self-dressing Archives

Learn to Dress Toys

April 10, 2024December 4, 2023 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

This blog post on learn to dress toys, was originally written 11-10-2014 and was updated 12-4-2023.

Occupational therapy practitioners work with children on a variety of self-care tasks, one of them being teaching kids to dress themselves. Because of that, we often use learn to dress toys in building dressing skills like managing zippers, buttons, the sensory motor skills involved with clothing snaps, tying shoes, etc. In this blog post, you’ll find information on what age should a child dress themselves as well as toy recommendations to make the self-care task of children dressing themselves fun and engaging through dressing skills toys.

Learn to Dress Toys

Looking for toys to support kids in self-care, especially in independence with self-dressing skills? These occupational therapy toys are fun ways to build skills in self care!

Parents often question when should child dress themselves, and there is much to consider. We cover all of the fine motor skills needed for dressing skills in a different blog post, because there are many underlying skill components that are needed for getting dressed.

When it comes to learn to dress toys, we can foster the development of getting dressed skills in kids because the toys make working on these sensory motor skills more engaging and fun. When paired with a toy or dressing skills doll, the self-care task becomes part of the play, combining functional performance areas.

In order to play with the learn to dress doll, a child needs to manage the buttons, snaps, zippers, etc. And, if they are playing with a dressing toy that has small clothing, or other fasteners like clips or buckles to place the doll into a stroller, they are are strengthening fine motor skills.

The play easily meshes with the functional performance area of self-dressing because the same motor planning skills are used and can be transferred to self-dressing.

We’ll cover specific toy recommendations for teaching dressing skills below. First, let’s go over the dressing developmental milestones for each age range. It’s important to know these general dates and dressing milestones because the toy recommendations can follow these guidelines. Also, when parents ask about when should a child be able to dress themselves, this information can go hand-in-hand with toy ideas to support developmental milestone progression.

Dressing Developmental Milestones

Teaching children to get dressed on their own can be a tricky subject. Kids achieve many developmental milestones at different ages and teaching independence skills can be frustrating. The ability to dress oneself is a self-care task that is part of child development.

Teaching kids to get dressed depends on many small splinter skills that make up the end result of clothing on, fasteners done, and child ready to go for the day.

Learning to get dressed takes time and it depends on the development of fine motor skills, gross motor skills, visual-motor skills, and even self-confidence. Children may reach some milestones ahead of “schedule” and require more time or practice to reach others. It is important to remember that every child is different.

Childhood Milestones for Getting Dressed

Here, we are sharing some approximate self-care milestones in dressing for kids and toys that can help with this skill. Remember that every child is different and the age ranges listed below are approximate.

This list of dressing milestones for each age is progressive, meaning that the list includes the milestones attained previously. Skills will progress as sensory and motor skills are accomplished. Previously achieved milestones may become easier, more fluent, and automatic as the child develops.

Dressing Skills for a One year old:

Takes off socks
Helps with pushing arms through sleeves

Dressing skills at Eighteen months:

Removes shoes

Dressing skills for Two years old:

Helps with pushing down pants
Helps with pulling on socks
Pushes arms through sleeves once shirt is over head
Removes hats
Assists with pants by pushing legs into pants
Unbuttons large buttons

Dressing skills for Two-and-a-half years old:

Attempts buttons
Able to pull on an open front shirt or jacket with assistance
Removes open front shirt/coat (without fasteners)

Dressing skills for Three years old:

Puts socks and shoes on
Able to pull on a shirt correctly
Able to put on shoes (may be wrong feet)
Able to put on socks (may be incorrectly oriented)
Able to pull up a zipper if engaged
Able to button large buttons

Dressing skills for Three-and-a-half years old:

Able to unzip a jacket
Able to unbuckle a buckle- Buckle toys are great for this skill!
Able to pull shirt on and orient clothing (front to back correctly)
Takes off shirt and pants

