One play-based skill that most parents struggle with is dealing with teaching their child how to ride a bike. In this blog post, we cover how to teach bike riding, based on the underlying skills that are needed for balancing and pedaling a bicycle. We’ll address how to ride a bike without training wheels, and how to support your child’s specific needs when it comes to learning to ride a bike. Summer occupational therapy activities include working on the skills kids WANT to get better at! So, if you’re starting with a balance bike, then you are in the right place, because we love to use balance bikes to teach bike riding skills! We’ll cover how to teach balance bike riding as well.
Let’s get started!
Teach Bike Riding based on underlying skills
One of the best tips for learning to ride a bike a therapy provider can suggest is to target the underlying skills that impact balance, sitting on a bike, pedaling, steering, and braking a bicycle. Considering the skills needed for riding a bicycle pertains to children with neurodiverse needs, typically developing children, and even adults learning to ride a bike!
Pediatric occupational therapists work with children to help them accomplish functional tasks, from play, to self-care, to learning, to day-to-day activities. Riding a bike is just one of those areas that an occupational therapist can work with children and families to facilitate function and ability.
When children struggle with riding a bike, there may be underlying issues happening that impact the successful transition to independent bike riding. Those areas might be as a result of an injury or diagnosis, or it might be a weakness in a specific area like strength, coordination, or balance.
This post was originally part of our giveaway series in the Therapy Toys and Tools Giveaway series. (Giveaway now closed.)
Skills needed for bike riding
When occupational therapy professionals work with children to achieve the functional task of riding a bicycle, they can help kids achieve independence with areas that are needed for bike riding:
- Core strength
- Motor planning
- Balance
- Sequencing
- Postural praxis
- Upper body/lower body disassociation
- Motivation
- Body awareness
- Visual convergence
- Visual scanning
- Coordination
All of these areas can be achievable by working on underlying areas through therapy.
How to Teach a Child to Ride a Bike
These are the general steps to follow when teaching a child to ride a bike.
Select the appropriate bike: Riding a bike requires visual skills, motor skills, and cognition. Determining the best bike to support these needs is pivotal. For the young child who is gaining more refined control of motor skills, or the individual requiring greater motor support, it may be best to start with a tricycle bike.
Others may benefit from a balance bike (see below) or a bike with greater back support. The great news is that there are many options out there to support specific needs.
Some of the adaptive equipment or modifications that can aid the child in maintaining balance while riding a bike include:
- Specialized seating
- Handlebar adaptations
- Foot support options like rear box, pedal toe cages, wider pedals, platform pedals, or pedal straps
- Bike height
- Back rest
- Three-wheeled bike options
- Trunk support
- Stabilizer wheels
- Thigh supports
- Safety training handle
One tip that is beneficial to all new bike riders is to ensure that the bike that fits them well. Sizing a bike to fit the rider means that the bike height should allow the rider to comfortably touch the ground with their feet when seated.
Teach a child how to balance on a bike
When working on a preferred task like learning to ride a bike, a therapy professional will look at several things that contribute to the ability to balance and sit on a bicycle.
These are the skills that are needed for balance and coordination to sit on a bicycle and maintain balance:
- Core strength/stability
- Bilateral coordination
- Visual gaze up (looking out in front of the bike, not down at the pedals)
- Separation of upper body/lower body (Upper body/lower body disassociation)
- Seated balance
- Muscle strength
- Visual processing skills
- Hand-eye coordination
- Range of motion
- Endurance
- Motor planning
Once the balance is in place, then you will start to see the ability to move the pedals and steer as an integrated process. This all happens through practice and experience in bike riding, but before one can move the bike, they need to have the basic ability to sit upright on the bicycle frame and place feet onto the pedals to start pushing.
One way to address the balance aspect is to use a balance bike which has no pedals and allows the child to focus on maintaining balance and steering.
Balance tip: When teaching balance on a bike for the first time, try finding a flat lawn. The grass offers more resistance which is greater feedback through the pedals than a relatively smoother surface of a parking lot. Plus, the grass is a better place to land compared to the asphalt of a street or parking lot.
To teach kids to have and maintain balance:
- Consider balance exercises off the bike: The physical therapist will design exercises and activities to target the child’s balance and stability. This may include activities such as sitting on a therapy ball, balancing on a wobble board, or performing dynamic movements while seated.
- Teach them to scoot: Encourage your child to straddle the bike with their feet on the ground. Demonstrate how to push off with their feet and glide, using their legs to maintain balance. This helps them get comfortable with the motion of the bike.
- Work on pedal motion: One of the main pieces of balance is getting those pedals moving. When the pedals are moving, the bike is balanced (including the upper body balance as well). To support pedal use, there are contributing factors: bilateral coordination, gross motor coordination, force modulation, holding the foot in place without pushing too hard, holding the foot on the pedal platform, and using pedal brakes.
- Verbal prompts- Use consistent prompts for pushing pedals: “push down” and “raise up”. Encourage the learner to always start with their stronger foot too, using their dominant foot to start the pedals and to push on the break.
- Physical prompts- Start by holding onto the handle bars as a physical prompt. Then move to holding onto the seat. A seat extender can help too.
- Braking- Getting the hang of steering helps with balance. Sudden stops can impact balance so working on smooth motor planning.
Therapy Tips for Bike riding
Use a bike without pedals to work on balance.
Address pre-bike riding skills by breaking down the skills that kids need for bike riding, including coordination of both legs, core strength, etc.
Work on core strength with activities like animal walks, donkey kicks, bicycle leg pumps, standing on one foot to build balance.
Use a balance bicycle to work on fears related to balance by allowing kids to glide feet along the sides of the bike.
Work on motor planning by stopping and starting the pedal-less bike and picking feet up/running feet along the bike, and stopping the balance bicycle.
Address core strength and endurance with yoga.
Address balance and upper body/lower body disassociation by pushing feet down and lifting feet up to practice gliding and balance.
Address vestibular issues by practice getting on and off the balance bicycle with both feet down on the floor and then just one foot down on the floor.
Work on vestibular input and balance, coordination by working on lean with a balance bicycle.
Build confidence in young bicycle users by instilling confidence in riding a bike without pedals.
Using a bike without pedals offers so many opportunities to work on all of the areas needed for bike riding, and core strengthening, motor planning, balance, and sequencing can help children become successful in helping them reach this goal.
Balance Bike for teaching bike riding skills
There are so many reasons why as an occupational therapist, I love the use of a balance bicycle to help children learn to ride a bike. I would love to share those reasons for using a bike without pedals in teaching bike riding. Here, you’ll also find bike riding tips and reasons that a balance bicycle helps children with balance and bike riding skills.
balance Bike for Kids
Balance bikes are nice to work on some of the skills that impact overall bike riding:
- Balance without the pedal aspect
- Navigating obstacles
- Steering
- Using a helmet
- Encouraging disassociation of two legs in pedal motion without the pedals- the balance bike requires legs to “run” alongside the bike. This is a great precursor to pedaling.
At this stage, teaching kids to use a balance kid for 2 year old children can involve pre-bike riding skills. These can involve things like breaking down the skills kids need and working on the areas listed above.
In all of these ways, bikes without pedals are so helpful for teaching bike riding, from 2 years old and older!
Radio Flyer Air Ride Balance Bike
Want to add a bike without pedals to your toolbox? Let’s get kids moving and building skills!
The Radio Flyer Air Ride Balance Bike is a great tool to add to your therapy toolbox or to use in your home to teach young kids to ride a bike! The Radio Flyer Air Ride Balance Bicycle is a pedal-less bike that allows kids to build balance and other bike riding skills.
Check out the comments below, for ideas on how readers would use the balance bicycle to teach a child to ride a bike!
Colleen Beck, OTR/L has been an occupational therapist since 2000, working in school-based, hand therapy, outpatient peds, EI, and SNF. Colleen created The OT Toolbox to inspire therapists, teachers, and parents with easy and fun tools to help children thrive. Read her story about going from an OT making $3/hour (after paying for kids’ childcare) to a full-time OT resource creator for millions of readers. Want to collaborate? Send an email to contact@theottoolbox.com.
484 thoughts on “Teach Bike Riding: Tips from a Therapist”
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This would be amazing to help my two year old daughter learn how to ride a bike! Fingers crossed!!
What a wonderful idea!
I have so many students on my caseload that would benefit!
I could use this for a few students when we get back in to school to work on balance training. I am a PTA in a low income city so this would be amazing!
I would use this with some of my students that struggle with pedaling.
I would use this for my students at school may benefit from the many underlying skills riding a bike provides. Plus, it would be fun!
I would use this bike as an option for sensory breaks for students. I would also use it as a warm up balance and vestibular activity prior to seated tasks!
As a PTA that works with many children with poor balance, core strength, and poor overall B coordination, this bike would be a fun and effective piece of equipment to use! I have used personal bikes in the past, but having this on sight would be an amazing tool for many years to come! The kids would absolutely love it! Thanks! ?
I would give to my 2 year old grandson to assist in balance and learn to ride with his sister by increasing his core strength. Then when he is outgrown it, I would use in my school assisting some of the younger students who would benefit from it.
Learning to ride a bike can build a lifetime foundation for mental as well as physical fitness. I’d use it in preschool to help a wide range of kids who will possibly never have the experience that outside of school.
I would help my daughter learn how to be confident and help her use her core strength to balance herself on the bike.
Would love this for the preschoolers I work!
Would be awesome for my kiddos at the clinic working on bilateral coordination balance and endurance!
I have many kids on caseload that would benefit from learning how to ride a bike and want to learn to ride a bike.
We are still in-person school and this would be great for a lot of 3 and 4 year olds on my caseload and a good addition to my daily sensorimotor rotations.
I would use it as another sensory tool option for kids! They would love this, and I would because I know how it’s helping them even if they don’t.
I have private clients as well as a granddaughter who would greatly benefit from working their core and thus their balance. Thank you for the amazing offer!
I am an OT and would use this bike for my students who have difficulty with body awareness. I work in a low income public school and have many, many students who could benefit. Thank you for the opportunity to win.
This would be a wonderful activity that could be used by the OTs and PTs at my school. It works on so many important skills, while the students are having fun!
I would use this to help both my six year old and my four year olds to ride a bike then I would bring it to the schools that I service to help some of the 55 kiddos that I work with to learn balance
Great addition to our clinic.
Riding a bike is a life long occupation. It is a key way children connect and socialize within their neighbourhood community.
As a therapist, there is nothing more powerful than supporting a child and their family in learning to ride a bike. When the child is successful…the pride expressed by the child and their parents/caregivers is palpable.
A balance bike can be a key stepping stone to enabling bike riding.
This would be a great addition to every Therapy Room! I would use this as part of a daily routine to help kids build balance/coordination skills, body awareness and it is always AWESOME when Therapy is FUN!
This would be a great addition to my son’s toys and equipment to help him with his gross motor skills and he would love the sensorimotor input!
This would be great to use!
I am an OTR working in an APS. We are constantly looking for new ways to address balance, coordination and simple ways for our students to engage in “normal” play/activities.
I would love to win this bike. My elementary aged students would benefit greatly from a tool like this! Thank you for the opportunity!
I would definitely use this in my clinic… as with all toys I get ?. I don’t know who is more excited about new toys? Me or the kiddos !!
I would use this for my petite 4 yr old who has been too afraid to step on the bike we bought him that does have wheels and hope he can transition to a real bike soon! Then I’d use the bike to teach my students (I’m an OT in the NYC DOE) pre-riding skills (when schools reopen- hopefully soon!)
As an OT and a mom I would use this bike both for my kids at work and to help teach my son once again how to ride a bike -as he learned when he was younger but didn’t ride for fear I think abs now wants to learn again !
I have so many kiddos in our brand new clinic that could benefit from this! I absolutely love bike riding for so many of my kiddos because of all of the skills it works on plus its a fun and easy way to get in heavy work! so anything to help my kiddos learn!
This would be a great tool to use with the kids on my caseload.
This would be an excellent to use with children with gravitational insecurity and weight shift issues, to work on reciprocal movement patterns. I work in a impoverished. & low income area school system. Equipment of any kind is hard to come by.
I love this!
I would love to teach my son how to ride a bike! I will be following these awesome steps in the Spring.
The physical benefits are quite obvious but I would like to focus on the mental health benefits to the students I work with. My students are used to not feeling good about themselves because of their challenges and this bike would provide a wonderful boost to their self esteem and confidence.
I would use this bike with my students to build core strength and as a brain break. There seem to be many children needing both of those this year!
I work in a school that has many special needs children who all have difficulties with balance, coordination and core stability. This bike would be helpful for all of them to use!
A perfect therapeutic tool for my school based practice. What better a way to utilize a quiet stretch of school hallway in between classes, and see the huge smile that says, “I did it!” from a student that masters the monumental moment of learning to ride a bike. This would also be a great tool to continue building strength, endurance, coordination, and balance in my students.
This is definitely a fun way to improve a child’s core muscle strength that so many of the school aged children that I work with would love to ride. It is a functional activity that also addresses sensory as well. Love it.
would be great in our OT/PT clinic to help children who struggle with balance, core strength, bilateral coordination and motor planning related to bike riding and other functional skills !
This would be excellent to use with children with gravitational insecurity and weight shift issues, to work on reciprocal movement patterns. I work in a impoverished. & low income area school system. Equipment of any kind is hard to come by.
I have children in my personal life as well as students i work with at school who would benefit so much from this tool.
This seems to be a fun tool for all my children at work as an OT who want to learn to ride a bike!! It could be the just right challenge to get them started!
This would be an amazing addition to the therapy gym at the preschool I work. Both PT and OTs can benefit from this bike! As a PT I this bike would be fun for the children while beneficial!
I would use this bike to help increase core strength as well as a sensory tool for vestibular and proprioceptive feedback! My preschoolers would LOVE it! Thanks for the opportunity to enter! 🙂
I would use the bike with my grandchildren. The oldest one is a little rambunctious. This would help her get her wiggles out!
This bike would be a great addition to the gross motor equipment for the PFA program I work with as an OT. It would be an awesome tool to help with motor planning for those struggling to ride the bikes and trikes that we currently have.
This would be amazing!!
So great to help with core strength, bilateral coordination and endurance!!
Balance, coordination, core strengthening, and building confidence in vestibular movement.
This would be great for the students at my school!
I would actually use it for my own son first who is so terrified of trying to balance even with training wheels currently. Then, I would pass it along to a student where I work as an OT
A great toy/tool to use with kids!
As a COTA with kiddos in K+, I would design it to be stationary to work on core and balance as I grade activities using their UB to challenge them. I’d also have a soft area around the bike on the floor for soft sensory landing!
As a home health therapist this would be SO helpful for the kids I work with and give the families a chance to try one out before they invest in one! I love bike riding for motor planning, eye hand coordination, strengthening and promoting independence!
I would use this for balance, bilateral coordination as well as motor planning and because it is fun!
This balance bike would be a great addition to my therapy for sensory breaks and to work on balance, praxis as well as bilateral coordination. Many of the school aged students I work with cannot afford a bike and have never ridden one – this would be a wonderful way to provide them with that opportunity and to build important skills while having fun! Thank you!
(OT here)I would work with our PT to develop meaningful ways to use this with our students!
I would definitely use this to work on balance and for vestibular input.
This is a wonderful giveaway!
I would use this bike to teach my 4yo daughter how to balance and move herself along on the bike. I’m an OT and know the value of balance bikes as a beginning step to pedaling and bike. My daughter has struggled with balance and coordination and I am excited at the thought of teaching her these skills over the winter. Thank you for this opportunity!
Would use this to help with fears regarding balance!!!
I would use this inside first to go around obstacles in the house, to gain confidence. then I would move to the outside with greater variables
This would be so wonderful for my son. This would be such a blessing for him.
I would love to use this to teach my twin niece and nephew to ride. They would love to learn how to balanced and motor themselves along.
I would use it to work on Motor coordination, balance, gravitational insecurity, and body awareness. All skills needed for riding a bike.
Love these!! I would use this with my students to work on strength coordination and balance.
I could incorporate this into my preschool physical education program! We could use it inside or out and it would be a great tool to use to teach them sharing and waiting their turn along with all of the physical benefits for their bodies!
Hello, we have a new walking/ riding track on our school playground. I would love to get my little guys to learn how to use the balance bike, using all those skills. Our new trail is the perfect place to learn since is has a cushion like feel to it if one takes a tumble. I have lots of little ones who need the core development.
Buenos días, se puede participar desde Peru.
Saludos cordiales
My OT brain would definitely set up an obstacle course, having them ride around objects to get to the end. I love these bikes!
I would use this as a brain break for my daughter now that we are back to virtual learning. The fact that she can walk with it for now and learn how to balance would be great to get her the sensory input she needs.
This would be great to have at a therapy clinic for all types of children. To help them gain balance, coordination, play skills, independence, confidence !! So many skills involved ! Would be awesome to win to use in the OT/PT/ST clinic ?
Would be great to use with my kindergarten class!
It is a wonderful fun way to address foundational sensory processing, bilateral integration and motor planning needs.
I would use it in my workplace, to aid all the children with autism that we follow with vestibular stimulation, balance training, coordination and many more! The possibilities are endless!
I have a tricycle at school that my students love and work really hard during OT sessions to get to ride. This would be a great addition for the students who have mastered the tricycle and could benefit from moving on to a bigger challenge. : )
This would be such as awesome tool to work on balance and coordination with both the children I work with as well as my own child!
I would use the balance bike in clinic to support transitions to/from therapy room to waiting area. So many of our children have difficulty in this area. Perhaps it would help break the pattern. Of course, i would use it in other ways as well. Many previously stated in above comments.
I work at a school in two self contained classrooms and a preschool! This bike would impact 26 kids lives this year and because of radio flyer’s superior quality many more over the next 20 years! A great resource when teacher’s are addressing core strength in small groups! Thanks for all you do and for this great opportunity! Good luck to all!
What a fun way to get some vestibular input and work on balance and coordination
I taught my youngest son to ride a bike on a balance bike. He was ahead of the curve when it came to riding a pedal bike with no training wheels because of it! Now that I work with elementary students, this would be great for the therapy gym.
I would use it to help my 6 year old daughter gain confidence to ride her own two wheeler. Over or quarantine she learnt, but she got scared and refused to try again. This will be a great toy to help her transition.
My son is almost two and this would be perfect to help him learn how to balance and ride a bike.
I work at a preschool and this would be a great addition to the site to assist with coordination, balance, and sensory input.
I work in preschool and elementary school where so my kiddos would benefit from having access to a balance bike!!
Thank you for all that you have done and continue to do!
This would be such a blessing and multi level support for our 4 yr old with speech delay to prompt bike related verbalization and UE/LE coordination and for the pure joy and freedom a first bike ride brings to the soul.
Love how this works on so many areas! Could use this with so many children at work and with my family.
This bike would be an amazing addition to our OT/PT therapy room. We have many students who can’t afford a bike and therefore; will not have the opportunity to learn how to ride a bike, especially our disabled kiddos. I have a student now that is losing motor skills and his mom said he can no longer ride a bike. He has the skills needed to ride a bike but we don’t have a bike to practice.
It would benefit the students I work with to help with balance and core strength. Others would benefit from sensory breaks on these. This is a wonderful giveaway!
Hello! I am a pediatric occupational therapist and I teach a bike riding program with my children. One of the first steps of this program is to ride a bike without peddles. The children have to bring their own bikes for this program. We do not have one at our facility. This is program is excellent; however, we are only able to offer it to children who have a bike. Some of our children’s families are unable to afford a bike. Having this at our facility would open up the opportunity for all children to participate in learning this fun and important life skill! Thank you so much for this opportunity!!!
There is nothing like the freedom you feel when you can independently ride a bike!! I have seen balance bikes help get kids to that amazing feeling!
These are so cool! We have some large ones for our older students but this would be perfect for some of our little ones to work on balance, learn to ride a bike and a different choice to get movement throughout the day!
I would use this to teach my daughter to ride a bike. She currently receives therapies that help her with motor planning and integration, as well as core strengthening and balance. It would be an amazing tool for us to have in our home program that would keep her motivated to learn and grow.
I would love to implement a balance bike into my kiddo’s treatments! I love pairing a lot of movement into my treatments.
I would use this with children I work with prior to seated activities and as a sensory break throughout our sessions. I work with children who don’t necessarily have the opportunity to ever ride a bike so with this, I would be giving them the opportunity/exposure to riding a bike while using it during therapy sessions.
I would use this bike to not only begin to teach my clients how to ride a bike, but to provide fun and exciting motor breaks, easier transitions, and a fun way to increase core strength and motor planning!
I would use this bike as a sensory warm or for sensory breaks. This would work on balance, vestibular input, proprioceptive input, bilateral coordination/bilateral hand use, and so much more. I would also share the bike with the PT at the school I work in so more kids could benefit from it.
This is amazing! I would use it to help with bilateral coordination and core strengthening! It would be wonderful for sensory input as well! What a fun way to work on important skills through play!
I have a boy on my caseload that is learning to ride his bike! He does not have much confidence yet. The balance bike would be perfect for him to learn balance and motor planning on!
I would give this bike to a family I used to work with in Early Intervention. Mom has been working diligently with two kids at home and they are at the perfect age to start learning how to ride a bike. This would be the perfect Christmas gift.
I look forward to teaching my toddler how to ride a bike sans training wheels. And of course, we pass everything on to families with younger kids!
I would love this for the kiddos I work with (all on the Autism spectrum) to help with movement in the school so they don’t have to be stuck all day!
This would be a wonderful addition to my “bag of tricks”! I am an OT that works with preschoolers and elementary students. I would use this bike to work on balance and coordination skills in all of my students. The neurological impacts of an activity like this are endless!
I would gift this to my nephew who lives in CA. They don’t have much open space so this would be perfect for teaching him how to ride a bike. Starting in the grass and moving to cement to increase confidence and balance!
As a peds OT who is currently in the works of starting up my own practice, I would absolutely love this balance bike to add to my toolbox to help all of the wonderful kids I see!!
This is fantastic! I can think of some really fun ideas to use this with the kids on my caseload!
This would be great for our kiddos in the schools to address all of the mentioned skill areas as well as fostering a healthy leisure skill!
A wonderful, fun piece of equipment to work on all skills!
Great giveaway! I would use it in clinic with kids, maybe as part of an obstacle course to help kids with balance and learning to ride a bike!
Motor planning, bilateral use of legs and arms and legs, great for bain development!!
My grandkids!!
My 3 year old son really wants to ride his bike. 2 of my 3 older kids really struggled with learning to ride. For our 3rd kiddo we borrowed a bigger bike someone had taken the wheels off of and used it as a balance bike. Within 2 or 3 days she was riding like a pro. I would love to have this balance bike for my youngest so he can learn to and we can go on family bike rides.
As a side note. As I was entering my info for this comment, there was a picture stuck over the top of the form so I couldn’t see what I was supposed to type in the space below my email. Hope I put the right info there. ?
I have a 4 year old grandson with the genetic disorder SCN2A who would LOVE to ride a bike! He adores watching his older brother ride his bike and tries soo hard (with lots of support) to learn to ride his brothers’ hand-me-down bike. Surprising him (and his parents) with a bike like this would be a dream come true!
I could really use it for my autistic 4 y/o who is being homeschooled. Once he outgrows it I would love to donate it to a local therapy program that provides free therapies to qualifying kids until age 3 that is funded by the state.
This would be a great addition to my toolbox! I would use it for sensory breaks, developing coordination and motor planning skills- to name a few! It would be a great motivator for kids to work on skills that are difficult for them in a fun and functional way!
This would be a great tool to work on motor planning as well as to provide a structured movement break for my early childhood and younger students. Upper and lower body association is a frequent deficit due to a lack of body awareness. So this bike would be a beneficial tool to work on that skill also.
I am determined to support my clients with vestibular processing and balance and show the families how fun riding a bike can be for a child on the spectrum!
I would use this to share with children who otherwise would not be able to afford this. This way my children will be able to socialize with peers while riding a bike.
I would use this at homes and in the clinics with kiddos who struggle with vestibular processing. I would have them push it for heavy work, wash it for tactile processing, and ride it for fun!!!
What a great idea! I can’t wait for families to trial this bike, so they can buy it to use at home.
I am the clinic manager for a peds therapy clinic and 90% of our caseload it low income children and the majority of them are never introduced to a bike. We would be able to use the bike in the clinic to introduce bike riding skills as well as work on strength, coordination and balance.
Where has this been? Or where have I been? LOL I can’t believe I didn’t know about this before! An amazing piece of equipment to add to our ever-growing toolbox. What a valuable skill, not to mention building so many other skills in the process, to help our kids with!
I would work with my PT to help some of our students who are struggling with this much needed “life skill”
So exciting! Would love a chance to try this out with my kids at the clinic!
This will be a great asset to my practice! It is sometimes difficult to implement this fundamental occupation with the low income families I work with. Having this will at least give my kiddos a chance to learn even though they don’t have one at home!
I would use this bike with the kids I work with on the spectrum who often have low tone and motor planning issues to build prerequisite skills to riding a bike as well as improve these areas that cross over to so many other areas!
This would be a great addition to our preK classroom. Love and use a lot of your ideas and suggestions. Thanks for your support!
This would be a great gross motor and body awareness warm up. With the lack of outdoor play, any opportunity to introduce balance and bike riding to children is welcomed!
Such a great giveaway! This would be perfect to use with my kids at school. Thank you for all you do!
Thanks for sharing
As a second year OT with a limited budget for therapy items, this would be a great addition to my toolbox!
Fun balance motor break for my own kids and students!
This would be great for our kids at the clinic! As we don’t have much gross motor play with our small clinic and with it getting colder it will be even less. This is a great opportunity!
This would be great to work on balance!!
I work as an OT in a low income elementary school. This bike would be a great tool to work on core strengthening and bilateral coordination. It could be a great warm up activity or reward at the end for working hard during a session. I have a small outdoor track right next to my therapy scape and this would be a perfect tool to help utilize that outdoor space more during sessions.
This would be such a great addition to my therapy room. I have so many children that don’t know how to ride a bike!
This would help my 3 year oldget stronger and learn how to balance. It would help him learn a healthy skill!
If it can be done, I would help the child feel comfortable about balance first. I would take the petals off so that the child could use his feet to propel and learn to balance before graduating to petals.
I have 2 year old twin nieces that were premies and would greatly benefit from improving their gross motor skills using this type of bike!
