud noises and becomes distressed around loud noises
• Constant crashing, jumping, fall to the point of becoming unsafe or affecting day to day activities
• Difficulty with emotional regulation and calming down after emotional outbursts
  

feeding therapy

Occupational therapists address feeding therapy through a whole body and sensory processing approach. While children will have preferred and non-preferred foods and may go through periods of eating less types of foods it is important to know when ‘picky eating’ becomes a concern. Signs that your child may benefit from occupational therapy feeding therapy include, but are not limited to:

• Child eating less than 30 food items
• Child is omitting entire food categories
• Child will not try new foods, even to task
• Child will gag and/or run from table when asked to try new foods
• Child struggles to sit during mealtimes or needs to have electronics to eat food
  

How We Can Help

If you think your child could benefit from occupational therapy, we are here to help! Read more about Feeding Therapy or Occupational Therapy services on our website. Give us a call at 859-353-3666 to schedule an evaluation, or use our free screening tool to learn more. We can help your child play their way to success!