The JumpTherapy Blog:
Sensory Processing, Motor and Social Skills Resources
for Parents of Special Needs Children
Sensational Strategies to Strengthen Sensory Skills
101 FUN sensory activities to do with your child
Part 1 of 5: Twenty activities to improve tactile/touch processing
Make sensory processing activities fun so your child will want to do them
Your goal is to help your child build up his/her ability to use sensory processing in order to achieve his/her “just right” (balanced) state of mind to function well in the world. You will support this through planned activities, which your child will experience as play. These hands-on activities will help your child’s brain develop; practice recognizing, interpreting and correctly processing signals from his environment; and increase her overall alertness. Plus, they are actually a lot of fun to do — especially together. So you’ll both gain the added bonus of spending enjoyable time with each other.
Trying things out
As we’ve read recently, there is no one specific strategy that works for all children, or even for the same child on different days. So be prepared for trial and error as you engage in different activities to see what works best for your son or daughter. You, and/or a professional OT working with you and your child, observe your child to see which sensory activities s/he gravitates toward. Start with those and build on success.
In this post and the next four, you will find strategies to help get to that “just right” level of sensory processing, organized by these five sensory systems:
Tactile — touch
Vestibular — movement
Proprioception — muscle work
Visual — seeing
Hearing — listening
There will naturally be some crossover between activities, so targeting one sense may also help another improve. Win win!
Target: the tactile system
The first sensory system we will address is the tactile system; the sense of touch. It tells us when a stove is too hot to touch; a metal pole in winter too cold to touch; when we are in pain, etc. Through sensory receptors in the skin (the largest organ of the human body, as you may recall from high school biology!), the tactile system alerts our brain to experiencing sensations produced by different surfaces, textures, pressures, vibrations, and more.
Remember, not every strategy will appeal to your specific child, so relax and have fun trying them out to figure what works best!
In the next post, we will discuss ideas for different vestibular-system-stimulating activities.
All the best,
Miriam Skydell MS, OTR/L is a pediatric OT with 30 years experience and a strong commitment to empowering every child and every family with the skills, confidence and emotional stability necessary for a meaningful, independent life. In addition to her Masters degree from NYU (1986) and membership in the AOTA (American Occupational Therapy Association), Miriam is a licensed Interactive Metronome®, HWT (Handwriting Without Tears®), and TLP (The Listening Program®) provider.
Miriam performs preschool screenings, contracts experienced OTs, PTs and STs to schools, helped implement the HWT curriculum, and lectures extensively for parent and support groups and at teacher conferences for public and private schools throughout New Jersey. Through her private practice in Fair Lawn, Miriam Skydell and Associates, established in 1995, Miriam has helped countless children with a wide range of diagnoses improve functional living skills, manage the impact of sensory processing dysfunction, and meet their individual potentials.