I taught both my kids and a few of their friends to ride a bike. Now I’d like to continue the tradition and teach my granddaughter. The balance bike would be a great way to get her started.
As a reading therapist, I wound use this with students for movement break and with the additional purpose of developing mental focus for the balancing exercise as well as guiding students to transfer focusing skills from one task (balancing on the bike) to focus on multiple tasks, such as reading comprehension.
I would use it at the non-profit county SPED preschool serving (100+ families) that I work for. We would use it outside in our playground, which has a paved riding circle for the students. They would love learning to balance and ride this bike. OT and SLPs and SPED teachers would appreciate it. Thank you.
I would use it with my pre-k students to work on balance and body awareness. What a fun giveaway! Thanks for your support through ideas and supplies for your profession!
I would give it to a family of one of the children I see that would benefit from this bike but doesn’t have the money due to Covid19.
I would use this as a trial bike for the school based rehab students that I service. This would be an excellent addition to our “loan” cupboard as an agency. Sue
Maybe I’ll win it!
I would use the balance bike with my preschoolers!
We have kids in our school who don’t have or only have some of the requirements (trunk stability and strength, balance, coordination, motor planning and body/spatial awareness. A child also needs a well-established vestibular and proprioceptive system.) that will help them to be able to ride a bike not even to talk about school work – writing, posture there are so many thing that will improve if they get time to learn to ride a bike. They are all from rural areas they don’t even have bikes or a safe place to ride a bike.
The Radio Flyer Balance Bike would be an outstanding tool for my your clients who are struggling to learn to ride a bike without training wheels. I would use this as part of our annual Bike Clinic to have youth throughout our community see the benefits of a balance bike and help families learn strategies to help their kids learn to ride a bike.
Perhaps this will become a reality!
What an amazing prize this would be! We’ve all had to get creative with services during COVID. I’d use this at school during OT/PT sessions, or for kiddos who need a brain break! We have very few hallway transitions now, so long empty hallways galore!!
This would be wonderful for my kiddos at work! I often have my parents take the pedals off bikes but it doesn’t work as well!!!
I would use this as a part of a par course and for sensory breaks to work on balance, motor planning and self regulation skills.
This would be a great addition to the therapy tools in our OT/PT classroom.
I would use this for my student’s sensory breaks.
I work in a clinic with low income families and foster children who have never been taught to ride a bike or have coordination or sensory issues that impede their ability to ride. This will help teach them the skills necessary to generalize to bike riding and higher coordination activities.
I would give this to the low-income special needs preschool I work with. Not only would it be a great opportunity to develop motor skills, it would be a great to work on communication/sharing (since I know they will all want a turn!) 🙂
Thankyou for your generosity, am I entered if I leave a comment???
This is amazing! I’m an OT in birth to three in Connecticut and have several families from lower SES background whose children could benefit from this bike. Thank you for offering this giveaway!
I would use it in the schools I work in to teach kids how to ride a bike, as well as, work on underling skills (balance, core strength, ect).
I would use this to work on dissociation, coordination, and balance with children who need to develop those skills before they will be successful on a bike with pedals.
Oh my goodness! This is just like the bike I learned on, the Radio Flyer! I love it so much!!! What a wonderful opportunity to teach my students how to ride a bike. My students need sensory breaks often and this would be an amazing opportunity to use their muscles, strength, and endurance in a fun, positive way. Thank you so much!
A great gift for a kiddo
I would love to use this bike to help my 3 yo grand with balance and core strength. Then, it would be donated to my favorite OT for therapy and sensory breaks.
I would use this to teach my 4-yr-old (with some developmental delays) how to ride bike (it could really help with his balance and coordination). He’s also a sensory seeker, so I’d also use it as a sensory tool for him.
I would use it for my nephew who has special needs- arm physical deformity to work on balance skills.
I always recommend the Radio Flyer Balance Bike to the families on my caseload looking for strategies for learning to ride a bike. It’s a great activity for promoting core stability and bilateral integration in addition to sensory input. What a great tool for both my home-based and school-based pediatric clients!
Wow! What a great give away! I would use it for my PK-2nd grade students to work on balance, coordination, strengthening, sensory insecurities, sensory breaks, so many areas can be addressed!
My co-therapist and I are working on bike skills and are really focusing on core strengthening and body separation. We are learning more and more about integrating reflexes as well. This bike would be awesome to have in our rural school setting!
I would use this bike to assist children in developing the balance and core strength as well as awareness of where they are in space. Children need SO many motor experiences in our world today!
Deb T, PT
This would help alot of the children in my class and the toddler class with the pre bike skills. It truly build balance and core. Would be a wonderful addition to inside grossmotor during the winter!!! Thanks for the chance!!!
My boss and I recently opened up a community-based OT clinic in an underserved area. Like all OTs, I use a holistic approach when providing education about exercise and wellness. Using this bike in the clinic would also help work on skills such as safety awareness, motor coordination skills, and reflex integration. I love all of the great ideas from the other commenters provided!
This would be an amazing tool to help my almost two year old to gain balance and confidence in riding a bike! As an OT, I would also be able to bring it to work to use with my sweet kiddos who need the extra help with balance, motor planning, and core strength. I work for a local school district so we don’t have a lot of extra funds to buy items like this to help our children.
I have many students who would benefit from the balance and coordination practice that this would provide during PT sessions and recess.
Strong core muscles help the extended system and at times compensate for their lack of strength/flexibility. We are always looking for ways to strengthen core muscles. Bonus, teaching kids balance and coordination.
As a seasoned OT i would continue to use my knowledge and this new piece of equipment to facilitate all the components of your article- along with building confidence in my kiddos.
I would use this with my preschool students at work.
This would be an awesome addition to outside play. Great tool to use for learning to ride a bike.
Bikes are such an amazing tool! Riding a bike works on so many different areas in only one activity. I would use this with my little guys for sensory input before stationary fine motor activities that require more sustained attention.
Having this bike would be so helpful with my two boys, especially since we are handing a lot of the therapy at home now!!
This would be fabulous for balance training and much more motivating for my kids than simply sitting on a yoga ball and marching in place to enhance balance!
I have worked with teaching students to ride a bike before but this bike would be useful in my therapy for teaching balance, bilateral integration, safety, sensory motor, and many more skills.
I work in the public schools and it would be a great way to
Teach student a healthy leisure skill for life, help with cardiovascular health and help develop body awareness among so many other things.
This is a fun way to encourage core strength and bilateral coordination! We are in a rural community with limited resources and I would love to donate the Radio Flyer balance bike to one of the preschools I work for.
I would use this in the school setting for my students (OT here!) to work on motor planning, balance, and coordination. Also would be a great gross motor break now that they’re stuck in on e classroom all day!
Motor planning and an alternate means of independent mobility!
Endless opportunities for sensory breaks and visual processing and balance activities as well for our clinic.
I would share this with the physical therapist at my school so that we both can work toward our ultimate goal of making the child as functional as possible.
I can picture my school’s OT/PT students cruising up and down the hallway with this! How awesome would that be?! It would be a great therapy tool
I’m an OT that works in the schools. This would be a nice addition to the therapy department as the district I work in is very poor!
Thank you
I could use this at work. We have great indoor hallways to use the bike even during the winter months.
I am an OTA professor and this would make a great addition to our lab for our pediatric class.
What a great tool/toy to work on balance, coordination, timing, and core strength with my students!
I would use this at work! I am an OT who works in 4 different elementary schools and this bike would be great for my kids at school. I used a balance bike with both of my our kids and it worked so well! Thanks so much for these great giveaways!
Becky O
My 2 grand daughters would love this!
I have many children on my caseload that are working toward learning to riding a bike so they can ride with their brothers, sisters and friends! This would really help pull all they are learning and working together in a very meaningful and purposeful way! Would be over the moon to have this as a tool for the kiddos!
Thank you for having this give-away! It would be awesome to win this for my students to use!
This would be awesome to use with both of my ASD sons!
I would love to use this to Teach my preschoolers how to ride a bike. I see so much growth once I can get my students to get on a bike and pedal.
I would use this to work on whole body bilateral coordination as well as vestibular input.
I have a kiddo at school that would benefit from having this bike. It would boost his confidence and gain skills as a stepping stone.
I would love to teach my daughter how to ride a bike using this balance bike so she can keep up with her two older brothers!
What a wonderful giveaway! I would use this with so many Kids in our clinic. Everyone should know how to ride a bike. I feel like recently there are so many kids getting left out on this life skill.
A balance bike would be an amazing way to work on core strength, balance and endurance along with many other skills! It would be awesome for many of the kids I work with!
This bike would be perfect for teaching my students how to ride a bike while building their confidence and self-esteem! It will allow them to build their strength, balance, coordination, and motor planning skills in a successful way that will encourage them to keep trying and not allow them to fail! I would love this bike!
I work in a very large school. This bike would be a great way to transition some students and get a motor break learning to ride a bike.
