Never Have I Ever Therapist Style

Never Have I Ever Therapist Style

I keep seeing all these point scales all over Facebook where you give yourself a score based on things that you have done.  I thought it would e fun to create a Never Have I Ever Therapist Style.  Give yourself one point for each statement that you have done during your career.  Here is my hypothesis – any pediatric therapist who gets a perfect score of 20 probably has at least 5 years of school-based therapy experience.  Would love to hear if you prove me wrong!

So here we go – one point for each statement, Never Have I Ever…

___ been locked out of a school
___ worked in a closet
___ unable to discharge because IEP team refused
___ been barfed on
___ worked with demanding parents
___ spent too much time in the toy aisle
___ repeatedly heard “fix this sensory issue”
___ had a ridiculously messy car
___ had my own kids take my work toys
___ ripped holes in the knees of my pants
___ disagreed with a lawyer
___ just finished scheduling caseload then student transfers in
___ written IEPs at home
___ completed and typed up an eval in under 2 hours
___ hurt your back on the job
___ stayed on schedule all day
___ provided carry over activities that no one followed through with
___ been called the OT/PT
___ cringed at the statement “babies don’t need to crawl”
___ fought to stop taking away recess as a punishment

TOTAL SCORE: ????

In all seriousness, the job of a school-based therapist can be overwhelming at times, to say the least.  At the end of the day, it is an amazing job where we get to work and play all day long.  As pediatric Occupational and Physical Therapist, we always need to remember that one of the most important, if not the MOST important, aspect of our job is to educate.  We need to let students, teachers, school staff and parents know what we do and why we do it.  Without buy-in from all team members, goals can not be reached.  In addition, in order for therapeutic activities to be carried out all day long we need to educate people how to make that happen.

Read more:

5 Reasons to Provide Hand Outs

How to Be a Successful Pediatric Therapist Coach

Educate Poster

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Research Review on Handwriting Instruction

Educational Psychology Review published a research review on handwriting instruction.  A meta-analysis was completed on experimental intervention studies with K-12 students to determine if teaching handwriting enhanced legibility and fluency and resulted in better writing performance.  The results indicated the following:

• when compared to no instruction or non-handwriting instructional conditions, teaching handwriting resulted in statistically greater legibility and fluency.
• motor instruction did not produce better handwriting skills.
• individualizing handwriting instruction and teaching handwriting via technology resulted in statistically significant improvements in legibility.
• handwriting instruction produced statistically significant gains in the quality, length and fluency of students’ writing.

Reference:  Santangelo, T. & Graham, S. A Comprehensive Meta-analysis of Handwriting Instruction. Educ Psychol Rev (2016) 28: 225. doi:10.1007/s10648-015-9335-1

Check out all of our resource for handwriting instruction including the new Handwriting Heroes lowercase handwriting instruction program.

Handwriting Heroes digital download is a highly effective, and easy to implement program for learning how to write lower case letters accurately and fluently. This powerful teaching tool is designed to accelerate handwriting instruction. This handwriting program includes everything you need for consistent handwriting instruction for lower case letters. FIND OUT MORE INFORMATION.

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