Occupational therapy is a client-centred health profession concerned with promoting health and well being through occupation.

The primary goal of occupational therapy is to enable people to participate in the activities of everyday life.

Occupational therapists achieve this by working with children, their families and their community to enhance their ability to engage in activities that

  • They want to do
  • They need to do
  • They are expected to do

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    • Attention and concentration skills
    • Self regulation and behavior
    • Play and social skills
    • Activities of daily living including eating, toileting and dressing
    • Fine motor skills
    • Handwriting, cutting skills and typing skills
    • Gross motor skills
    • Childcare/school participation

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  • Frequent meltdowns and tantrums
  • Poor attention and concentration
  • No safety awareness, always climbing running and on the go
  • Picky eaters and problem feeders
  • Behavior concerns from Childcare / School
  • Coordination and fine motor concerns
  • Messy or slow handwriting
  • Difficulty making friends or playing with other children
  • Struggling to develop independence in daily living skills such as toileting

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Children with diagnoses of

  • Sensory Processing Difficulties
  • Autism/ Aspergers Syndrome
  • Developmental Delays
  • Learning Disabilities
  • Anxiety
  • Attention Deficit Disorder
  • Feeding difficulties and picky eaters
  • Chronic Constipation
  • Developmental Coordination Disorder or Dyspraxia
  • Down Syndrome
  • Cerebral Palsy
  • Visual Impairments
  • Hearing Impairments
  • Physical Impairments
  • Various syndromes

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Developing Feeding Skills

Kids Play offers specialist skills in addressing Picky Eaters and Problem Feeders.  Many families have stressful mealtimes, are worried about the limited range of foods their child eats and can’t find a way to successfully introduce new foods.

Areas we can assist with include

  • Won’t sit for mealtimes
  • Meltdowns when new foods are presented
  • Limited range of tastes and textures eaten
  • Feeding difficulties related to medical conditions including reflux, naso gastric tubes, peg feeding

We use an approach based on the Sequential Oral Sensory Approach to feeding problems developed by Kay Toomey and Erin Ross.  It utilises a step by step approach with systematic desensitization and behavioural modification.

This enables children to learn the routine of participating in mealtimes, how to explore food in fun and new ways, how to engage with a broader range of foods and start to expend what they eat.

We provide sessions individually or in groups where appropriate. They can be run as an intensive over 1-3 weeks or over a period of weekly appointments.

We work with other professionals as required including Speech Pathologists, Dietitians, Paediatricians, GPs, and Gastroenterologists.

Developing Independent Toileting skills

Kids Play offers specialist skills in addressing children’s difficulties to use the toilet.  It is a difficult task for some children and families to develop the skills to use the toilet independently.

Areas we can assist with include

  • Not able to release while sitting on the toilet despite frequent prompts and trips to sit on the toilet
  • Not able to stop using the pull up for a passing bowels
  • Wetting through the night
  • Frequent accidents in underwear
  • Wet marks or stain marks on underwear
  • Cant hold on once the urge to go hits

We complete assessment to understand the key barriers to toileting independence and then work with you and your child to have a greater understanding of the factors involved in toileting, develop routines, skills and techniques to improve toileting skills and take a step by step approach to toileting independence

We provide sessions individually and work with other professionals as required including Dietitians, Paediatricians, GPs, Gastroenterologists and Physiotherapists.