This bike would be a great addition to our ECD classroom. Let me just name a few things that it would provide – core work, reciprocating movement, sensory break, motivation to complete task along with balance and coordination! It would be put to great use!
I would love to add this to our sensory space. We have so much room and so many kiddos that would benefit from this via avoiding obstacles, balancing, and even going down small ramps!
I would use this as part of my students’ sensory motor integration program, as well as a fun incentive activity for task completion!
This would be perfect to address initial balance and positioning to facilitate bike riding. It would also be great to add as a step of an obstacle course, as well a great sensory break during sessions.
This would be perfect for my nephew. All three of my boys started on a balance bike. Definitely the way to go.
There are other OTs and a PT in my district that could benefit from a bike. I think it would be a great warmup activity or even a great way to work on balance and bilateral coordination with many elementary students!
I would use this to help my kiddos learn to ride a bike as well as target balance, coordination, bilateral coordination, lower body strength, core strength, etc. My kiddos would love this!
I would like to use the balance bike to address the vestibular issue of my three sons who are diagnosed with autism.
I would use this bike with my kids so they can have fun while also improving their bilateral coordination and motor skills!
Judy
What a wonderful gift to give to a deserving parent of a physically challenged child who might otherwise never have a chance to realize his/her potential.
A balance bike would be an amazing way to help teach my son, who is struggling to ride a bike, finally gain confidence in his balance on a bike; and hopefully master the challenging skill!
I would use this while in gym to help my students learn to balance.
I am an OT and would use this to help my own children, as well as children I work with to improve coordination and balance.
Not only would this be great for my three year old son, but it would also be great to be able to share it with my ECSE classrooms for them to you during gross motor gym time!
Years ago, my typically functioning son had one of these and as a result, was a proficient bicycle rider by 3 years old. Today, my caseload at work has many children who could benefit from the increased balance and vestibular skills gained with a bike like this! Since the PT office is right next to mine at school, we could definitely share a product like this, benefitting even more children!
This would be a great addition to our school district!!
I would use it for my nieces, nephews, and I also would use it at my elementary school that I work at.
This would be great to work on core strength and balance 🙂
I would gift it to my sons school as he’s a bit old for this. Thank you.
As an OT, this bike would assist with development of my students’ core strength, coordination, endurance, and balance. My students would absolutely love to use it during their warm up activities.
The balance bike would be an incredible addition to my therapy gym. It would help so many of my students meet their IEP goals.
Heather
I work at a small outpatient clinic, and we have many clients that would benefit from this! We have to buy all of our own equipment so usually require parents to bring in personal bikes if we want to work on the skills. Having something at the clinic would be amazing!
I have actually been thinking about buying this for my son and daughter, I would love to use it to teach them balance and how to ride a bike.
I would use it in the school hallways! It would be a blast!!
I would use this bike as an option for sensory breaks for students. I would also use it as a warm up balance and vestibular activity prior to table top fine and visual motor tasks! The kids would be so excited about this!
Would be great for my k-2 students with Autism to be able to improve balance and participate with same age peers. Thank you for this opportunity
Would be great for balance work with kindergarten classes
I would love to use this when we return to school. Sensory breaks but also for our many impoverished kids who don’t have a bike and thus will most likely never learn to ride a bike. This would improve so many skills for my kiddos-motor planning, coordination, sequencing, increasing CONFIDENCE, etc.!
I would use this at my clinic to teach some of my younger kiddos how to ride a bike! Many of their parent goals for them is to ride a bike!
I would use this to work on balance and bilateral skills.
I am thankful for this giveaway opportunity. I would use this bike to help my students with motor skills, social skills of turn taking opportunities, communication of asking to play with the bike, and leisure activities of learning how to play with a new toy. My students have many motor, social and communication needs. This bike could be used as a tool to help improve all areas for my students.
I just got one of my client’s to ride a bike… at 10 years old.
I was determined to push him to do it before mom resorted to buying special adult-sized training wheels, because I knew he could do it!
He finally got it after 4 sessions of half of our OT time spent bike riding, and he cried. I cried. Mom cried! I LOVE working on bike riding because it helps with SO many different motor, visual, mental, and other performance skills… but also because it is such a great confidence and independence booster! My kiddo was crying and saying “I’ll never say ‘I can’t do it again!’ “, which is really so much more important than the skill of bike riding.
Regardless of whether or not I get the balance bike for my clinic, I am still super inspired by all the other posts and by the OT Tool Box’s drive for sharing opportunities… and joy! Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! Glad for everyone out there helping us live life to its fullest (:
I would use this bike to build their independence and confidence as well as strengthen their gross motor.
I would use the balance bike help provide a child with vestibular Input to decrease gravitational insecurity with a child who would like to be able to ride a bike like their peers.
I would use the balance bike help provide a child with vestibular Input to decrease gravitational insecurity with a child who would like to be able to ride a bike like their peers.
This would be amazing for so many of my sensory friends. Thank you for the opportunity!
My son is struggling with balance on a bike. Having a bike like this would definitely help us work together to and for him to build confidence in balancing
I would love to use this bike in OT and with the the PT as well! I have many kids that could use this to address bilateral and alternating coordination as well as core strength/gravitational insecurity and overall balance!
My older daughter just recently learned how to ride a bike without training wheels and the excitement and accomplishment she gained was priceless. I would use this for my younger daughter to build her core and confidence and scaffold the skills to transition to riding a bike. I would also use this with my future pediatric clients who are sensory seeking that might need a sensory break.
what a wonderful idea. I know this bike would get some mileage where I practice OT
I have always wanted this bike to use within our district. It would address a multitude of skills, I would use it to provide a fun and motivating session with my students while addressing underlying needs.
We love to work outside at our school. This would be a great addition and a fantastic way to teach a lifelong leisure skill that so many of our autistic students struggle with.
My daughters would absolutely love this! My oldest is sensory seeking and very active. She has difficulties with balance and coordination and I know this will help with her development as well as speak to her sensory seeking needs!
I would love to use this as a core strengthening activity with many of my kiddos on caseload!
This would be a great tool to use for my students on my occupational therapy caseload and I would also love to use it to help promote it’s therapeutic value to typical developing kids in my neighborhood and mom groups. Thanks so much for the consideration.
This would be amazing for the kids in my school district. So many valuable skills are learned through play!
I would love to use this for my son who receives OT and PT to work on motor planning, vestibular issues, weakness etc. I could also use it as a school-based OT for my students who struggle with similar issues. Thank you for your wonderful website!
I could use this bike with so many of the children I see in OT at the clinic. They often struggle with balance, body awareness and motor planning, as well as bilateral coordination. It would be an fun and excellent way to help them work on these skills and build a future exercise habit for good health and social skills!
I would love to use this for my K-2 students! They could use it to transition to and from the classroom (FUN!) and work on balance, etc at the same time!! Love it!
I would hold the handles and back of seat to help balance the child. Riding a bike is such a big success and confidence builder with everyone. Great reminder about all of the skills that are developed.
I would use this with my primary students that struggle with balance and motor planning.
What a fabulous way to work on balance, coordination and sensory motor skills in a FUN way!!
I would use the balance bike for my 2 daughters in helping them learn how to ride on their own and if it’s big enough for my older twins who are austistic then win win all around
I have a student in my class who is really struggling with riding a bike and I would love to use this with him. We have been working on this for over a year!
This would be an awesome piece of equipment to use with any student! A great way to work on balance, coordination, and a great way to incorporate proprioceptive input!
Would love to use this bike as a motor break in our low lighted school gym with glow sticks at each corner.
I would use it as an incentive for my students. I would be able to use the bike to introduce bike riding skills as well as work on strength, coordination and balance. I would also share it with the preschool and PE teachers to get maximum use from it.
I would use this with my kiddos who are working on balance, core strength, and bilateral coordination!
As an OT i have noticed not many kids these days know how to ride a bike and that also translates into their abilities to engage in school and social participation as the motor planning, visual perception skills and core skills that are required to ride a bike can be transferred in all aspects in life! It would be amazing to use this bike for brain breaks away from an iPad whilst sneakily still getting in more therapy so these kiddies can reach their full potential! I work for a non-for profit so many of case load dont have the personal funding to even purchase a bike… this way they can at least get some exposure, development and hopefully enjoyment of complex gross motor activities.
Can’t wait to use this bike when we are back in Brick and Mortar school! We have the longest carpeted hallways to practice and learn to balance this bike!
I would use this bike at our preschool and in our clinic with my 3-5 year olds!
Love bikes, I would use this with my K kids to enhance their balance and motor planning.
I would use it in soooo very many ways! In the school to offer movement breaks! It would so help with organizing and calming my kiddos nervous systems. Thanks
I would use this with the special needs preschoolers I work with. Many of them could benefit from a balance bike.
With the pandemic outbreak imposing social distancing and restrictions, many parents of the students I serve are struggling to find places and activities to keep their children engaged and regulated. This will be a great tool to teach children the balance skills and coordination needed to ride a bike so that they can engage in a family bike ride activity.
I would use this balance bike with my students to help improve balance, coordination, core strength, and all the other benefits this bike has to offer.
this would be fabulous for my Deaf and hard of hearing students! Some have some balance issues with the inner ear.
I would use this bike to help my younger students develop the skills for riding a bike. So fun!
I would love to have this bike to work on core stability, motor planning, and body awareness.
I would love this bike to work on bilateral coordination, motor planning, and provide a great movement opportunity during sessions!
I work with many less fortunate special needs students I would donate to a needy family
I work at a non-profit preschool as an OT. We have almost 100 pre-k and K students with many receiving OT and or PT. This is a wonderful addition to our activities to work on body awareness, visual scanning, strengthening and coordination.
This would be a great addition to my therapy toolbox as I have several children that need help learning how to ride a bike.
I have a lot of kids on my caseload that could benefit from the strengthening, balance training and vestibular stim that riding a bike would provide, and would love to have this tool available for use.
I would use the bike in the preschool setting I work in, serving children who are typical as well as many who have IEPs for various reasons. Many of the children I serve have motor planning challenges, this would be a great tool to introduce bike riding. In addition, it would be useful for the children who are not identified needing services, but struggle due to lack of exposure and oportunity.
I am a pediatric occupational therapist in Upstate NY. I work with just preschoolers. This would be a perfect activity for our upcoming cold months!!
My students would benefit from this equipment to address vestibular processing, gross motor coordination, and motor planning deficits!
I have a 4 year old son with Autism. My husband & I tried to teach him to ride a bike, but I think he has difficulty coordinating top/bottom halves of his body together. Using this bike would allow me to downgrade this activity by eliminating the coordination of the LE (for the time being).
Thank you for this offer. I work with inner-city black children, many of whom do not have a safe place to learn to ride a bicycle when they have difficulty with spatial awareness, strength/endurance, balance, motor, and executive functioning skills. My school has long hallways and I am allowed to use that space for OT activities. This bike would be a marvelous incentive for my kiddos to work on the skills I listed above. Tricia Tandle
I work in a special needs school with limited space so having an outdoor sensory activity would be awesome! We now have 2 year olds attending as well as 3 and up so this would be a great size for them to explore some vestibular input while facilitating so many other skills!
This would be a great addition to the tools used in our special education program since many of our bikes were sent home with students during the shutdown in March and not returned.
The playground at the preschool I service is very limited. This would provide another activity that the students could do, and would provide them with opportunities to work on a variety of skills!
I work for a not for profit with limited funds. This bike would help build a gross motor room.
I would use this to teach my learners how to ride a bike, as well as to provide vestibular input for all my seekers!
I would love to teach my son how to ride a bike! He is not interested because he says that it is too hard. Maybe starting on a balance bike would help him to be more interested. Thanks for the tips on teaching him how! I wasn’t sure where exactly to start. After he has learned, I would love to use this bike with some kids on my caseload! They could truly benefit from the multiple skills that using the balance bike addresses!
I am an ECSE teacher and this bike would benefit many of my students….once we get back to school!
I usually remove the pedals when I am teaching bike riding. This would save me that step! It’s such a good way to work on balance and motor planning.
I would love this to practice balancing with those who don’t quite have the motor coordination for pedaling yet!
We would be able to move from a Rifton Adapted trike to something that might be more age appropriate
This would help so many of my children on my caseload.
Balance is a common difficulty for my older clients. This would be a great asset for me and my OT colleagues!
This would be great for students on my caseload to have an opportunity and access to practice learning to ride a bike. What a fun way to work on so many skills.
Pedalless teaching is a concept that many parents haven’t heard of. What a great way to introduce and support the preriding skills needed in school and at home!
I work in ECSE in a low income school district where most of my students do not have tricycles or bicycles. It would be great to have this balance bike to help them with higher level balance skills that they need to work on. This bike would challenge them.
This would be a great way to work on balance- for bike riding and other daily activities.
This would be a useful tool that could be used by OTs and PTs at my school. And during this pandemic, it is something that can be easily sanitized. It is motivating and a skill that will work on areas of development kids would in isolation take several exercises. It works on so many important skills, while the students are having fun!
This would be an incredible tool to have students with balance and core strength needs use during recess time with supervision from an educational assistant. It would be a fun and engaging to work on needed skills throughout the school day!
I would love to use it with my students to help develop core strength!
This bike would be very beneficial for assisting those with underlying balance, coordination, and visual perceptual skills on caseload. What a great opportunity – Thank you!
I work with preschool students who would love this bike! Core strength, balance, and coordination are my main goals with these littles! Thanks so much!
As a PT I work with many kids on many levels and bike riding is always on the list! I do not have access to a balance bike, so this would be awesome to add! Thank you!
I have spray chalked a big infinity rainbow in my street. I’d have my students kick bike around the infinity!
This would be a great asset to the balance activities I use to help facilitate riding a bike! How fun.
Thanks for the giveaway! I teach special needs preschoolers. This would be great for several students!
I would love to use this for sensory breaks, in addition to teaching all of the motor skills!
I would use this to work with balance on several students in my special needs preK classroom. It is the perfect size for their little bodies.
This would be great for the Early Learning Center I work at. There are several children would have their first opportunity to work on bike riding skills. Children with and without special needs attend the Early Learning Center. This would be such a great tool to work on balance, motor planning and just plain fun!
Would love to use this with my 3-4 year old prek students for all the wonderful benefits of balance, gross motor, fine motor, etc as well as gaining confidence!
I would probably use this with my OWN almost 2 or 3.5 year old kids!
I have 2 girls that love scootering and would love to learn how to ride a bike as well.
This would be great for my primary students.
I can see SO many ways to use this bike! From sensory to motor coordination and core strength! This would be an awesome addition to my tool kit!
I work with medically fragile kids in a low income school. This would be such a great addition during our OT sessions.
I live an work in a school district near the Navajo Reservation in which many of our kiddos come from. We have used a small tricycle that has needed lots of repairs over the years, but the kids love it. I would love for them to have something to move up to and challenge their skills.
I would use this at home first with my daughter to learn the functions of this bike and then adapt the use for children based on their individual abilities in a school setting.
This would be great to work on balance with my preschool caseload. We don’t have access to a playground so their gross motor experiences are sometimes limited.
It would be nice to test it out before recommending if it is better than an old fashioned bike.
This would be a great option for sensory breaks for students!
I would donate the bike to a local integrated preschool program that does not currently have enough movement toys. The children in this program may not have other opportunities to play with scooters, tricycles, and balance bikes and develop these skills. It is also meaningful for them to have these fun experiences that many families can take for granted.
I have so many students who don’t have the opportunity to learn how to ride a bike at home, so this would be so great to help teach them the skills of riding a bike as well as so many other skills needed in the educational setting.
I would definitely use a balance bike to teach my students who have down’s syndrome how to ride a bike. It’s the perfect bike to start with to work on core strength and sitting balance before adding pedals!
I would use this bike in the schools that I work at for balance, coordination and a great brain break for sensory!!
This would be a great option to use with students for working on so many different skills, including bilateral coordination, balance, endurance, movement break, core strength, and visual perceptual skills. It would be fun to use as part of a short obstacle course, and especially along a longer surface.
Some may kids do not learn to ride a bike or spend time outdoors these days. This would be an awesome tool to help teach a student to feel confident in learning how to ride a bike and encourage more outdoor gross motor activities. It would help to build trust with the therapist, and build self-esteem to master a potentially scary activity that has so many positive benefits!
I would use this bike to work on balance, core strength, starting and stopping, and to provide much needed vestibular input, as a stepping stone to learning to ride a pedal bike. One of my general education, intense sensory students had his most growth in the year that he started riding his bike to school! 🙂
The balance bike would be a great addition to the sensory room at our elementary school!
I am an OT in an area with a lot of children who do not have access to bikes, scooters, etc. This would be an awesome way to work on balance and coordination that would be motivating to kiddos! The PT I work with could also use it in a variety of ways with her students.
Great opportunity to practice a multitude of skills
I would use this bike with my 4 year old, and then with my almost 2 year old when she is ready. I would definitely bring this into my clinic/school based setting for children that can benefit from balance training as well!
We just opened up a pediatric OT and Speech outpatient clinic in our town. We would love to have the bike as another tool to use in our clinic to work on motor planning, body awareness, coordination and balance. I have several friends that come to see me at the clinic that would not only benefit from this but would think it was super cool!
I would LOVE to start training my 2 year old granddaughter to ride a bike with this! I firmly believe that kids should have a balance bike, rather than a standard bike with training wheels so that they can develop the core strength, balance, and coordination skills needed for riding a bike safely. When she outgrows it, I will bring it to my school to use with my younger students as a pre seat work activity to work on balance and vestibular integration.
I am a school based COTA/L that works in rural districts. These would be awesome to have available for my kids.
