Occupational therapy

A child’s occupations are centred around play, self-care and learning. Occupational therapists work with children with any condition, disability or impairment that affects their ability to perform the everyday activities of life, such as getting dressed, eating, going to school, making friends and being part of a club or group.

We work in partnership with each child, their parents and other important people in the child’s life such as their doctor, teacher, paediatrician and other health professionals.

Occupational Therapists can:

• Help children achieve their developmental milestones such as fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination to help with play, school and independent skills (e.g. throwing a ball, getting dressed, holding a pen or utensils).
• Educate and involve parents, carers and others to support the development and learning of the children in their care.
• Help children with developmental delays learn everyday tasks (such as bathing, getting dressed, brushing their teeth and feeding themselves).
• Help children with behaviour issues maintain positive behaviours in all environments (e.g. Using positive ways to deal with frustration and anger, adapting sensory demands of environments and supporting parenting skills).
• Assess and prescribe devices and therapy equipment to help children do the activities that they need to do. We make sure that the child can use the device in the best way to meet their needs and provide education on its use.

Areas of concern that we may be able to help with include:

• Attention and concentration
• Learning and developmental delays
• Handwriting and reading skills
• Visual and visual perceptual skills
• Body awareness, coordination and motor skills
• Motor planning and organisation of learning motor tasks
• Processing sensation, self-regulation and adaptive behaviour
• Daily activities of looking after self, play and school
• Social skills
• Anxiety, self-esteem and positive behaviour management

If you have concerns with your child’s daily skill development, we can assist you to help improve these areas for your child. If you would simply like to know more about typical development and play opportunities, we can help too.

For further information on Occupational Therapy for children explore the following information sites.

https://www.otaus.com.au/

https://aboutoccupationaltherapy.com.au/working-with-children/

https://childdevelopment.com.au

https://kidshealth.org

https://www.rch.org.au/kidsinfo/fact_sheets/Occupational_therapy_factsheets/

https://www.rch.org.au/ot/information_sheets/Kids_health_information/