Beanbag Alphabet Fun – Gross Motor and Body Awareness Activity

Beanbag Alphabet Fun:  Beanbags are a wonderful tool to encourage physical activity, body awareness, motor planning and coordination skills in children.  They are inexpensive or you can even make them yourself with socks and some rice.  So grab a beanbag for each child and try moving through the alphabet with your beanbag.  You can download this as a one page handout below.

A:  Put the beanbag on your ARM.

B:  Put the beanbag on your BACK.

C:  CATCH the beanbag in the air.

D: Put the beanbag DOWN on the floor.

E:  Put the beanbag on your EAR.

F:  Put the beanbag on your FOOT.

G:  GALLOP with your beanbag.

H:  Put the beanbag on your HEAD.

I:  Walk IN a circle around your beanbag.

J:  JUMP with your beanbag.

K: KICK your beanbag.

L:  LEAP over your beanbag.

M:  MARCH in a circle with your beanbag.

N:  Put the beanbag on your NOSE.

O:  Jump OVER your beanbag.

P:  Put the beanbag on your PALM.

Q:  QUICKLY toss your beanbag up.

R:  RUN in place with your beanbag.

S:  Put the beanbag on your SHOULDER.

T:  TWIRL in a circle with your beanbag.

U:  Put the beanbag UNDER your foot.

V:  Hold the beanbag VERY high up.

W:  WALK backwards with your beanbag.

X:  Slide your beanbag up your leg and pretend to take an X-RAY.

Y:  YELL the word beanbag.

Z:  ZOOM around the room with your beanbag.

Looking for more beanbag activities?  Check out 50 Sensory Motor Activities for Kids!  This ebook includes an whole section on games to play with beanbags.

Need more alphabet movement and learning activities?  Check out Sensory Motor Group Activities A to Z and The ABC’s of Movement®- Combine Movement with Literacy.

 

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Balance and Coordination of Boys with Intellectual Disability

Adapted Physical Activity Quarterly published research examining the balance and coordination of 123 boys (ages 8-18) with intellectual disability (ID) but without Down syndrome.  The Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency (BOT-2) was used to measure 6 items for balance, 5 items for upper limb coordination, and 6 items for bilateral coordination.

The results indicated the following:

• mean scores for balance,upper limb coordination and bilateral coordination were consistently below BOT-2 criteria for the boys ages 8-18.

The researchers concluded that overall motor skills of males with ID are below the competence expected for children and adolescents without disabilities.

Reference:  Pitetti, K., Miller, R. A., & Loovis, M. (2017). Balance and Coordination Capacities of Male Children and Adolescents With Intellectual Disability. Adapted Physical Activity Quarterly, 34(1), 1-18.

 

 

25+ Bilateral Coordination Activities – Download of 28 bilateral coordination exercise sheets including QR codes with links to video demonstration of exercises. Also includes hand out explaining bilateral coordination.  FIND OUT MORE.

 

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Clap, Snap or Tap – Rhythm, Motor Planning and Coordination Activity

Have you ever stopped to think how may sounds you can make with your body?  You can clap, snap, tap, stomp, click and more.  These skills challenge children’s motor planning, rhythm and coordination skills.  Have children make some sounds with their bodies such as:

1. clapping hands together
2. snapping fingers
3. tapping fingers on table
4. slapping knees
5. tapping top of head
6. stomping feet
7. rubbing hands together
8. popping air filled cheeks
9. tapping two fingers on palm of hand
10. rubbing hands on floor.

Once the children have practiced these sounds try mixing it up to follow a two step pattern:

Clap hands – slap knees – clap hands – slap knees – clap hands – slap knees….

Try adding a rhythm:

Clap 2x – stomp feet 3x – clap 2x – stomp feet 3x…

Make it more difficult by trying a three step pattern:

Clap hands – tap top of head – snap fingers – clap hands – tap top of head – snap fingers…

Encourage the children to maintain a rhythm as they complete the body sounds.  This is a great brain break or indoor recess activity that requires no equipment and concentration.