Dressing skills for Four years old:

Buttons coat or shirt
Able to put socks on with correct orientation
Able to initiate zipper by inserting one side into the zipper carriage

Dressing skills for Five years old:

Put shoes on correct feet
Dresses independently

Dressing skills for Six years old

Zips/unzips independently
Ties shoes

Dressing skills for Seven years old and older:

Chooses clothing appropriate to the weather

Each of the dressing skills noted above can be generalized, according the the needs of the individual. For example, children from various cultures or environments may have different types of clothing or clothing fasteners that are required at various ages. These differences may mean more or less exposure to different dressing skills.

Toys to help kids learn to get dressed

Now that we’ve covered dressing milestones and ages, let’s go over some toy suggestions for dressing skills.

The learning to dress toys include a variety of options:

Learn to dress dolls
Zip, button, buckle, tie dolls and toys
Dressing boards
Dress up puzzles
Clothing fastener supports
Dressing lap pads
Getting dressed supports like fun visual tools

gift guide toys for helping kids to learn to dress themselves independently

When a child needs to work on some skills for their independence, toys can be the way to go! These toys are great for developing independence in dressing skills. This post contains affiliate links.

Sequencing Toys for Dressing Skills

Picture sequencing puzzles like this What Happens Next puzzle (affiliate link) is great for kids who need to gain insight into concepts of before and after. You can not put your shoes on before you put your socks on. Cognitive concepts can be tricky for children to understand if auditory processing of these ideas are difficult.

These picture puzzle pieces are not all about dressing skills, but the first, second, last sequence and order words are a helpful first step for children learning to get dressed on their own.

Books about learning to get dressed

These learn to get dressed books support skills like why wearing appropriate clothing for the weather is important. They can be a great way to incorporate discussions of interoception into the task of self-dressing skills.

Oliver West Gets Dressed (affiliate link) is a fun book for the smallest children. This book will introduce terms and language needed for independence in getting dresses.

“Ella Sarah Gets Dressed” (affiliate link) is a fun book to read for getting dressed ideas.

These toys to work on clothing fasteners are dressing boards. They can be incorporated into play by using in different positions, in sensory play, and in obstacle courses.

Working on buttons, snaps, and other fasteners is great for practicing on boards, books, and dolls. However, it is often difficult for children to relate the skills they learn on these tools to real clothing that is ON their bodies.

Manipulating clothing and fasteners is actually OPPOSITE movement patterns when fastening these same fasteners on the body verses on a board or doll that the child is looking at.

This Special Needs Sensory Activity Apron (Children & Adult Sizes)(affiliate link) solves that issue as the child can manage the clothing fasteners right on their lap. This is so great for children with motor planning difficulties.

You could also use a Montessori Buttoning Frame with Large Buttons Dressing Frame (affiliate link) and lay it right on the child’s lap.

Children’s Factory Manual Dexterity Vests – Button-Zipper Combo Vest (affiliate link) is a good way to practice buttons and zippers right on the child.

Other dressing board toys include (affiliate links):

The Original Dressing Board– includes buttons, snaps, buckles, zippers, and other clothing fasteners.
Fine Motor Fidget and Dressing Skills Board– has many pages of activities. This looks like so much fun!

Sometimes managing a zipper can be difficult because grasping the zipper is ineffective or clumsy. A large zipper pull can make managing the zipper on clothing or a backpack much easier.

These 4 pcs Large Flowers Zipper Pull / Zip pull Charms for Jacket Backpack Bag Pendant (affiliate link) are great for flower lovers, or maybe your child would rather have cool princess zipper pulls (affiliate link). You could also incorporate crafting and make your own DIY zipper pull fidget using a pipe cleaner and beads.

More fine motor practice can be done with the Buckle Toy “Bentley” Caterpillar (affiliate link). I actually love this for the Toddler age set who LOVE to buckle car seats, high chairs, and all things buckles. This cute little caterpillar also works on numbers for pre-math learning, too. Here are more of our favorite buckle toys for therapy.

Practice basic clothing fastener skills like buttons, zippers, snaps, and ties with the Melissa & Doug Basic Skills Board(affiliate link). The bright colors are fun and will get little fingers moving on clothing fasteners.

Learn to Dress Dolls

The nice thing about using learn to dress dolls is that they are a part of play and make the skill-building fun. However, just because the phrase “learn to dress doll” has the word “doll” in it, doesn’t mean that you can only find dolls that offer these sensory motor skills. There are learn to dress figures and toys like monkeys and other fun figures.

Learning to Get Dressed Monkey (affiliate link) is a fun toy for clothing fasteners.

Here are other fun learn to dress doll options (affiliate links)

June Learn to Dress Doll
Buckle Penguin– This toy helps with learning to manage buckles
Learn to Dress Owls– These owl stuffed animals are great for kids that don’t want to play with dolls.

Dress Up Puzzles

There are dress up puzzles and mix and match dressing toys that help younger children to play with and explore different clothing options. This is nice for those struggling with clothing options based on weather or activity.

Some of our favorite dress up puzzles include:

Responsibility Chart for Getting Dressed:

I Can Do It! Reward and Responsibility Chart (affiliate link) is a great idea for kids that need a little motivation to be independent. Making the morning routine smoother can make a big difference in independence. Older kids may benefit from this chart for self-confidence or working on responsibilities.

Shoe Tying Gifts

There are many shoe tying toys out there…

Melissa & Doug Deluxe Wood Lacing Sneaker (affiliate link) is a fun toy for shoe tying practice. The big, chunky shoe makes it fun. Sometimes different colored shoe laces help when a child is learning to tie shoes. I love these Easy Tie Shoelaces (affiliate link) that come in two different colors.

Other toys that build skills…

Gift Guide: Toys to Promote Improved Pencil grasp

Gift Guide: Toys for Sensory Play

Ages of typical development for children in getting dressed. Developmental milestones for independence.

Do you have any favorite learn to dress toys, dressing boards, or dress up dolls?

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.

How to Hold a Spoon and Fork

October 19, 2023October 10, 2022 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

Teaching a child how to hold a spoon and scoop food requires several motor skills that must be developed before a toddler can use utensils themselves. Even older children struggle with the ADLs of holding a spoon and scooping food to feed themselves. Here, we’re covering sensory motor skills needed to hold a spoon, fork, knife, and other utensils. You’ll also find some creative activities and play ideas to develop the underlying skills that play into using utensils.

Note that these strategies and skill areas are needed across the lifespan when it comes to self-feeding. Older children and even adults who may have had a physical or cognitive impairment can benefit from addressing the underlying skill areas needed for using utensils. No matter the age, noting how an individual holds a spoon and fork is part of a comprehensive feeding evaluation.

how to hold spoon and fork

Before we get to the skills in play when holding a spoon or using a fork, let’s cover the specifics on how to hold these utensils. Why? Because often, we see older children who hold a spoon with a gross grasp or hold a fork with the whole hand. These grasp patterns can impact functional performance, but can also be a cause of concern for parents.

Note that the way an individual holds a spoon or holds a fork can differ when adaptive equipment for eating is used.

how to hold a spoon

To hold a spoon, one needs to grasp the utensil with their dominant hand.

The spoon is placed along the lateral edge of the middle finger or pad of the middle finger.

The pointer or index finger typically rests over the top of the neck of the spoon, and guides movements when scooping.

The thumb rests and stabilizes the flat handle of the spoon on the top, above the pointer finger in a modified lateral key grasp.

The scoop of the spoon is pointing out toward the direction the thumb points, and the handle is above the thumb web space.

In this position, one can scoop with refined movements and graded precision using the pad of the thumb on the flat part of the spoon handle. When the spoon is properly placed in the hand, the wrist is slightly pronated and slightly flexed.

You can see from the image below that there are many different grasp patterns used when holding a spoon, which progress as the child develops more refined fine motor skills. The most efficient grasp pattern is the “adult grip”, however, the other grasp patterns are typically part of a progression as the toddler or young child gains experience with eating with a spoon.

Using a spoon is likely one of the first functional tools that a small child has experience with, and while messy eating will ensue, it is important to allow the baby or toddler experience with holding and manipulating a spoon, even if they are not getting actual food into their mouth at first.

*Grasp patterns for holding a spoon*.
No source was found for this image, may be subject to copyright

Inefficient grasp on a spoon- When the handle end of the spoon is UNDER the thumb web space, the grasp moves into a poor position for function and accuracy of scooping. In this case, the hand moves into a gross grasp pattern, and in order to gain motor control with graded precision, the elbow tends to pop out as the shoulder abducts. In this poor functional grasp pattern, you’ll see the wrist fully supinated.

Activities to move from an inefficient grasp pattern to an efficient grasp pattern include PLAY:

LightBrite activities
Play dough
Blocks
LEGO
Building toys
Hand strengthening activities

how to hold a fork

Next, let’s cover the proper grasp pattern required to effectively hold a fork. Note that there are different ways to hold a fork, depending on location, no one way of these different style being better or worse for functional performance to hold and use a fork to stab and eat food.

To hold a fork, the fork is held in the dominant hand much like a pencil is held. The thumb stabilizes the narrow part of the fork handle, or the neck of the fork. This area is located above the prongs, or tines of the fork. The neck of the fork rests on the lateral side of the middle finger or the pad of the middle finger.

Like holding a spoon, the end of the fork is above the back of the hand, and not under the thumb web space into the palm.

The wrist of the hand should be slightly pronated and slightly flexed.

Note that when holding a fork to scoop food, a different grasp pattern is used than when using a fork to stab food, and still another grasp pattern is used to stabilize food when using a knife to cut.

To stab food with a fork, the fork rotates in the hand and skills of in-hand manipulation are used.

To stabilize food with a fork, in order to hold food stabile so a knife can cut the food item, the fork continues to rotate within the hand using in-hand manipulation, but the addition of finger isolation of the index finger is used to hold the fork steady.

Inefficient grasp on a fork– When the end of the fork handle is under the palm, the hand tends to pull into a gross grasp on the fork, which is a more primitive grasp pattern, and is less functional for refined and graded movements. Similar to the motions used with a spoon held in this manner, a fork held in a gross grasp will include elbow and shoulder.

Much like using a spoon, progression from inefficient grasp patterns on a fork is developmental and requires practice. Allowing kids to use and hold a fork with verbal and visual prompts is helpful. Other fine motor and eye-hand coordination tasks will support development from inefficient grasp patterns when holding a fork to more efficient and refined motor skills:

Playing with play dough and using play dough tools like play knives, play forks, and sculpting tools
Cutting with scissors
Finger isolation activities
Dropping items like cut straws or pipe cleaner pieces into a bottle
Sorting coins into a piggy bank or recycled containers with slotted lids
In-hand manipulation activities

We’ve created a video that shows how different grasp patterns impact functional use in holding and using a spoon and fork. If you can’t view this video, we’ve also posted the activity ideas to help kids hold a spoon on our YouTube channel.

Prerequisites to hold a spoon and fork

Before a child can use fine motor tools such as a spoon, fork, knife and other self-care tools (hair brush, toothbrush, pencil, scissors…) independently, there are certain physical, cognitive, and emotional prerequisites that must fall into place.

These self-care skills include many of the same sensory motor components, so in this blog post, we’re covering primarily the skills needed to hold a spoon and fork.

Toddlers and young preschoolers that sit at the table, probably have taken notice of how adults and older children at the table eat. This is actually part of the developmental process. When sitting at a table, a baby and toddler is observing and noticing how older siblings and parents use forks to stab food, spoons to scoop, and knives to cut.

