Occupational Therapy
Occupational therapy is a health profession with the goal to help people achieve independence, meaning and satisfaction in their lives.
Listening therapy is a tool used to help children with sensory processing difficulties cope with the world.
With children, the goal is to promote the development of skills necessary for learning and performing specific tasks.
Occupational therapy focuses on a child’s self-care skills and development to promote the child’s functioning in the home, school and community.
Programming available to children includes:
- Fine motor development – addresses strength and coordination of small muscle movements, involving the hand, fingers and thumb necessary for toy play and writing tasks
- Sensory integration evaluation and treatment – helps the child to learn how to process and integrate sensory input in organized and meaningful ways, so that the child is able to interact more successfully with his/her environment
- Therapeutic listening program for children with sensory integration disorders – uses sound-based stimulation programs to help children become better able to identify, categorize and tolerate various stimuli
- Neuro Developmental Treatment (NDT) – a model for therapeutic management and treatment of children with neuromotor impairments, especially Cerebral Palsy. It addresses problems children may have with posture and movement. Observation and analysis help determine what hands-on therapy will minimize impairments and prevent secondary disabilities.
The ball pit encourages movement and play.
Standardized evaluation instruments used include:
- Peabody Developmental Motor Scales – 2nd edition
- Bruininks Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency
- VMI (Development Test of Visual-Motor Integration)
- TVPS (Test of Visual-Perceptual Skills (non-motor) Revised
- Sensory Profile (Dunn)
With licensed therapists in three disciplines (occupational therapy, physical therapy and speech therapy), the Children’s Therapy Center can provide play-based assessments in all three areas at one time.
Here are more pictures of Occupational Therapy in action: