This article is going to focus on how to start homework in a positive and successful way, and I will write some posts in the near future about more strategies for sticking to homework and coping with the frustrations that can come along with it. If you would like to receive a notice of when I have written these, don’t forget to join our newsletter in the form below. We do not send any spam and we do not pass on our email addresses to anyone. Alternatively, follow us on Twitter or Facebook and you should see our ‘announcement’ there.

1. Prepare Yourself:

This is probably one of the most important, shortest and most forgotten steps you can take. It is very easy to jump straight from one activity (e.g. lunch) to homework, because we want to get it done. Unfortunately, when we do this, we are bringing with us all the “baggage” of the previous activity. We may have been frustrated with the mess at the table, flustered by the rush of the afternoon, annoyed by the war that broke out between the kids or any number of everyday issues. This step is really only about taking 1 moment (or more if you need it) to calm yourself down, let everything else go and focus on developing a positive attitude towards the homework. Our attitude towards the homework can go a long way towards helping our children calm and focus during homework.

Here’s how to achieve this: First, remind yourself that whatever just happened is just a normal part of parenting/daily life with kids and that the children will have forgotten it in a matter of moments. If necessary, remind yourself also, that although it may seem like it, they didn’t mean to be naughty, disrespectful, clumsy, lazy, careless or whatever may have happened. Next, take a few deep breaths and help yourself get into your calm place. Finally, remind yourself that it is important for you to be positive about homework (even if you are sick of it and have done it for 5 kids already) in order for your child to be positive about it. Even though these seem quite logical, we all have a tendency to not focus on these things. Keeping our focus on these can really help us maintain our patience going into and enduring the task of homework.

2. Get Organised:

Another seemingly logical, but often overlooked, task is getting organised and prepared. Being fully prepared will avoid unnecessary interruptions which will interfere with the flow of the work. It will also ensure your child doesn’t have the opportunity to get off task by having to hunt down some necessary tool or “go to the toilet”. It can be hard to keep track of what you need to do to get prepared, but having a paper or mental checklist can be very useful. Here are some things we recommend you do/consider before starting homework:

Go to the toilet: ensure your child has recently been to the toilet before you start, even if they say they don’t need to go. Remind them that there will be no toilet breaks in the middle of homework time.

Have a drink or snack: You can choose if you would like to give your child a drink and/or snack before or during homework, depending on what works for your child, but ensure that this has been organised beforehand to avoid trips to the kitchen.

Prepare tools and materials: Don’t forget to have a quick check through to make sure you have all the pencils, rubbers, scissors, glue, paper and anything else you may need. Personally, I like to keep a separate pencil box for homework time and I check and sharpen pencils while my son is doing his homework, so that all pencils are sharp for the next day.

3. Stay positive:

Homework is arguably one of the greatest stressors of most parents. This is primarily because it is a repetitive task, and most parents have several children with which to do homework (at this moment, I only have two children and I am already bored with homework). It can also raise the most emotive of feeling by children, and if your child has any regulatory or attention issues, this can make it much more difficult. It is important for you to “keep your cool”, but even more, to stay positive. Continue to count homework as a blessing that helps you keep on top of what your child is doing at school and how they are progressing. Before and during homework, remind yourself that this too shall pass and that this “battle” with homework will actually stand your child in good stead when he/she is older.

4. Be Empathetic:

As much as we are soooo tempted to say “Just deal with it”, or “You just have to do your homework”, these aren’t particularly helpful to someone who is having a hard time. It’s a little like when you are so completely frustrated with something (say your child’s endless tears) and your husband or best friend turns to you and says “tough” when you are looking for a listening ear. Instead, remember that your child is experiencing his/her feelings intensely (children feel emotions very strongly). Help your child know that you understand how they are feeling by saying things like “I know you don’t like homework, so let’s do it as quickly as we can so that we can do X” or “I know this feels like a big job, but we will tackle it together”. Avoid minimising their feelings whenever possible (try not to say anything like “it’s not that bad” or “it’s only a bit of homework”). When you feel someone is not on your side (even if this is not true), you are less likely to be open to working with them.