Toddlers often want to take part in the action!

Using a spoon and fork during the Toddler years is a natural development of self-awareness and self-control. Using utensils is part of that progression of feeding developmental milestones that children go through. A child becomes more aware of the skills that they are developing and that they can assert their own independence.

Likewise, using a spoon to eat at first can lead to messy eating with young children, and that’s totally normally, developmentally.

But, before these areas of independence arise, there are certain prerequisites that need to be in place. Using tools in self-feeding, brushing one’s own teeth, using a knife, crayon, pencil, or other tool requires development in a few areas.

Speaking of using crayons to develop motor skills, these crayons for toddlers support fine motor development and coordination skills through play.

Prerequisites that are necessary for kids (or adults!) to effectively and efficiently use tools in fine motor and self-care tasks, like scissor use, handwriting, hair brushing, self-feeding, tooth brushing, and more. From an Occupational Therapist.

This post contains affiliate links.

Skills Needed to Hold a spoon and fork

When you take a look at the motor breakdown of using a spoon and fork, there are several components you’ll see in action:

Posture
Grasp Development
Hand Preference
Cognition
Attention
Eye-hand coordination
Somatosensory experience
And even play!

Let’s cover each of these areas needed to hold a spoon and fork in more detail:

Posture- When using a tool like a fork, pencil, scissors, toothbrush, paint brush, knife…postural control is essential. Like anything else, it all starts at the center and at the body. You can’s use your hands in fine motor play activities if your upper body is slumped or slouched. If postural support is the issue, work on getting into a better sitting position. Speak to an Occupational Therapist for individualized assessment and recommendations.
Grasp Development- For using tools, a child needs prehension skills and precision skills, including grasp, release, and the ability to stabilize their arm and write while moving the hand. Sometimes a pinch or required muscle movement is too much for an unstable arm/wrist and that required muscle effort makes the upper body slouch. Start over with posturing is this happens.
Hand dominance– A true hand dominance doesn’t typically become established until 5-6 years. And that is a good thing! A child’s body is developing strength, balance, muscle tone, and sensorimotor abilities at an even and symmetrical rate in the early years. We want that to happen! If a very strong preference of dominance is noticed at an early age, ask your pediatrician or occupational therapist for assessment of asymmetry or delay.
Cognitive prerequisites– Appropriate ability to follow simple directions is a must in order for use of tools in typical ways. Sure, a fork makes a great hair brush. A spoon is an excellent drumstick. But, inappropriate use of utensils can be dangerous.
Attentional Prerequisites– Appropriate attention span is needed for using tools in functional tasks. This blog post covers more on attention needed during meals.
Constructive play– What? A child needs functional play in order to use a pencil? Yep! Building with blocks, combining toys, and pretending provides the base of fine motor development, skilled use, strength, imagination, and creativity that is needed to problem solve and use tools appropriately.
Eye Hand Coordination– More play! Catch a ball and use crayons to establish the base of hand eye coordination needed for skilled maneuvering of tools to the mouth, paper, hair, or teeth.
Somatosensory Experience– Playing and experiencing the senses in typical every day activities are essential for the child to build on their awareness of textures, weights, manipulating objects, and sizes.

Given all of these areas that a child must have in place before showing success with tools in functional tasks, it’s important to work on certain areas.

Below, you’ll find a great printable resource that covers all of these skill areas that are needed for using a spoon and fork. This is a great handout to use especially when working with families of young children who are learning to hold a spoon and fork.

You can enter your email address into the form below and access this printable handout, or The OT Toolbox Member’s Club members can log into their accounts and access the handout in the Educational Handouts Toolbox area.

Scooping food with a spoon

Teaching kids how to hold a spoon is the first step, but then actually scooping food, getting the food to the mouth, clearing the food from the spoon, and then repeating the process is part of the functional task of eating.