I have many students on my caseload that would benefit from this bike along with the PT who works in my district.
This would be awesome to use in the clinic to work on balance and coordination. Would be a fun addition to obstacle courses!
This is a DREAM tool to use with the special ed population to help them engage their core and extremity strength. This would help build their foundation of skills so that they could further develop their balance, coordination and endurance. Thank you for offering this great tool for a give away!
This would be great to work on balance with students who have challenges in that area.
This is amazing! I would use this bike for so many things including developing coordination skills and I have so many students who would love it as a sensory break! We have a big hallway outside our treatment room, so I can imagine how perfectly it would work! thanks!
Balance bikes are fantastic! It’s so exciting to watch kids master the skills to ride without those pesky pedals getting in the way. : ) These are great for kids with balance insecurity because they feel more stable while sitting.
I’m a COTA and so many of the kiddos are work with have core strength deficits due their diagnosis but also due to times changing where kids want to stay tuned in to the tv and electronics. I want to get these kids outside and start playing and exploring their environment more. Gross motor and core strength translates into so many other areas and I want kids to have fun while also gaining necessary skills they need to be independent.
I would love to use this bike during our treatment sessions to work on balance and coordination! I may even ride it myself!
I would use it with my 2y/o grandson to build his balance, coordination of lower and upper extremities, core strength, motor planning and so much more! What a lovely gift it would be, and something he needs so badly, living in a tiny townhouse with little opportunity for gross motor activities.
This would be a perfect treatment session tool to use with my students to improve their balance, strength, coordination and gross motor/planning skills while they have a BLAST!!
I would use this during OT sessions to promote balance + coordination and to provide sensory input to support learning!
we are still having warm weather where I live and school is still in person so this would be great to work with students outdoors and prep for bike riding in spring, enhancing their leisure skills (less screen time) in addition improving their bialteral skills. also great to show parents what to do to encourage bike riding skills via zoom/google meet.
This is an awesome product. I taught myself to ride a bike this way when I was a child 40 years ago. (I now know that I suffered from Gravitational Insecurity) I had to grow enough that my feet touched the ground and I ignored the pedals until I felt confident that I could maintain balance. If I won, I would share this with our children in Head Start so they could learn this way, too.
This would be an amazing addition to our trikes and scooters for the special needs preschoolers.
I would use this bike in so many ways! I work both at a preschool and elementary schools. I would use the bike as a fun reward for the end of OT sessions to (secretly work on motor and visual skills) and build rapport/ interest in therapy participation!!
What a great way to teach riding a bike! I would use this to work on proximal stability with my students. It’s great to be able to grade skills at different levels and this would be a great addition to our sensory motor tools for the preschool students that I work with.
I would use this for my students with motor planning, bilateral coordination and/or vestibular issues-I have had many parents requesting help in this area over the years. I think this would also be a great tool to assist with teaching safety awareness, endless possibilities!
I would use this is a tool for my son who struggles with motor planning and can not peddle his feet. I would also use it for sensory play.
I work at two different schools, one school has bikes for kids to use; however, the other has no bikes. It would be great to have something like this to utilize and use with the kids, especially those who struggle with balance tasks and those who do not know how to ride a bike.
This would be an amazing tool to help my kiddos at school! I could help many children for many years with this bike 🙂 This is something I don’t have a budget for but a needed tool!
I work in school as a COTA with many students who could benefit from this awesome tool to help with balance coordination skills.
I would use the balance bicycle to help children who have difficulty with vestibular input (over responsive) to ease them into learning how to ride the bicycle.
Bike would work great for students I have that are have difficulty steering and pedaling at the same time and are either fearfully of either falling or crashing into something. Being more successful on a 2 wheel bike will sure build their self confidence!
I would use it to teach my nephews how to balance after their parents recover from Covid.
I would use the bike with my preschoolers who can’t pedal yet to develop the balance they will need later.
So many great things to work on for kiddos with this bike, but especially balance!
I LOVE this idea!! I know a certain 2-year old boy that I would love to see gain core strength and balance using this bike! What a great opportunity to help a child learn a skill and reap the rewards of watching him succeed!
This is a great tool for developing core strength and bilateral coordination. Our students are in need of movement opportunities that support growth in these areas now more than ever. My students love our scooters and refitter. This would be a nice addition!
Great size for little ones!
Thanks for the opportunity to win something so awesome! As someone who works in home health as contracted through a company, I’m only limited to the supplies that I can afford and buy myself. So something like this would be amazing to offer as an activity to my clients.
This would be great for my preschoolers during gym time or gross motor play!
It would be great to have it in our preschool for therapy. Our students have some trikes but nothing that changes their balance.
I would love to teach my niece how to ride a bike!
This bike would be great for children who experience gravitational insecurity learn to ride a bike. It’s a nice in between step for children struggling with picking their feet up off the ground to ride a bike.
This would be great for my 3 year old. He likes his toddler scooting toy. To be able to help him gain confidence and skills to help him learn to ride a bike would so helpful for him.
This would be great to work on balance, thr vestibular system, and so many other areas.
This balance bike would be a great tool to use in my in-home OT practice! I could encorporate it into obstacle courses or use it to work on balance with my kiddos.
This balance bike would be great to use with the special needs preschoolers I work with.
I am a motor para in our school district. Unfortunately money is scarce for equipment and tools invaluable for our kids. There are so many important attributes that balance bikes gives to children with special needs. But most importantly, learning needs to be fun.
Thanks for considering my entry!
I would love to use with my 2 to 3 year old clients in my outpatient PT clinic. This would be a great way to promote and improve balance, body control, and weight shifting.
My husband races dirtbikes and this would be perfect for our almost 1 year old to practice on!
I’m also an OT and this would also be perfect more my students!
Either way, it would get used!!
I would love to use this for my own 2.5 year old as well as my students who would love this treat to ride during school OT sessions!
I would use this with several of the students that I work with in multiple school districts during our school PT sessions!!!!!
This would be great for our “littles” who have balance and core strengthening issues!
What a fabulous tool this would be for the PT and OT to share! Not only will this bike work on many, many OT and PT performance components, but it works on the “super important to kids” component of being able to ride a bike…and that’s the coolest!! We have some really nice straight hallways in schools, and of course some great space outside already sectioned off for kids to safely use, due to COVID distancing guidelines. There are no words to describe seeing the smile on the face of a child when he/she has “got it” and is riding away from you all on his/her own.
I would love to have this Balance bike for my students, it would be a great way for them to work on balance & building core strength, along with some vestibular stimulation. Also, great for those sensory seekers!
I would use this for the students I have that struggle with the multi-tasking/motor planning of riding a bike. I can see so many of the kiddos experiencing so. much. JOY. using this bike!!
the balance bike would be great for large motor coordination and bilateral coordination
Both at work (bancroft School in Southern NJ) and at home (5 year old) this bike would help children learn to love movement, volitionally.
I would use this in our preschool to help kiddos with balance and motor planning.
I would love this! I work for a smaller peds clinic and we do not have anything like this. I have a lot of kiddos with poor core strength and bilateral coordination skills impacting their ability to ride a bike. This would be such a great way to help work on some foundational skills for the parents to carryover at home.
I would use this for my youngest 2 children.
This would be awesome in our sensory gym. Putting out an obstacle course for them to hold balance would be so much fun!
When working with my students we have a lot that need assistance with body awareness, balance and many other things. I service multiple school districts, all in low income. This would give the kids an opportunity to be able to achieve self-esteem, all while working through their occupational therapy goals.
I have so many students who would benefit from this bike to learn how to ride and gain a sense of movement.
I would use this bike to help teach my kiddos in therapy who are struggling to ride a bike. It has been a bike that I recommend to my families to help them with their children, but our clinic would greatly benefit from one!
This would be awesome in the sensory room at school to work on balance. Bike riding is such a lifetime skill that I would love to help little ones accomplish.
I would use it to continue incorporating fun into our sessions. I just taught a student with very complex needs to ride a bike (so far with training wheels) and mom could not believe it. Bike riding is something that so many are motivated to learn, and they end up gaining sooo many skills in the process!
I would love to add this to my tool kit, and to show it to the families so they can test it out and see if it can help their children.
This is exactly what I’ve been looking for to get my 19 month old girl for Christmas!! She is a brilliant little thing, but has struggled with gross motor skills and would learn so much from using a balance bike. She has progressed and now loves to ride her rocking horse, and a bike would be the perfect way to grade up the challenge and add alternating movements and greater challenge for balance!
I would love this for my 2.5 year old! he was in PT at the beginning of the year but had to stop due to finances and then Covid!! He has some gravitational insecurity and balance trouble.
Would love to use this with my pre-k age students and patients especially the one’s that don’t have access to bikes (while working on so many fundamental skills).
I would love to support my kids at work as an OT while sharing it with our PTs close by. I would also give my little guy some more strength and confidence to transition him to a two-wheeler ?
I would love to be able to use this in the outpatient pediatric setting! I’d love to incorporate it for our kiddos who have body coordination & awareness, as well as motor planning challenges!
