Using Things From Around Your House

Therapy “equipment” and therapeutic or developmental toys can be very costly for parents who are already paying for various services for their children.  It can also be expensive for schools/teachers/therapists to purchase them when there are no extra funds available to do so.  However, you might already have some items at home or in the classroom that you can use to facilitate further development of skills without having to spend a lot of money.  The following are some ideas of these types of items and ways that you can use them to work on some skills:

Newspapers or scrap paper:  Have your child use 2 hands together to scrunch up the paper.  This works for improving bilateral skills, hand strength.  Have a “snowball fight” with them, or use them to stuff a craft project.  Have your child use one hand alone to scrunch up the paper to further work on in hand coordination/manipulation.

Clothes pins:  Pinching a clothespin works on improving finger strength, and improving finger isolation/opposition.  It is also a pre scissor skills task, in developing control to pinch/release.  Have your child pinch clothespins and place them on the lip of a box.  Print letters or numbers on them and have them clip them to a card that matches the letter or number to work on matching skills.  Have them pick up small items such as cotton balls or pom poms with the clothespin and transfer them into a container.

Plastic margarine containers:  Cut a slit in the top of the lid of a plastic margarine container.  Have your child push coins through the slit to work on improving finger tip prehension skills and finger strength. Cut various size holes in the lid and have your child push/place various sized items through the matching sized holes.

Tennis balls:  Cut a 2-3” slit in a tennis ball.  Hot glue some craft eyes above the slit to make it look like a face, the slit being the mouth.  Have your child use one hand to squeeze the sides of the ball to open the “mouth” and the other hand to “feed” small items to it.  Items such as pennies, beads, pom poms, cheerios, etc.  This works on bilateral coordination, hand strength, finger tip prehension skills.

Grated parmesan cheese containers:  Push small pom poms through the holes in the top of the container to work on finger tip prehension patterns.  Have your child sort by color to incorporate other skills into the task.

Masking tape/painter’s tape:  Put a tape line on the floor and use it for a balance line.  Have your child walk forward on it, heel to toe, backwards, side step, etc.

Plastic cups:  Stack plastic cups on top of each other (like you would with cones in a therapy setting). Have your child transfer them from left to right and back again, using each hand.  This is a good activity for crossing midline and sequencing.

You can use cups such as the one on the left to stack just as you would the therapeutic cones on the right.

Scarves:  learning how to catch is easy when done with scarves.  Wad a scarf into a ball and “toss” it to your child to catch.  Throw the scarf up into the air and catch it.  This is good for working on beginning throwing and catching, and eye hand coordination skills.

Tongs/tweezers:  Use regular kitchen tongs or tweezers to pick up small items.  This is also a precursor task for scissor skills, and works on hand strength, eye hand coordination and dexterity.

Laundry detergent lids:  Hold the lid or a small plastic cup filled with water upright in the tips of fingers. Turn the lid without spilling by turning it in fingertips to work on in hand manipulation skills.