My son is almost 4. My nursery called me in for a meeting as they had severe concerns about his development. Whilst my son is very intelligent, they feel that he is falling behind in certain milestones. He cannot pedal a bike, he finds it hard to kick a ball about the garden in a coordinated manner. He will not do any drawing (when he tries, he just scribbles everywhere.) We had recognised some of these issues and tried to take him to group soccer lessons/swimming lessons that have been complete failures as he does not like to take any instruction/perform badly.

On the other hand, he interacts well with all the other kids and is quite extrovert and loves us reading him stories and going to zoos. He can name almost any animal and is quite perceptive. He also now builds with blocks which he did not do before, although he can get frustrated quickly if it does not go to plan.

The nursery are getting my son assessed to see if he needs special assistance to develop his motor skills before he starts school. We have tried everything we can do ourselvs to help him in this area, but his poor concentration/coordination skills have let him down. Both my husband and I have poor hand/eye coordination. For example, my husband has only started to learn tennis at 30 and it has taken him several years to get in a position to play at a respectable level.

To what extent could OT/special needs teacher assist him as we are concerned that he will never want to do sport/have issues with writing when he starts school?

thanks

Sarah

Hi Sarah:

The best place to start with Aaron would be to have him assessed by a multi-disciplinary team including a diagnostician, speech therapist, OT, and PT. This can be done for free at your nearby school district. It will give you a better idea of where Aaron is performing in relation to peers his age.

It sounds as if Aaron has some difficulty with motor planning, eye-hand coordination, and possibly visual-motor integration skills. These skills have nothing to do with Aaron’s cognitive ability. In fact, we often see kids excel in one or two developmental areas while the others stay in the background. It is especially important that Aaron’s visual, fine, and gross motor skills are addressed early to help instill the confidence he needs. You mentioned that he gets frustrated quickly. How do you think he might feel if his peers are able to perform skills in kindergarten and he cannot? It is so important to start out with good self-esteem at an early age.

You asked how OT can help Aaron and then you mentioned that you were concerned he would never want to engage in sports. You are also concerned Aaron will have issues with writing when he starts school. Pediatric OT’s are trained to help little ones learn motor planning techniques. They have specific writing protocols that are adaptive in nature to meet the need of each patient they work with. We also have techniques to assist with eye-hand coordination and fine/gross motor skills. I have yet to see a child who didn’t love coming to OT. OT’s help facilitate and sharpen skills to give little ones the confidence they need to succeed in their environment. We also help adapt their environments if need be. Hope that helps J

Robynne

Thank you very much for your answer it was really helpful, I will speak to the education coordinator at Aaron's kindergarten about OT, as it sounds as if this might be what he needs. Unfortunately in the UK I'm not sure howthe system works as far as a having a multi disciplinary assesment but I will ask about this.

Thanks