Thanks for this opportunity!
Would be an awesome tool for our preschoolers.
This would be a great new tool for the schools I service.
I would help my students learn to visually focus on a targeted area or object to pedal to in order to help with the visual aspect of balance and movement in space.
I’d use it with the kiddo’s I work with :0)
This would be a great tool to use at my school that I work on to focus on balance.
I would love this bike for my 3 year old daughter as well as for my preschool students on my caseload!
This would be amazing to use with so many of my littles. So many of them struggle with coordination and core strength. We could ride this around our OT room.
I work in early intervention and love teaching kids how to ride a bike due to the overall benefits It provides in development!
In my clinic we run bike courses to teach our children to ride. We set up obstacle course with them to navigate on the balance bikes and they love it!
I would use this at my outpatient clinic with my kiddos that are working on Balance and coordination as well as core and trunk strengthening. They would have a blast!!!
As a COTA and grandma this is perfect!
Would love to try this with my daughter to build core strength!
One of my students has poor left-right body awareness and learning to ride a balance bike would support this kiddos proprioceptive and spatial development
This would be great for my preschoolers
We could use it at they playground area for our early childhood children
Would love this for my kit!
This would be great for the kids I see in the clinic!
Love working on core strength and balance by having them lift their feet and get help rotating their trunk by turning the handles
I am all about promoting functional movement for children I work with and children in my personal life.
Such a great tool to have for children working on balance, bilateral and reciprocal movement and coordination.
I love balance bikes. They are awesome to use.
We would be so grateful for this bike!
Riding a bicycle is such a motivating activity for the majority of children we see. They just light up! I like to not only work on the mechanics of riding to address balance, U\LE dissociation and coordination, visual scanning, vestibular processing, etc., but social skills and the confidence that comes with the success of such a tangible “kid skill”. I love to see their little faces and giggles as they wave to other kids and families. Those moments bring so much joy to our special kiddos who deserve those and so many, many more moments like that!
A balance bike would be great to help strengthen the core to help with riding a bike.
I have many kids on my caseload who struggle with bilateral coordination, balance, motor planning, visual perception, and praxis. All of which could be addressed with this bike!
I would use this to help give my 6 year old more confidence in bike riding and increase his core strength and visual perception skills.
My nephew, who has dyspraxia, learned to ride by beginning on a balance bike. At 22, he now uses his bike as his main mode of transportation to and from his jobs! How great it would be to start another child on that balance bike journey. Thanks for the opportunity!
Love different and fun ways to work on skills at school
would love to use this with some students on my caseload
The possibilities are endless! And the best part — it’s durable and will be useful for more than one child.
I would use this bike to help kids who are afraid to pedal on a bike due to poor balance and coordination.
This would be great for my daughter to learn to balance. She doesn’t have great proprioception because of EDS and this would be a safer way to learn.
This looks amazing! Would love to win it ❤️
This would be amazing to use while working with so many that have poor core strength and endurance.
I’d love to use this when I push into the classrooms with the preschoolers to work on core strength, balance, motor planning, etc. They will feel like big kids!
Would love to use this with my students when we work on gross motor skills and transitioning in the school.
Would use it as a preschool center activity in the hallway outside the preschool classroom and set it up with carpet markers, carpet tape and/or cones for students to have a few obstacles to move around.
This would be great for the pre-K kids I work with the promote balance!
As an outpatient OT I would use the balance bike to help children explore their balance and own skills to learn how to ride a bike which is I believe is essential for everyday skills.
I would put them on a very gentle hill to experience how the bike can move.
this balance bike would be perfect for my boys to learn balance and skills for bike riding!
This would be wonderful to work on motor planning, balance, as well as providing vestibular input!!
The perfect sensory motor break! Great for teaching balance, coordination, core strength, visual skills and more! Would love to use this in therapy.
I have a prospective job lined up working with children who have significant sensory needs. I would use this for sensory while also building upon balance, core strength, and bilateral coordination.
This would be a fun and great equipment to work on postural stability, balance, and bilateral coordination for kids with special needs in my school.
I would love to be able to gift this to a kiddo on my caseload who otherwise would never have the chance to have a bike of his own!
This would be such a motivator for students! Great warm up activity to work on so many skills!
I would use it with my 2 yo son for now since schools are remote.
This would be a great to get kids moving.
Great addition to the center based program for children with Autism I work at.
Leaning to ride a bike is important skill and work on development. However many kids doesn’t get that opportunity to learn. The bike above will help them learn and be confident in their skill.
I would love to have this to teach my 7 year old, as well as take it to work to use with students.
While on a pilgrimage in Spain where I had the opportunity to walk through several small towns, I saw many very young children proficiently riding bikes. I wondered why. Then I saw even younger children – 2 year olds! – on balance bikes. It was my ah-ha moment in my OT brain! I realized that these very little ones learn to BALANCE first! Training wheels are for parents, not children. I vowed then and there I would introduce students, grands, and parents to the benefits of a balance bike. I introduce balance bikes by doing a scavenger hunt and letting them push and glide from station to station. We can do it indoors if there is enough room, or outside. I am always nearby for reassurance and to assist if needed.
I Would love to have this to work on gross motor and balance impairments for my kiddos who are stuck in quarantine.
I would use this bike with my kiddos on an obstacle course or interactive path to improve gross motor skills, coordination, balance, core strength, and visual perception skills.
This bike would be ever so helpful for my kiddos with a myriad of abilities and needs! Definitely something not in the budget! Wow this would help many kids for many years. This would give my kiddos access to a fun and helpful activity!!
This is a perfect tool to transition children from tricycles to a bicycle. Fun way to work on balance and motor planning!
This would be a great tool for working on balance, motor planning, and and core muscles. Most of my students are in the Life Skills classroom and don’t have the opportunity or ability to ride a normal bike. Giving them the skills to learn to ride a bike in a safe, non threatening way would be wonderful.
Well my students would really love this but I’d love it for my own 3 year old with Down syndrome. Everything is so big for her petite legs, this would do the trick!
i think this would help my son be less afraid to try riding.
I would use this at our preschool to encourage all of the children to learn to balance & ride.
This would be a great way to provide sensory input and work on balance, coordination, and motor planning with my students!
This is just the world’s best way to teach a kiddo how to ride a bike. Way beyond that though is all the amazing vestibular and proprioceptive input that this toy can provide.
Core strength!!
I would donate this to our school’s PE teacher who could use it for multiple students for years to come. He’s great working with students with disabilities, and this would be a great way to increase his biking unit to include students with disabilities.
I would love to win this to use at the daycare I service.
When we are back in school, this would come in handy for myself and other OTs and PTs to share to help students and families start an activity they can do together at a local park!
This is fantastic for grading the overwhelming activity of riding a bicycle. I would definitely use this to help with activity analysis and motor planning/praxis needed to ride a bike and help kids feel comfortable and confident in their own skills!
We have tricycles in our program. This would be a great addition to bicycle riding development.
Great for core strength!
What an amazing bike and a wonderful tool to teach my students on the spectrum how to ride. Such a great gift for anyone.
This bike is the perfect way to teach the kiddos I work with how to ride a bike.
I would love to use this with my students! Thank you!
I would absolutely love this to work on balance skills with my youngest kids! What a wonderful way to introduce biking to young kids- sets them up to be successful when they’re old enough to ride a real bike!
I would work with my kiddo outside in our back yard and sport court and just have fun! He is 6 next week and hasn’t gotten the hang of traditional bikes. I would ask for tips from his OT on how to improve the areas you listed he needs to learn this new skill:
Core strength
Motor planning
Balance
Sequencing
Postural praxis
Upper body/lower body disassociation
Motivation
Body awareness
Visual convergence
Visual scanning
Coordination
We enjoy going on family walks and have tried lots of “bikes”. I’m hopeful this one will work for him:)
Our PT uses one of these bikes regularly at one of our schools. The kids love it. I would use it to work on self confidence, bilateral skills, coordination and as an incentive at the end of therapy sessions.
I would love to use this with the school aged children I work with as an OT, many with motor planning, balance, and vision goals.
Oh a can just see a pre-k kid ridding down the hall to the therapy gym now! What a fun motivator. Making an obstacle course with pre riding activities would be fun too. Such a great therapy tool!!
I would love this to teach my 5 year old how to ride a bike!
I am a school based PT always on the hunt for new activities. This would be a great alternative to the Plasma car which I already have as a new way for motor planning, coordination and problem solving. I could also use it alongside the Plasma car for group sessions to set up an obstacle course race and other peer to peer activities.
The kids would I’ve this. It would be a fun movement or sensory break activity.
The kids would I’ve this. It would be a fun movement or sensory break activity.
So many of my kids love riding bikes during my sessions! This would be great for our clinic since our bikes are older…this is a great activity to reach balance, coordination, alternating left and right, bilateral coordination, and strength.
Wow i sure need it in my new kindergarten
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