Connecting OT - Blog Post

Rationale for topic: introduction to occupational therapy, for families who don’t access services and would like further information when visiting the website.

Title: An introduction to pediatric occupational therapy to unlock your child’s development

If you have ever wondered “What is occupational therapy?” Then this is for you!

In this blog post, we will explore what occupational therapy is (the paediatric kind) and why it can be a key factor to supporting your child to meet their full potential.

What is Paediatric Occupational Therapy?

Occupational therapy (OT) is a dynamic, play based and engaging allied health stream that supports children to develop the skills required to engage in a range of meaningful and necessary everyday activities. This includes self-care tasks (toileting, dressing, buttons, zips and feeding), leisure activities (play and social skills) and productive occupations (school based focus including handwriting and executive functioning).

Occupational therapists work with children who experience challenges that impact their ability to engage and participate. These challenges may be due to physical disabilities, neurological or developmental conditions, missing developmental milestones or sensory processing challenges. Occupational therapists can provide a unique perspective to support children to build their comfort and confidence to engage in activities they find meaningful and necessary.

Getting started?

Assessment: the first step is information gathering! Throughout our comprehensive assessment process, we gather vital information to ascertain your child’s unique strengths and where we can provide further supports. This assessment phase is flexible! This can include 1:1 assessments examining fine motor skills, gross motor development, sensory processing and executive functioning. Likewise, observing a child within their functional scholastic environment can provide pivotal insight to their current presentation. We also offer a range of standardized assessments to further understand sensory processing, gross motor skills, fine motor skills and handwriting.

Therapy sessions: Once the information has been gathered and analyzed its time to get started with sessions. These sessions are tailored to the unique goals and interests of the child. At Connecting OT we provide outreach services, with sessions occurring at home, at school and in the community.

Consistency with sessions is pivotal to unlocking development, as is opportunities for practice at home! As part of our comprehensive service, parents will receive a detailed session note following each session. This enables for collaboration and team work to ensure that therapy principles can be incorporated within the home setting.

Benefits of paediatric occupational therapy:

Occupational therapy is a holistic approach to supporting childhood development. It is an evidence based support to unlock development. At Connecting OT, we practice from a family centered lens to work collaboratively and ensure the best possible outcomes. We believe that safety and connection is essential to positive therapeutic outcomes and love to bring fun and play to sessions to see your children thrive!

Should you have any questions or want to know whether OT would benefit you, please don’t hesitate to reach out.