Remember that eating is a developmental process, and that this is another occupation in which practice is key to functional performance!

To improve use with a spoon and fork (and then spoon, fork, and knife!), it’s important to have various opportunities for practice.

Provide opportunities to use tools like spoons in scooping items. You’ll find more information on the topic of scooping in our blog post on scooping and pouring.

These black beans are a great way to practice tool use and all of the skills needed in managing tools. See the bottom of this post for more ideas.

Be sure to provide your little one with lots of opportunities to use tools in activities and play!

Related activities that you will love for teaching kids to use tools:

Sight Word Scoop– this scooping activity encourages users to develop the eye-hand coordination needed to use a spoon to scoop an object in a liquid, much like scooping the remaining cereals in a bowl of milk, or scooping food from a soup broth.
Toddler Visual Motor Scoop (Ping Pong balls)– This activity is another great way to teach toddlers to use a spoon, using a large and bright object with high visual contrast.
Invitation to Scoop and Pour– In this activity users can use a spoon with graded precision and refined movements to scoop grains of corn which can be a great way to practice motor skills to hold a spoon.
Field Corn Sensory Bin– Another activity using spoons to scoop field corn, this activity offers proprioceptive feedback through the joints and muscles of the hand, wrist, elbow, and shoulder.
Moon Dough Scooping– In this activity, users use a spoon to scoop and pick up a moist and dry material. This can be a great way to practice using a spoon with different materials.
Scooping Ice– Using a spoon to pick up ice is a fun way to practice using a spoon with a different material that also offers precision and refinement in using a spoon or scoop.
Relaxing Lavender Water Bin– Kids love this sensory bin, but therapists love the functionality! Use a spoon to pick up small items in a liquid, developing eye-hand coordination skills with sensory benefits.
Invitation to Scoop, Pour, Transfer Nuts– Use a spoon to pick up nuts with a fun sensory activity that offers feedback with movement.
Scooping Dyed Alphabet pasta– Kids can pick up dry pasta with a spoon and practice motor skills.
(Amazon affiliate link) Learning Resources Handy Scoopers are colorful and bright and a great way to practice the prerequisites for tool use in many ways.

How to hold a fork and spoon handout — *Get this free handout on skills needed to hold a fork and spoon below or in The OT Toolbox Member’s Club*

Free Handout- Skills Needed to Hold a Spoon and Fork

Want a printable handout of the skills kids need to hold a spoon and fork? Working with families on teaching kids how to hold a fork and spoon and need actionable tips and strategies in a handout format?

Zipper Pull Craft

July 19, 2019March 17, 2018 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

When kids are learning to manage a zipper, it can be frustrating if fine motor skills or visual motor skills are delayed. Even children who are developing fine motor and visual motor skill work at an age-appropriate level can have difficulty with using a zipper. When kids learn to zipper up a coat or jacket, children can have difficulty with all of the steps that go into zippering. Using a zipper pull on a coat zipper can be a helpful tool in independence.

You will find more information about teaching kids how to zipper here on The OT Toolbox. In fact, zippering is an important part of self-dressing and functional independence that toddlers can begin with.

Make this DIY zipper pull craft to help kids learn how to zipper their own coat or jacket, while working on fine motor skills and self-dressing skills in kids.

When small children are able to pull up their zipper or pull down their zipper, they can feel a sense of self-confidence that makes them want to try harder to work on the skills involved in zippering: engaging the zipper into the zipper chamber, holding both sides of the zipper in a coordinated way, and holding down the edge of the coat while pulling up the zipper pull.

Other children who are more challenged with physical abilities benefit from a zipper pull.

Try this DIY zipper pull craft that is not only functional, it’s also fun to create! It’s a real fine motor power-craft for kids.

Click here to see the directions to make this craft over on our guest post at Craft Project Ideas!

