Coupon Book to Get Kids Moving, Exploring and Playing

Here is a great last minute gift idea for anytime of the year or holiday – a coupon book to encourage children to move, explore and play. Parents can make memories while you enjoy spending quality time with your children.  There are coupons for a picnic, trip to the park, play basketball, etc.  You can download it here http://www.yourtherapysource.com/coupon.html

Need more coupon ideas for kids or want them printed already?  Check out Kid Coupons from Growing Play.

Extra Physical Activity and Academic Achievement

Research on the impact of physical activity intervention program on academic achievement was published in the Journal of School Health. The study provided 408 twelve year olds with an additional two hours per week of extra play and motion activities. The control groups were three different schools (matched for male/female ratio, average level of income, education and unemployment of parents) who did not receive the extra two hours of physical activity per week.

Academic achievement was tested four years prior to the study and five years later. The results indicated the following:

1. Higher proportions of students in the intervention school achieved the national goals in all 3 subjects compared with the reference schools after initiation of the intervention program.

2. The odds for achieving the national learning goals in the intervention school doubled.

3. The odds for achieving the national learning goals did not change or decreased in the control schools.

The researchers concluded that promoting physical activity in school by means of a curriculum-based intervention program may improve children's educational outcome.

Reference: Lina B. Käll PhD, Michael Nilsson MD, PhD, andThomas Lindén MD, PhD. The Impact of a Physical Activity Intervention Program on Academic Achievement in a Swedish Elementary School Setting. Journal of School Health Volume 84, Issue 8, pages 473–480, August 2014. DOI: 10.1111/josh.12179



Need some easy ideas to squeeze in physical activity and play time?  Check out Roll Some Fun at http://yourtherapysource.com/rollsomefun.html

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4 Free Summer Printables for Motor Skills

Need a summer motor activity in a hurry?  Check out these freebies:

1.  Watermelon Multisensory Handwriting Activity Page at http://yourtherapysource.com/mssummerfreebie.html

2.  Hand Out on Fun Physical Activities for the Summer at http://yourtherapysource.com/summerfree.html

3.  Summer Tic Tac Toe at http://yourtherapysource.com/summerfitnessfreebie.html

4.  Outdoor Bingo at http://yourtherapysource.com/fmsummerfree.html

Happy Summer!

Exercise Rocks!

Make some exercise rocks!  Here the kids thought of some exercises and we wrote them on smooth rocks with metallic pens.  Try these activities:

1.  Scavenger Hunt:  hide the rocks outdoors.  When you find a rock perform 10 of the exercises on the rock and then return it to start.  The person or team with the most rocks/exercises completed is the winner.

2.  Brain Breaks:  After you make the exercise rocks, give them to the teacher to keep in a bowl on the desk.  Need a quick break, grab a rock and get moving.

3.  Make as a Gift:  Do you know someone who is an exercise fanatic?  This would make a cute gift to give them.

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March Madness Physical Activity Brackets

 

Here is a fun activity to go along with March Madness.  Have the children and/or school staff vote for their favorite physical activity or therapy activity.  You could actually use these brackets any time of year to gauge what physical activity or therapy activity children enjoy the most.  It also helps to give the children ideas for leisure activities outside of school time.   Print out the brackets at Your Therapy Source here http://www.YourTherapySource.com/freebrackets.

5 Steps to Promote Participation of Children with Disabilities in Physical Activities

This week on the blog the focus will be on exercise participation and children with disabilities.  The recommended amount of physical activity daily for children is at least 60 minutes per day. This can be difficult to accomplish for any children with the busy schedules that face this young generation today. For children with disabilities, this can be very difficult to achieve each day for various reasons. Pediatric occupational and physical therapists can help parents, teachers and other members of the community how to promote participation in sports, recreation and physical activities.

1. Educate on the benefits of sports participation and recreation: Regular physical activity helps the body by maintaining muscle strength and range of motion, increasing bone mass, and improving cardiovascular fitness. The brain also benefits from physical activity through elevating the mood, improving self concept, enhancing social skills and more. Specifically sports participation can create friendships, encourage creativity, foster teamwork and define meaning for one's life.

2. Choose appropriate activities: A child's disability or diagnosis needs to be taken into consideration when deciding upon an appropriate recreational or sporting activity. The American Academy of Pediatrics has produced various charts in the article Medical Conditions Affecting Sports Participation to help guide the decision making process. In general, it is recommended that children with disabilities participate in increased duration (minutes per session), frequency (times per week) and decreased intensity if comparing to typically developing children.

3. Minimize risk of injury: Once a sporting activity is chosen, modify the activities if necessary to ensure the safety of the child.

4. Adapt the activity: Offer suggestions to adapt the sporting activities so that the child can participate the most.

5.  Have a positive, supportive attitude: Unfortunately, society tends to view children with disabilities too susceptible to injury to participate in traditional sporting activities. Families and the environment seems to influence participation more than the child's choices. Remember the children have a right to participate!

Reference: Murphy, Nancy A., Carbone, Paul S., and the Council on Children With Disabilities, Promoting the Participation of Children With Disabilities in Sports, Recreation, and Physical Activities Pediatrics 2008 121: 1057-1061

5 Make and Take Ideas for Summer

Here is a fun idea - have kids create their own activities to do over the summer break.  Start now during part of a therapy session to assemble and teach students some games or activities that they can do over the summer for carry over of therapy skills and to keep them busy.  Once you have created an activity and reviewed how to play it set it aside to give to the child the last day of school.  Hopefully, by the time that day comes the child will have created several activities for over the summer.  Here are some suggestions:

1.  Rock Tic Tac Toe - Go outdoors and collect 10 small rocks (or head to Dollar store to buy a bag of river stones for $1).  Paint 5 'X's and 5 'O's on the rocks.  Using sidewalk chalk draw a tic tac toe board.  Play tic tac toe with the rocks - either place the rocks in a square or toss them from far away.  Place the rocks and the chalk in a plastic bag to send home.  Maybe include other games to play with the rocks - hopscotch, hide and find, etc.

2.  Journals - Cut apart a recycled cereal box.  Using two large pieces of cardboard cut two rectangles to make the front and back covers.  Glue colored paper over the cereal boxes.  Cut out 10 pieces of paper the same size.  Punch holes in the paper and covers.  Tie a string through the holes to assemble the journal.  Include several story starter ideas.  Need it easier than this?  Print out Doodle Diaries, staple and ready to go! 

3.  Activity Idea Book - At each session ask every child for an activity idea to do over the summer.  Perhaps a trip to the library, blowing bubbles, hide and go seek, etc.  Once you have documented everyone's answers write or type them all together on a sheet of paper.  Add this hand out on Physical Activities for the Summer.  Makes copies for each student to add to their summer bag of make and takes. 

4.  Printables from Your Therapy Source - Print out fine motor, gross motor or visual processing ebooks activities or from the free stuff page all sorts of activities.  Put out suitable activities on a table.  The child can go through the activities and select some to put in a folder to bring home for summer.

5.  Play Dough - Make large batches of home made play dough.  Give each child a small container of play dough and activity ideas to do with the play dough.  Need activity ideas - check out Creative Clay Activities or Play Clay Mats to print and send home.