5. Setting boundaries

Children can find the task of homework particularly overwhelming when it seems like it will be a never-ending task. Setting some boundaries about how long they will work for can be hugely helpful in letting them see the end point. Smaller chunks will be useful, especially if homework takes longer, with a break in between. Telling your child “We will work on this for 15 minutes and then get a break” will help them see an end. Using colourful timers can be useful too (there are currently countless apps that will show visual timers suitable for children of various ages). Remember that the boundary doesn’t have to be set all the way until homework is finished, but can be set to the next “break”. Also, remember, if your child is taking a particularly long time on homework, you may need to talk to his/her teacher about what a reasonable amount of time is.

Another thing to think about is setting boundaries about what your child will or will not do during this time. For example, say something like: “We are going to work for 15 minutes and stay sitting and concentrating for that whole 15 minutes before our break”.

6. Offer Incentives

Children really do work for rewards. In fact, even we work for rewards. The difference is that we can be more internally motivated and our “rewards” can be more subtle (for example, as much as I hate housework, walking into a tidy room makes me feel much less stressed, which motivates me to do it at least every so often!). For children, rewards need to be more concrete and obvious, but they don’t need to be “big”. There is no need to offer your child 15 minutes on the iPad for every 15 minutes of homework, or a chocolate bar for every day of homework done willingly. In fact, the more “big” rewards you offer, the more your child will get used to expecting such big rewards. Train your child to work for smaller and more intrinsic rewards by beginning and continuing with small, but desired rewards. Also, be clear to work these incentives in a positive way that offers your child control. Instead of saying “If you don’t do your homework, you won’t get to watch TV (or go outside or play with your lego)”, say “As soon as we are finished our homework, you will be able to watch TV (or …)”. This way, your child knows that his positive behaviour leads to a positive outcome.

Finally, remember: This too shall pass! We all hate homework, and doing homework with a child who struggles with homework can be doubly challenging. Take your deep breaths and remember that this will not be forever!

I hope you all had a great Christmas and start to the new year. I’m back at work today, trying to frantically catch up on my emails, reports, blogs, and so on, and feeling completely frazzled, but I took a moment to stop and think about what the new year means to children.

Aside from the over-tired tears and dramas we had this morning as I was trying to get my children ready for their first day back at school, the start of the new year is also very important to them. Although they are not starting a new school year (those of you in the summer hemisphere have a new calendar year and school year, while we only have the new calendar year to contend with), the new year still gives the children a chance to reflect on what has happened over the past year, what went well and what they would like to change. Although we can’t really expect children to set ‘new year’s resolutions’, this reflection can be very helpful. It can help them work through issues that may be long-standing and it can really help them gain perspective. Children tend to live in the moment, and if the moment is good, that’s brilliant, but if the moment is not good, that can be quite traumatic, especially for the more emotional or thoughtful children. I don’t think I would be able to count the number of times my oldest son say “I hate my life”. Reflecting on the previous year usually involves remembering the big things, which are usually positive. Holidays, new teachers, Halloween costumes, birthday parties and many more events usually stick in the mind, or are easy to bring to mind with little reminders and they help children to realise that most of their past experiences are positive. This gives them a balance for those “bad moments”. If there have been any significantly bad experiences during the previous year, this can give children a chance to talk about them and their feelings and to put these things “in the past” while focusing on the fact that the upcoming year is likely to be better.

Here are some things I did with my children this new year to help them reflect (I will try to remember to post these and many more just before the next new year to help you plan your “new year’s party” with your children):

Photo Memory: We took photos from the past year, printed 2 copies of each onto coloured card and played the traditional “memory” game. The kids loved to be reminded of what happened and had a great opportunity to practice their story telling and their memory skills. I, of course, pretended to forget many of the events and had my children remind me, but the game was a big hit for children and adults alike.

Video Journal: We recorded a new edition of our video journal, during which I asked the children questions and they answered. Aside from being irresistibly cute watching the previous years videos to see how much the children have grown in the past year, the videos helped the children put some of their thoughts and hopes into words. And children just love watching themselves on video, so each time they do, they are getting another chance to reflect on the questions.