Need more NO PREP, NO EQUIPMENT sensory motor group activities?   Get 25 instant sensory motor activity ideas for your group sessions. The ideas require absolutely NO equipment, just a little imagination and fun. These activities allow you to get your group off to an immediate, productive start taking full advantage of your students’ desire to move.  Find out more information about 25 Instant Sensory Motor Group Activities.

Here is a video of a group performing it together.  One child is establishing the pattern and the others follow. They added in additional locomotor skills and ball skills.

 

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Link Between Visual Motor, Object Manipulation Skills, Executive Function and Social Behavior

Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport published research on 92, three to five year old children to establish a link between early visual-motor integration skills and executive function and a link between early object manipulation skills and social behaviors in the classroom during the preschool years.  Each participant was evaluated for visual-motor integration skills, object manipulation skills, executive function, and social behaviors in the fall and spring of the preschool year.  The results indicated the following:

1. children who had better visual-motor integration skills in the fall had better executive function scores in the spring of the preschool year after controlling for age, gender, Head Start status, and site location, but not after controlling for children’s baseline levels of executive function.
2. children who demonstrated better object manipulation skills in the fall showed significantly stronger social behavior in their classrooms (as rated by teachers) in the spring, including more self-control, more cooperation, and less externalizing/hyperactivity after controlling for social behavior in the fall and other covariates.

The researchers concluded that children’s visual-motor integration and object manipulation skills in the fall have modest to moderate relations with executive function and social behaviors later in the preschool year.

Reference:  MacDonald, M., Lipscomb, S., McClelland, M. M., Duncan, R., Becker, D., Anderson, K., & Kile, M. (2016). Relations of Preschoolers’ Visual-Motor and Object Manipulation Skills With Executive Function and Social Behavior. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 1-12.

Teaching Catching, Throwing and Kicking Skills is loaded with information to help children learn object manipulation skills. It is in PDF format and in Word (therefore you can edit the pages).  This packet includes the age progression of each skill, visual picture cards with step by step directions, tips on teaching the skills, letter home to parents regarding teaching the skills, different ways to practice the skill and data collection to track progress. The activities are reproducible to use over and over again with all the children that you teach.  FIND OUT MORE INFORMATION.

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Kid Balloon Boxing to Practice Coordination and Timing Skills

This fun activity encourages bilateral coordination, timing, eye hand coordination, visual tracking skills and upper extremity muscle strengthening. The key to this activity is teaching the child to hit each balloon or ball with the right hand and left in a rhythmic, controlled pattern. Have fun with it!

Need more activity ideas? Turn fine motor skills into gross motor skills with the activity ideas in Motor Magic.

Check out Play Strong to encourage muscle strenghtening through play.

Quiet Eye Training to Help with Visual Motor Skills

Are you familiar with "Quiet Eye Training"?  This is a technique that attempts to get the eye to focus more instead of flicking about during coordination tasks.  It teaches the eye to look at the ball long enough to process the information.  The individual is reminded to briefly look at the exact spot where you want to send the ball (throwing or kicking) and then settle your eyes onto the ball and leave your focus on the ball.

A recent study in Research in Developmental Disabilities looked at using the Quiet Eye Training (QET) with 30 children with developmental coordination disorder (DCD).  Previous research indicated that QET was more effective than traditional training (TT) when teaching 8-10 year old children to throw and catch.  Traditional training teaches children how to control their arm movements during throwing and catching.

During the training the children were evaluated on performance and gaze.  In addition, motion analysis data was collected at pre/post-training and 6-week retention.

The results indicated that the QET group significantly increased QE durations from pre-training to the 6 week retention whereas the TT group experienced a reduction in QE.  QET participants showed significant improvement in the quality of their catch attempts and increased elbow flexion at catch compared to the TT group.

The researchers concluded that: QET changed DCD children's ability to focus on a target on the wall prior to the throw, followed by better anticipation and pursuit tracking on the ball, which in turn led to improved catching technique. QET may be an effective adjunct to traditional instructions, for therapists teaching visuomotor skills to children with DCD".

