......can be refreshing!
This past Friday I spent the day ( a pseudo back to work day) at the airport attending an education workshop. I wanted to attend this conference for many reasons, primarily to refresh my OT brain but also to inspire my Mommy brain.
I left with two HUGE bags of materials and a head full of possibilities and ideas. Much of the information presented I already knew and had been using for many years in everyday practice. However, so many other great ideas had been forgotten and stored in my pre-kids 2008 brain. Years ago I looked at kids purely through OT eyes, but now 2 kids later, I undoubtedly see children, childhood, and being a Mom so differently. I can say without hesitation that I would not make the same recommendations as a therapist today as I would have 4 years ago. With children of my own I now have a different perspective on the multi-tasking, "hold on a second", "she/he can do it at home", "we tried to do it before bed" life and vocabulary.
In the morning I attended. "Readiness and Writing",
In the afternoon I attended " Language & Literacy and Math & Numbers.
All three programs were presented by the folk at Handwriting Without Tears.
You Tube if you are interested has lots of videos. { Super handy and interesting}
All three sessions were geared towards the pre-K population. This was ideal as I live with one of those pre-K kids and many of the kids I see in the school setting are functioning around this level.
There are so many different ways to achieve the goal of school readiness and so many are so simple. All three programs provided a 35 week day to day curriculum. So while completing all three programs on a daily basis is obviously a little ambitious in my house (and I am also lacking 15-20 other pre-schoolers) I do want to incorporate pieces of the program into our daily fun and learning. Since I very rarely ( maybe never) share my OT side I thought I would share a few of my ideas....just incase you ring the door bell and you see me dancing and singing about pencil grips in my kitchen.
- Place a sticker on the R hand everyday for several weeks. Apparently works like a charm for learning R and L
- Sing a hello song. The one one the CD is all about greetings and shaking hands. Kind of cute
- Break all my crayons and only use crayons. I knew this but it is often more fun to diversify and not have zillions of crayon pieces. Resistance and establishing the proper grip are the reasons for this.
-More colouring!!
-Use strips of paper when printing name.
-More hand and finger play
-Do lots more comparing. ( Big/small, same/different, etc)
-More inventive and imaginative sorting tasks (more than colour and size)
-Practice building and recognizing patterns.
-Teach and inquire without asking questions. Try it, it is tricky. Questions are presumptuous and come with an expectation!
-More predicting (what could happen next?) when reading stories.
There is so much more floating around in my head. However, for tonight this is a good start especially because I have a big day to plan tomorrow and 5 construction workers coming to my house on Saturday. It should be a fun day! Stay tuned for # 4 details.
4 already, I know!
Crazier yet is 5 weeks from now J will be 1!
Where has the year gone ( not to cleaning my house that is for sure...still struggling with the cleaning part, doing well with the cleansing )
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