While we are on the topic, new year’s can be a great time for parents too. It’s a great time for us to introduce new rules or expectations that can help improve family dynamics or children’s behaviour. You can try to introduce new rules/expectations by saying something like: “We are stating a new year, so we want to start it off right by…”

Tablet Computer/iPad:

What it builds: A wide range of academic skills depending on which apps are installed.

A post about building academic skills wouldn’t be complete without a mention of a tablet/iPad. There are so many apps now that encourage reading, maths and even writing that it would take me a year to list them all, by which time there would be a whole host of new apps. Instead, let me offer some guidelines you may use when choosing apps: be very clear about which skills you want to help your child build. Try to download a free/trial version first, before you spend money on something that may not suit. Try the app out yourself to ensure it is the right level for your child (if the app is too difficult, your child will be discouraged and give up, making it harder to encourage them into educational apps in the future). If possible, try to choose apps that look more game like rather than “worksheet” or exercise like, as your child is more likely to use these, although be careful that it is not too much “game” and too little “learning”.

Notebooks/Journals:

What it builds: Writing Skills

This can often be overlooked by parents, I mean, would we like to receive a blank notebook for Christmas? In reality, though, children are inspired by the opportunity to write their own notes, doodle or draw or just scribble on paper. Books such as “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” by Jeff Kinney has helped encourage older children to write diaries. Don’t worry if your child starts a diary and doesn’t continue/finish it, just give them a new notebook and you will find they will start something else. Even if these are incomplete, these simple acts of writing will encourage your child motor and intellectual writing skills. Notebooks can be as fancy as a pre-printed diary, or as simple as a plain flip-over notebook…both will inspire your child. While I wouldn’t encourage forcing your child to use the notebook, you could encourage them to use it for tasks such as helping you make a shopping list or a list of what to do to prepare for school.

A pack of cards:

What it builds: Mathematical Skills, Planning and Attention

A simple pack of cards can be great for developing mathematical skills. Whether you play traditional card games or make up you own ones, these games are a great way to spend quality time together building maths, planning and attention skills. For younger children, arranging the cards in order, finding the missing card, playing memory games by putting them upside and turning two over a time to make a match or playing an adapted version of UNO will do the trick. For slightly older children, play an adapted version of “Go Fish” (having players find pairs that add up to 10 instead of matching pairs), use the cards for addition or multiplication practice (eat player turns two cards over and the player with the highest total (when added or multiplied) is the winner and collects the cards) or play more complex games such as Rummy or Poker which requires attention to rules and strategy.

Comics/Magazines:

What it builds: Reading Skills

Although this may seem obvious, these are often overlooked by parents because they don’t necessarily contain great educational content, however, they are great for building an interest in reading and improving reading fluency. If your child is not motivated to read (e.g. they tend only to look at the pictures), feel free to read to them initially. This will peek their interest and they will gain more confidence when re-reading it themselves. Don’t forget to play to your child’s interests. Nowadays there are magazines for children about football, superheroes, Lego, Disney characters, nature and so many more. If your child’s interests are a bit uncommon, don’t forget to search the internet…you might be surprised what you find.

Commercial Options:

There are also many commercial options available, traditional games like scrabble and monopoly (both of these have a junior version available for younger children) and many more games get invented each year. Don’t exclude these, but bear in mind that these can be limiting as to how many different ways they can be used.

Here’s to hoping you find just the right gift or stocking filler for your children/family. Happy Christmas everyone.

Playdough with Accessories   

Description of item: Either store bought or made at home (see recipe below)

Why it’s recommended:

Playdough is a great, non-threatening activity for children with fine motor difficulties. Although Play dough can be used as a hand warm-up tool at times, it is also a great therapeutic tool in itself. It can be used to assist with hand strength, in-hand manipulation and coordination. Starting off by squeezing and squishing the dough for strength and moving onto rolling or pinching the dough will give your child a sense of success (as squeezing and general playing with the dough is much easier than coordinating both hands at the same time to create something!).