Do you use QET in your therapy sessions?  Would love to hear about the outcomes?

Reference:  C.A.L. Miles, G. Wood, S.J. Vine, J.N. Vickers, M.R. Wilson.
Quiet eye training facilitates visuomotor coordination in children with developmental coordination disorder.  Research in Developmental Disabilities. Volume 40, May 2015, Pages 31–41. doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2015.01.005

Visual Motor Exercises includes 25 long mazes and patterns to print, assemble and complete to practice pencil control.  Find out more at http://yourtherapysource.com/vme.html

Pool Noodle Stick for Reaction Time, Coordination and Balance

Create this simple pool noodle stick to encourage reaction time, eye hand coordination, balance skills and muscle strengthening.  Read all the details and watch the video at http://yourtherapysource.com/videopoolnoodlestick.html

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Need more sensory motor activities?  Check out Sensory Motor Game Boards at http://yourtherapysource.com/sensoryboards.html.  Just print and play these games that encourage coordination, motor planning, gross motor and balance skills.

Hidden Cups Video Activity

Watch this video activity idea that encourages fine motor skills, forearm pronation/supination, eye hand coordination, grading of movements and counting.  You can view it at http://www.yourtherapysource.com/videohiddencups.html

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Motor Performance and Social-Communicative Impairment in Children with ADHD

The Journal of Attention Disorders published research on 11 children with ADHD - Combined Type (ADHD-CT) and 10 typically developing children as the control group.  Each child participated in an upper limb Fitts’ aiming task to measure motor performance and the Social Responsiveness Scale t0 measure social-communicative/autistic impairment.

The following results were recorded:

1. Children with ADHD-CT displayed greater variability in their movements, as seen with increased error variance over repeated aiming trials compared with TD controls.


2. Motor performance variability was associated with social-communicative deficits in the ADHD-CT but not in the TD group.

The researchers concluded that further research is needed to determine whether a particular pattern of motor disturbance in children with ADHD-CT may be useful in evaluating children with a more complex ADHD presentation.

Reference:  Nicole Papadopoulos, Nicole J. Rinehart, John L. Bradshaw, John Taffe, and Jennifer McGinley. Is There a Link Between Motor Performance Variability and Social-Communicative Impairment in Children With ADHD-CT: A Kinematic Study Using an Upper Limb Fitts’ Aiming Task. Journal of Attention Disorders January 2015 19: 72-77, first published on July 30, 2012 doi:10.1177/1087054712454569

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25+ Bilateral Coordination Exercises is a collection of bilateral coordination exercise sheets including QR codes with links to video demonstration of exercises. A QR code is a black and white image with squares, that stores website links for reading by the camera on a smartphone.  Find out more at http://yourtherapysource.com/bilateralcoordination.html.

 

 

Cross Crawl Bilateral Coordination Exercise with Video Modeling

Here is our latest freebie from a new ebook entitled 25 Bilateral Coordination Exercises.  It is an instructional hand out on how to perform the Cross Crawl exercise, including a QR code to link to a video demonstration of the exercise.  You can download the freebie here - http://yourtherapysource.com/bilateralcoordinationfreebie.html

If you are not familiar with QR codes, they are a black and white image with squares, that stores website links for reading by the camera on a smartphone.  Therefore, when you hand out these bilateral coordination exercise sheets, the child can simply use a QR code reader to take them immediately to the demonstration video.  This allows children to watch the video over and over again if necessary to learn the skill.  It also helps parents and teachers, so they can check if the child is performing the exercise correctly.

Research has shown that video modeling can help individuals with moderate intellectual disabilities to learn gross motor skills (1).  Video modeling has been shown to be effective in teaching skills to children with autism.  The research indicated that a child should watch the video 1-3 times before attempting the task (2).

Get more information on 25 Bilateral Coordination Exercises here http://yourtherapysource.com/bilateralcoordination.html

References:

1.  Linda C. Mechling and Catherine O. Swindle Fine and Gross Motor Task Performance When Using Computer-Based Video Models by Students With Autism and Moderate Intellectual Disability J Spec Educ November 2013 47: 135-147, first published on January 19, 2012 doi:10.1177/0022466911433859 .

