Occupational therapists at Monkey Mouths help children participate and engage in a variety of daily living skills. These skills are divided into two main categories, activities of daily living (ADLs) and instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs).
As children develop, they will often learn a wide variety of daily living skills. Children require varying levels of assistance to master these daily living skills. Some skills may come easier than others, and if it is found that a child is having difficulty meeting a daily living milestone our occupational therapists at Monkey Mouths can assist in helping your child learn and master these skills.
Activities of Daily Living
ADLs are basic self-care tasks, such as dressing, grooming, feeding, and toileting.
Instrumental Activities of Daily Living
Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADLs) require more complex thinking and planning to complete. IADLs include tasks such as household chores, playing, money management, meal preparation, and personal safety.
Challenges of daily living skills are often seen in difficulty using utensils during mealtimes, understanding the orientation of clothing when dressing/undressing, clothing fasteners (zippers and buttons), shoe tying, brushing teeth, hand washing, and safety awareness.
Occupational therapists at Monkey Mouths will work with your child and your family on developing strategies to help find the best way to learn these skills. Each child learns differently so our occupational therapists will tailor their treatment sessions to best meet the child’s needs.
During an occupational therapy visit at Monkey Mouths, your child’s skills will be targeted in fun and functional ways. The occupational therapist and child may practice a skill directly by breaking down a daily living task into smaller steps and mastering each step until the child can complete the entire task independently. This method can be helpful because the therapist can grade and adjust the amount of assistance that is provided depending on the amount of assistance a child is needing. This may look like placing your child’s socks over their toes and having them pull the sock up and over their heel to help with dressing. This can also be used with the child learning and mastering the first few steps of shoe tying and assisting them to complete the remaining steps.
An occupational therapist at Monkey Mouths may also work on daily living skills by practicing the foundational skills needed for the overarching task. This may look like practicing crossing midline during play to help with dressing or brushing teeth as this is a big component of many daily living tasks.
Fine motor strength and coordination may need to be targeted to help with the completion of clothing fasteners such as zippers and buttons. This can be targeted with the use of therapy putty or Play-Doh, stringing beads, and building with Legos or blocks. There are several foundational skills needed for each daily living task and your occupational therapist will assist in deciding which skills are impacting your child’s ability to complete the ADL or IADL.
As children learn and master these daily living skills, they will grow in not only their independence but also their self-confidence. Our occupational therapists at Monkey Mouths strive to provide children with the best opportunities to work towards the skills that they are expected to do, need to do, and want to do.
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2024. All Rights Reserved.
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