Play dough tools are a great addition to playing with playdough on its own. Tools such as cutters and pressers (cookie cutters and shapes) are wonderful for hand strength and often require both hands to work at the same time (bilateral coordination). Tools also incorporate challenges and problem-solving aspects to the activity, for example when using a play dough scissors, the play dough may need to be rolled out more for the scissors to cut through it properly.

Play is a great way for children seeking tactile input who touch everything in sight, find different textures and materials to rub, and excessively touch people’s faces or clothes. These children may be unable to get enough “messy play”, therefore, playdough is brilliant to incorporate in their daily playing. Adding beads/pasta shells/marbles to the playdough can add extra textures.

It can also be used as a tool to build self-esteem.  Children love to create pretend food, build ‘snowmen’, create animals, and use the accessories to make imaginative sculptures. There are no rules or correct way to use play dough, therefore children can take pride in what they can make on their own. 

Lava Lamp

Description: A great addition to any room, lava lamps have coloured wax which heats up and moves around to create different shapes.

Why it’s recommended:

Lava lamps come in many shapes and sizes, colours and designs and are a great gift for any age group from 5 years onwards. For children who seek visual sensory input, or even for those who are overly stimulated by stimuli in their environment, lava lamps have a natural calming effect when in an environment. When a child feels fearful, overly excited, agitated, restless, hyperactive, controlling or moody, this simple calming visual input can act to reduce their level of arousal/alertness. Lava lamps are also great for children who have difficulty settling down for sleep and regulating sleep/wake cycles, and for those who have a fear of the dark.

Balance bike

Description: Balance bikes, also known as runner bikes, training bikes or walker bikes, are bikes which don’t have pedals.

Why it’s recommended:

These bikes will help your child develop an early sense of balance and control, along with independence, self-confidence and happiness. The bikes offer your child just enough stability and at the same time instability that will teach them to learn balance. This builds confidence and eliminates fear by allowing the child to have their feet on the ground and progress at their own pace. Although a lot of these bikes are smaller and aimed at children aged 2-4 years old, there are bigger models available for children up to 10 years old. These are perfect for children with gross motor difficulties, and difficulties with balance and bilateral coordination.

Learn to dress doll

Description:  Many different models/dolls are available. Can be used to practice zips, snap buttons, laces, buttons, and buckles.

Why it’s recommended:

Dressing dolls is an effective way for toddlers to develop the manual dexterity they need to dress themselves. Not only are they developing the motor skills to get dressed, they are learning the process of how to dress themselves, the names of clothing and clothing parts. Dolls with additional clothing to put on or off can be beneficial as the child practices pulling clothes over the doll’s head and arms, and in turn, learns how to perform these same actions on their own body. Dolls are available with boy’s or girl’s clothing and children can also learn how to dress appropriately for different weather (a must for living in Ireland!).

Cra-Z-knit design set

Description of item: This set includes a knitting loom to knit yourself some personal items or presents such as a scarf, hat or anything else you wish. Using the loom makes it a lot easier to make cool designs and it comes with two looms and sparkly yarn.

Why it’s recommended:

With this year’s obsession with loom bands, this knitting loom is a great way to encourage your child to continue their creative streak. Working with the loom requires fine motor skills, organization and planning. It also requires your child to follow directions and problem-solve while using the loom. With this gift, your child will have an end product to work towards, encouraging them to continue and concentrate on the activity for longer and also brings their creative side out, making something personal and suited to them. The age recommendation for this set is 6 years and up.

Post by: Maeve O’Sullivan, Occupational Therapist

Blocks: Building the blocks for language

Why is this item being recommended?

Building with blocks is a brilliant language building activity. Not only does it provide lots of opportunities for pretend play, it involves social interaction (turn taking, problem solving), and basic concepts (tall and short, big and small, more and less). There are lots of great block sets out there, so when deciding which one is the best one to get, think about your own child (e.g. bigger, colourful blocks may be better suited for young children). As an added bonus here, no batteries are required – ever!!

To ‘Mr. Potato Head’ and beyond…

Why is this item being recommended?

