Children's Center for Development & Behavior

Occupational Therapy

Occupational Therapy (OT) will help increase your child’s ability to function more independently throughout their everyday life and in their daily routines.

The therapeutic goals of occupational therapy are based on increasing physical strength, visual perceptual skills (the ability to recognize and identify shapes, objects and colors), fine and gross motor skills (handwriting, jumping, skipping), sensory modulation (processing information from the environment more effectively) and cognition (understanding the steps involved to complete a specific task).

OT also develops the child’s ability to problem solve and improves motor planning.

Daily living skills are taught and reinforced throughout therapeutic intervention.

Sensory Integration (SI)

Sensory Integration (SI) is the way a person interprets and organizes various sensory experiences including sight, sound, smell, touch, movement, body awareness and the pull of gravity.

SI is viewed as a fun activity for your child. Our clinicians provide therapeutic techniques using a variety of textured objects, movement activities, and deep pressure techniques to increase the child’s ability to “make sense” of the variety of sensations they get from the environment.

Most children diagnosed with autism, pervasive developmental disorder or other developmental delays experience their environment differently. Occupational therapy can help the child make the “new connections” needed to improve their sensory systems (vision, touch, hearing, smell, taste).

The result after therapeutic intervention is an improved quality of life and independence as the child becomes more aware of their environment.

Motor Planning

Motor Planning is the ability of the brain to understand, organize, and carry out new and unfamiliar tasks. Although the child may have adequate physical strength to complete the task, the brain may not be making the connection to the part of the body that needs to perform the task. Therefore, the child will have difficulty sequencing complex movements.

Our occupational therapists will engage the child in activities that will increase the ability to make the proper connections so motor planning and sequencing can occur. The therapeutic interventions will improve the child’s overall ability to perform important and purposeful activities.