2.  Shipley-Benamou et al. (2002) Teaching Daily Living Skills to Children with Autism Through Instructional Video Modeling. Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions July 2002 vol. 4 no. 3 166-177

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Giant Balloon Toss

Here is a simple, new way to play balloon volleyball.  Just blow up a bunch of balloons and put them in a clear, plastic bag.  Starting tossing the giant bag of balloons.  The balloon bag allows for a large, very slow moving target to help children who may be just learning how to catch.

Try playing a game of balloon volleyball.  Try laying on your back and hitting the giant balloon bag with your feet to add in some core strengthening.  See what games your child can create with the big bag of balloons.

Watch a video of giant balloon toss in action at http://yourtherapysource.com/videogiantballoon.html

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Have a Ball This Summer

Today I'm over at OT Cafe sharing a must-have item in my therapy bag.   While you are here, download this list of 15 ways to have a ball this summer and then head on over to Abby's blog to find out why I always have a playground ball in my therapy bag.

 

 

Clay Marble Mazes

Clay marble mazes is a great activity to encourage hand strengthening, eye hand coordination, visual tracking skills and more.  

Here is what we did:

1.  Cover a recycled, clean styrofoam tray with tin foil.  Use a small tray if you have a little bit of clay and large tray if you have a lot of clay (or want the maze to be bigger).

2.  Push the clay flat on the tray to cover the entire tray if possible.

3.  First use a pen cap or pointed tool to draw a path for the maze.  

4.  Go over the maze that was drawn using a marble pushing with your fingers.  Retrace the path many times so that it creates a slight tunnel for the marble.  You could use a larger marble to make the path.

5.  It is ready to use.  Hold the tray with two hands and see if you can navigate the marble through the maze.

6.  Another option is to create and trace letters in the clay and then track the marbles with your fingers.

7.  When done, just flatten out the clay and make a new one next time!

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This is a collection of 6 clay play mats that encourage: muscle strengthening of the hands, fine motor skills, visual memory, counting and number identification.  Find out more at http://www.yourtherapysource.com/clayplaymats.html

Bunny Garland Freebie

Download this bunny garland freebie to encourage eye hand coordination, fine motor skills and hand strengthening.  You can get the freebie from Your Therapy Source at http://yourtherapysource.com/freebunnies.html

Walking While Holding a Box Level in Children with Hemiplegia

It can be difficult for some children to complete two tasks at one time (dual task conditions).  In the school setting, the task of walking and carrying school supplies, lunch tray or textbooks is a common occurrence.  Here is some recent research that was conducted to evaluate the effects of dual task constraints on walking and bimanual coordination for 10 children with unilateral cerebral palsy (CP) and 10 children without unilateral CP.   The children (ages 7-11 years old) were asked to

1. stand still while holding a box level (standing condition)


2. walk along a path (baseline condition)


3. walk again while carrying a box steady and level (dual task condition) at a preferred speed.

The results indicated the following:  

• the children with unilateral CP decreased their walking speed, stride length, step width, and toe clearance from the floor under dual task constraints when compared to the baseline condition.


• typically developing children did not change under dual task constraints.


• the children with unilateral CP also had less level box carrying, larger vertical box movement, and larger elbow movements when compared to typically developing children under dual task condition.

The researchers concluded that future treatments or assessments should consider using dual task constraints to manipulate the difficulty of tasks.

Reference:  Hung YC, Meredith GS. Influence of dual task constraints on gait performance and bimanual coordination during walking in children with unilateral Cerebral Palsy. Res Dev Disabil. 2014 Feb 13. pii: S0891-4222(14)00038-9. doi: 10.1016/j.ridd.2014.01.024. [Epub ahead of print]

Get activity ideas to challenge motor planning and coordination from 50 Sensory Motor Activities for Kids! at http://yourtherapysource.com/50book.html

Motor Planning, Physical Activity and Coordination Activity for Fall

Here is a Fall or Halloween activity to encourage eye hand coordination, bilateral coordination, motor planning and gross motor skills in children.