Who needs buzz light-year when we have Mr. Potato Head? As any speech and language therapist will tell you, Mr. Potato Head is the staple, go-to toy on their toy shelf; he is our Toy Story hero.

Mr. Potato Head is a toy that I myself once played with as a child, and I now see many children playing with, and getting great enjoyment from. Mr. Potato Head provides endless language opportunities to be capitalised on if your child’s language development is delayed, from body parts, emotions, clothing, and size to comparisons, prepositions and more. Mr. Potato Head is a lovely toy that you and your child can play with together, providing your child with the social interaction that will foster and encourage their language development.
It is safe to say that Mr. Potato Head is lasting through the generations and as a speech and language therapist I would have to say “long may he last!”

Bubbles

Why is this item being recommended?

 Simple and extremely fun – bubbles are a great stocking filler that children will love and get endless hours of fun from. If your child is having difficulty making eye contact, bubbles are an interactive fun way of encouraging your child to give you eye contact in a social situation. When playing with the bubbles, get down to your child’s level, whether this means sitting, kneeling or standing. To start with, blow the bubbles a few times so that your child is aware of what happens (someone needs to open the bubbles, blow the plastic bubble stick and bubbles are created). Then pull back! That is to say, open the bubbles, put the bubble stick to your mouth, take a deep breath in as if you are going to blow the bubbles and simply wait – wait to see what your child does. If your child is at a stage where eye contact is fleeting, your goal is to get your child to look at your eyes and once he/she does so, you blow the bubbles immediately. Through this the child is learning that if they want you to blow the bubbles they must look at you. Eye contact is only the beginning of what you can use the bubbles for to help your child’s development.

If you are getting consistent eye contact from your child, wait for him or her to make a sound indicating that they are looking for the bubbles to be blown. Like the eye contact, once a sound is made by your child, blow the bubbles. Bubbles are great fun and can be used indoors or outdoors and are enjoyable for all involved. You can also adapt this for the sounds you are working on in therapy or for words like “blow”, “more”, etc.
Games

Description of the item: The games that fall under this bracket are those that require multiple pieces in order to play the game. The above games are simply suggestions that I have found to work well. Any game where a ‘token’ can be collected during your child’s speech and language therapy practice will work just as well.

Why is this item being recommended?

For the parents out there that are working with their child on his or her speech production, I know how repetitive and hard it can be to keep your child’s motivation going through numerous productions of sounds. That is why games such as the ones above can be extremely motivating for your child. Each time your child produces the sound that you are trying to elicit, you hand them a token. A token is the object that the child is collecting; it is required to play the game. Examples include: the white body parts in operations, or the horse’s objects in Buckaroo. There is also no rule that limits these games to be used solely with speech production; they are a great motivator for other work as well.

Articulate 

Description of the item:

A team board game where the teams are competing against each other to be the first team round to the finish segment on the board. Progress is made by correctly guessing what your team mates are describing.

Why is this item being recommended?

This is a great game for the older kids, teenagers, and adults! A team game which means that this can be a great game to take out around Christmas time to play with family and friends. It is perfect for the child/teenage who is working on their expressive language; building their vocabulary or especially those practicing adding descriptive words to sentences. Allows us to work on language in a fun and interactive way; a task in itself which can be tricky to do with teenagers.

Other Ideas:

Remember that many games or toys can be adapted to build on your child’s speech and/or language skills. All you need is a little imagination. Keep your ‘goals’ in mind while you play and keep introducing new words and emphasising the important ones.

Post created by: Niamh Ni Dhufaigh, Speech and Language Therapist

However, children/adolescents with dyspraxia tend to face other problems that do not seem to be specifically motor-based. Here are some examples:

Organisation: Planning and carrying out a task is actually a complex process. We need to decide what we want to do, what tools/materials we need to do it, and how we are going to do it (what movements are involved, how many steps, in which order and so on). While we can understand that people with dyspraxia have difficulty with carrying out the motor movements of each task, this doesn’t really explain why they don’t seem to be very good at organising themselves. Have you ever watched a teenager with dyspraxia try to cook a simple meal? Why does the kitchen look like it was hit with a bomb afterwards? Did they have to use every pot, dish and cooking spoon? Why is every surface covered in onion peels? Often, they may start the cooking and only realise halfway through that they don’t actually have any tomatoes or some other necessary ingredient. These are examples of the challenges in organisation faced by people with dyspraxia. Younger children tend to have difficulty figuring out how to tidy their bedrooms (everything lands in one box), organising their schoolbag (how did all those books get so dog-eared?) or setting the table (how many knives and forks do we need, where’s the salt?). Older children appear to have more difficulty organising themselves, although I believe this is because of the greater demands on older children. Older children are expected to remember their chores without being reminded, keep their room tidy, remember which books go to school or back home, what was for homework, where they left their pens or pencils, and of course, to manage their pocket money without losing it or spending it all on the first day. Never mind looking after their mobile phone and house-keys! It all seems a bit too much!

Managing time: Ever noticed that the teenager with dyspraxia is always the last one out the door, late for class, last one finishing an exam? There appear to be two reasons for this: one, because of the motor deficits faced by children with dyspraxia, they take longer to do tasks that appear simple to others, and secondly, because they are notoriously disorganised, they end up spending more time trying to find things or may not even be aware that it’s nearly time to go. And can you imagine trying to figure out when you have to start getting ready if you want to leave at half past…?

Mixing with peers: Although there doesn’t seem to be any reason why, several research studies have highlighted that children and adolescents don’t mix as well with their peers as might be expected. Some studies have looked at whether people with dyspraxia have difficulty reading facial expressions, and while this may be a problem, it is unlikely to be the full picture. Another theory is the link between sensory processing disorders and dyspraxia. Following this though, people with dyspraxia may find situations with a lot of sensory input (such as groups of people, or “fun” environments like fairs, nightclubs etc) overwhelming. Also, people with sensory processing often have difficulty controlling their emotional responses to situations and keeping their “alertness” levels at a “just right” level. This means that people with dyspraxia may react differently in social situations than other people. Another possibility is that, due to difficulties with typical childhood activities such as riding a bicycle or playing sport, people with dyspraxia have a history of being or choosing to be excluded from social situations which may reduce their practice at social skills.

Sleeping: While sleeping doesn’t seem to have any direct link to motor skills, a high number of people with dyspraxia have difficulty with sleeping. Often, this is difficulty falling asleep, but at times they may have difficulty sleeping through the night or may be “groggy” in the mornings and take longer than expected to get going in the mornings. This is most likely due to the link of sensory processing disorders with dyspraxia. As mentioned above, people with sensory processing disorders often have difficulties regulating their level of “alertness” and this means that they are likely to struggle getting their bodies in to the right state for sleeping or waking up.

Dealing with emotions: The world of the dyspraxic person is fraught with challenges that bring with them their own emotional upheaval. Facing failure at many tasks can seriously damage a person’s self-esteem unless they have had the opportunity of experiencing success in other areas. Also, high levels of frustration are associated with not managing tasks as expected and especially if others expect the same. The hidden nature of dyspraxia often makes this the case. Also, typical stress-buffering strategies such as social support are often less available due to their difficulties making and keeping friends.

In conclusion, although people with dyspraxia do present with motor skills, but also have a variety of other challenges that they face on a day-to-day basis. For all those working with youngsters with dyspraxia/DCD, I would highly recommend reading Victoria Biggs’ book: Caged in Chaos. It is ideal for adolescents and those working with adolescents with DCD/dyspraxia.

I was faced with this dilemma when I did my Master’s degree, wanting to explore the impact of dyspraxia in the adolescent, but having to use the term “developmental coordination disorder”.

In my opinion, the term DCD does not accurately reflect the difficulties faced by these children/adolescents. Developmental Coordination Disorder implies that the main challenge of these children/adolescents is coordination, and while the majority of these children do have coordination difficulties, this completely minimised the remaining challenges faced by these children/adolescents, including organisational skills, social skills, self esteem, and many more (which we will discuss in part 2).