1.  Create the bat, spider and ghost.  For the bat and spider we used half a recycled toilet paper roll, duct tape, google eyes and glued on some wings or 8 legs.  The ghost was just a tissue inside a tissue using a pipe cleaner to secure one issue as the head and loop it around so the ghost can hang.  See the picture above.

2.  The child can lace the bat, spider and ghost onto a rope or yarn.  Now get ready to play and explore.

3.  I hung up the rope high on one end and wanted the child to problem solve how to get them down.  First she tried pushing a chair over and climbing on it but it was still too high.  She landed up shaking the rope and they slid down.  She repeated this process several times moving the bat, ghost and spider along the rope.  

4.  We created an obstacle course for the bat, spider and ghost.  I put the rope under a bench and through the chair.  The child had to motor plan and coordinate how to get each object through the obstacle course.  There was lots of bending, reaching and bilateral coordination needed to complete the course.  

5.  Then she started to move herself along the rope.  She tried riding on a wheeled toy (you could also use a scooter board) and pulled with both hands along the rope while I held the one end firmly.  She also ran along the rope moving the spider as fast as she could.

6.  Finally, we folded the rope in half and put the spider on the rope.  She held one piece of the rope in each hand and I held the folded side of the rope.  She would open her arms wide to get the spider to move along the rope web.  

This was an inexpensive therapeutic activity that included so many stages of child development.  It was helpful to start the activity off for the child to problem solve because it increased her interest in the activity rather than me telling her climb on the chair and see if you can move the bat.  She was proud of herself when she figured out how to finally get them down.  This then led to her exploring moving along the rope herself with different physical actions.

Need more inexpensive activities?  Try $ensory Motor Fun on a Budget at http://www.yourtherapysource.com/budget.html

Box Balance Game - Motor Planning, Body Awareness and More

Watch the video at YourTherapySource to see how to play the Box Balance game to encourage balance skills, motor planning, body awareness, eye foot coordination and right/left discrimination.  You can get the Bilibo Pixel here.

Loopz Motor Planning Game and App Review

There are more and more active games coming out on the market.  LoopzTM is a toy available in stores ranging from $35 to $50 (Walmart, Target, ToysRUs, etc) and online that is a great tool to practice motor planning and coordination skills.  It is a set of four arches that has lights in each arch.  There are different ways to play with Loopz and motion sensors detect your movement as your wave your hands through the matching loops.  Some of the games start out with you using one hand to follow the lights and then progress to two hands.  In addition you can make music by turning on and off the loops, which the teenagers enjoy.

This has been a great toy to add to my PT bag.  The children can play on all fours, over the therapy ball or even in standing.  Motor planning skills, reflexes, balance and coordination skills are challenged as the children have to follow the patterns of the lights.  My favorites are Repeat the Beat and Reflex Master.  Repeat the Beat is where you have to repeat an increasing number of lights.  Reflex Master challenges you to wave as many lights as you can before time runs out.  Have to admit the kids don't love playing in standing (although I do) because it challenges their balance and they really just want to play the game.  I usually have them try it and reward them with a turn on all fours which is still beneficial.  When the game progresses to requiring the player to use two hands at a time it can become difficult for many children since it challenges bilateral coordination skills and timing.       

The Loopz app ($0.99 full version but a free version is available) is also a fun addition to challenge students reflexes, motor planning, bilateral coordination and timing.  I prefer the "real" game to the app from a physical therapy perspective but I am sure OTs would love to try out the app.  There are also more options on the app to create music by tapping the Loopz.  I think a bargain for $0.99.    

Has anyone else tried out this game?

Bean Bag Tunes on You Tube

Came across these fun YouTube videos to use as a quick brain break for teachers in class or some activities during a therapy session.  It reinforces learning right side from the left side, bilateral coordination, body awareness and following directions.

Here is the BeanBag Beatbox #1:



Here is Beanbag Beatbox #2:



If you need more movement to music ideas check out all the great titles for sale at YourTherapySource.com.