A particular school of thought considers dyspraxia to be a sub-group of a Regulatory Sensory Processing Disorder and this group is gaining in popularity. It is to this group that we, as occupational therapists, tend to subscribe, most likely because experience working with these children/adolescents and their families shows us that almost all of these children have sensory processing deficits and modulation difficulties and logic tells us that not understanding the sensory information we get from our bodies can result in us being clumsy and having difficulty figuring out how to use our bodies.

So, in conclusion, dyspraxia goes by many names and it is important for people who live with or work with those with these difficulties to understand this and to be open to information about all of these terms as they will most likely apply to this group of children/adolescents.

Poor posture may be caused by a multitude of things, but it is commonly caused by low Muscle Tone resulting in reduced joint stability. (Muscle Tone is the tension in the muscles before we ‘do’ anything with those muscles. Lower muscle tone can make a child appear “floppy”) Holding a correct stable position can be extremely difficult for children with lower muscle tone, leading to slouching, restlessness/fidgeting or fatigue. Often children have persisting childhood reflexes (i.e. primitive reflexes that have not been superseded by more skilled movements and balance reactions) and if sitting posture is not corrected, head movements can affect stability and posture as well.

Why is proper posture important?

• It keeps bones and joints in the correct alignment so that muscles are being used properly.
• It allows for free, flexible movements on the arms for function by providing a stable ‘base’.
• It helps decrease the abnormal wearing of joint surfaces that could result in arthritis.
• It decreases the stress on the ligaments holding the joints of the spine together.
• It prevents the spine from becoming fixed in abnormal positions.
• It prevents fatigue because muscles are being used more efficiently, allowing the body to use less energy.
• It prevents strain or overuse problems.
• It prevents backache and muscular pain.
• It contributes to a good appearance.

How should we sit for good posture? 

• Sit with your buttocks at the back of the seat with your hips, knees and ankles at 90 degrees.
• Your feet should be flat on the floor. If a chair is too high for a child, try adding a foot block. A foot black is anything firm that the child can rest his feet on to improve his posture. These can be home-made by using old boxes or even old telephone directories.
• The desk height should be about 2 inches above the level of the elbows when the elbows are bent and the child is sitting upright in the chair.
• When sitting on the floor a cross-legged position is best. This gives more stability than long-sitting or side-sitting, which is more tiring and requires the child to use his or her hands for support.

A Few Exercises for Building Endurance to Help Posture:

To strengthen back muscles and stability of shoulders:

Ask the child to lie on their stomach. The child must try to lift up their arms (including hands), head, shoulders, legs and thighs off the floor. Help can be given to assume this position if necessary. To make it more fun why not time it to see how long it is possible to maintain the position.

To strengthen muscle strength and postural control:

Put a few elastic bands in a bowl. Place the bowl approximately 3m (10 feet) away from the starting line. Hold onto knees or legs while the child walks on hands to the bowl (wheelbarrow walking). Once the child reaches the bowl they must put the elastic around their arms and wheelbarrow walk back to the starting point. They must try to collect the elastics as quickly as possible.

However, this draws my mind back to when I first started practicing OT (which was not all that long ago, just at the turn of the century). At that time, experts were adamant that Autism was non inherited. I always had a hard time believing this since I worked with families who had two, three and even four siblings on the spectrum, but who was I to argue with the “experts”?

In the years since I started working in the field (in my limited capacity), I have been bombarded with countless contradicting ‘evidence’ (is it linked to vaccines, not linked to vaccines, diet related or not, a social disorder or a sensory disorder, and so on). These have left me confused and frustrated, and if I feel that way, how can parents of children on the autistic spectrum possibly feel?

What irks me the most is the attitude of researchers or experts who put out these statements, opinions or research articles. Very few of them acknowledge that they don’t truly know, and fewer will ever acknowledge that they were wrong (sorry if I am being overly prejudicial). Without acknowledging that ‘evidence’ is not written in stone, incomplete or even completely ‘wrong’, these bits of ‘knowledge’ about autism stay in the general domain, being passed from parent to parent and even professional to professional, dirtying the water of an already confusing and unclear diagnosis.

What can we do about this? I usually like to end my blogs with advice or information about how to help/address issues, but I have to admit, I don’t have the answers. All I can suggest, particularly to parents of children with autistic spectrum disorder, is to just accept the children for who they are, help them build on necessary skills, celebrate their achievements and take all ‘evidence’ with a pinch of salt, because we are still nowhere near the full truth!

Link to article mentioned in post: http://www.independent.ie/life/health-wellbeing/health-features/autism-breakthrough-as-33-genes-associated-with-condition-identified-30704496.html

I don’t know about you, but I remember the ache of writing final exams, those 3 hours of agony, trying to block out the pain of throbbing elbows, pulled up shoulders and aching fingers. It was only later when I realised that this wasn’t normal. While everyone got sore and tired hands, they didn’t feel the extent of pain I felt in exams. Now, as an OT, I am particularly conscious of how children experience the act of handwriting. Typically, handwriting instruction focuses on teaching children the mechanics of forming letters, spacing them correctly, resting them on the line, etc. But little focus is given to handwriting endurance because so little is known about it and awareness is lacking, particularly in those who have never really experienced these challenges.

Handwriting endurance is the ability to maintain handwriting over long periods of time. This time will depend on the age/grade of the child, but young children would only be able to write for 5-10 minutes, while secondary school pupils are expected to write exams of 2-3 hours (and sometimes more). In order to maintain handwriting for this period of time, we need a lot more than just strong fingers. Here’s what goes into the seemingly simple task of handwriting:

Postural Control: We need to be able to hold a stable position in your chair and hold your weight up through your spine (not slumped over leaning your head on your arm/hand.

Muscle Tone: The tension in our muscles not under conscious control is called muscle tone. This prepares us for functioning. If this tone is lower, a child can appear “floppy” and may have poor joint stability (see below). A number of children are born with lower muscle tone and some children don’t get the opportunity to develop their muscle tone in the early years. Muscle tone is probably one of the biggest factors in handwriting endurance. If our tone is low, we need more strength in the muscles to achieve the same thing as another child/adult would. Although there are strategies that can improve muscle tone (see below), these are short-lived and need to be repeated before every handwriting exercise if a child’s tone is lower.

Joint Stability: Stable joints are necessary for effective function. Joints are held in place by ligaments and muscles (via the tendons). Where a child has looser ligaments or lower muscle tone, the child may seem hypermobile, have joints that bend back further than expected and/or complain of pain when writing. These children can sometimes also develop a very tight pencil grasp to compensate for this instability.

Muscle strength: The strength that are in the individual muscles used for handwriting, from the shoulder muscles down to the smaller finger muscles, these are all important. Muscle strength, as in the case with most muscles, can be improved with exercise (see below).

What to do about it?

The old adage “They will get used to it” only applies to typically developing children with no difficulties in joint stability or muscle tone. If your child complains of sore hands, or shows other signs of poor handwriting endurance (e.g. rubbing their hands, elbows or shoulders or shaking the hand or arm out), it is suggested that you follow up with an occupational therapist. In some cases, your child may need some simple remediation, or it is possible that your child needs to use a computer instead of handwriting. But here are some useful strategies you can use in the meantime:

Work on a vertical surface: Working on blackboards or white boards or taping work to windows or walls helps build on shoulder strength and postural control.

Do active games with the shoulders and arms: Play wheelbarrow races, swing a bat or carry in the shopping bags. These activities will also strengthen the shoulders and improve postural control. However, an important word of caution: If your child bends their elbows back (further than a straight line), don’t let your child do any weight-bearing activities on their arms such as wheelbarrows or handstands. These could further stretch and weaken the joints. If your child has noticeable joint hyper-extension in their elbows, you may want to check with your GP, physiotherapist or occupational therapist if this needs further examination.

Do resistive activities with the hands: Finger strength can be built up through art-and-craft type activities that have resistance. For younger children this would include play dough, buttons, baking (especially kneading dough), etc., while older children/teens could use clay, elastics (e.g. loom bands) and baking.