Looking for more ways to teach kids how to zipper? Try these ideas:

Clothing fasteners and sensory processing challenges

Teach Kids How to Use a Zipper

The Ultimate Guide to Independence with Clothing Fasteners

February 21, 2020November 21, 2016 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

If you’ve been following the Functional Skills for Kids series this year, then you know the wealth of information that has been shared. Each month, the team of OT and PT bloggers have broken down a functional task into it’s development, necessary components, and strategies for increasing independence. This month brings buttons, snaps, buckles, and the ultimate guide to independence with clothing fasteners.

Check out the links below to find everything you need to help kids with management of clothing fasteners with increased independence. From pincer grasp to shoulder girdle stabilization and sensory processing to visual motor skills, children have a lot of precursors to master before they can independently put on their jacket or managing their clothing in the school bathroom.

The Ultimate Guide to Independence with Clothing Fasteners

When Can Kids Learn to Button and Zip? | Mama OT

Clothing Fasteners and Gross Motor Skill Development | Your Therapy Source Inc

How to Adapt Buttoning and Zipping for Your Child | Miss Jaime OT

Learning How To Use Buttons, Snaps, Zippers, and Buckles Through Play | Growing Hands-On

rel=”nofollow”Tips to Teach Kids to Zip and Button | The Inspired Treehouse

Pinch. Poke. Snap… Helping Kids to Manage Buttons, Zips and More! | Your Kids OT

Clothing Fasteners and Sensory Processing | Sugar Aunts

The Visual Motor Aspect of Buttons and Zippers | Therapy Fun Zone

Functional Skills for Kids and a guide to independence with clothing fasteners.

Clothing Fasteners and Sensory Processing Issues

April 11, 2024November 15, 2016 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

One aspect of the Activities of Daily Living we complete each day is fastening clothing fasteners. In this blog post we are covering the skills needed for managing clothing fasteners. Lets go over one aspect of sensory issues with clothing: clothing fasteners like buttons, snaps, zippers, and shoe ties.

Sensory processing affects everything we do. From movement and learning on down to the tiniest snaps and buttons that adorn our clothing. Many times, children with problems with sensory processing skills have difficulty with manipulating clothing fasteners.

Here, you will find sensory-related issues that may impact a child’s ability to fasten and manipulate clothing fasteners, strategies that can help with independence in addressing sensory processing issues, and sensory-friendly clothing fastener solutions.

Clothing fasteners and sensory processing issues can affect buttons, snaps, buckles, and zippers.

Clothing fasteners and sensory processing issues

Clothing Fasteners and Sensory Issues

Today in the Functional Skills for Kids series, ten Occupational Therapist and Physical Therapist bloggers are sharing everything there is to know about manipulating buttons, snaps, zippers, and buckles.

The child with sensory processing issues may experience patterns of behavior related to many skills needed for managing clothing fasteners. There can be giant clothing sensitivities that are red flags that we can help the individual in some way. This might look like sensory friendly clothing that accommodates for challenges with clothing fasteners. Or, it might look like wearing compression garments under a shirt that has a zipper on it.

In turn, a difficulty in movement, reactions, balance, and posture can interfere with managing buttons, zippers, snaps, and buckles. Clumsy fine motor skills may present during manipulation of clothing fasteners.

There are many other issues that present with sensory processing problems that may present during management of clothing fasteners:

RELATED READ: Buttoning Activities for Kids

Vestibular Sensory and clothing fasteners:

Poor bilateral coordination– Children with poor sensory processing often times present with bilateral coordination difficulties. Gross motor tasks and coordinated use of the hands in fine motor tasks at midline appear to be clumsy. Managing buttons, snaps, and zippers are difficult when asking these children to use their hands together. Tasks such as buttoning and zipping require one hand to perform a precision task while the other hand assists. These types of skills challenge the child with poor bilateral coordination. While children with poor bilateral coordination may not have a clear established dominant hand, it can be difficult to manipulate buttons when one hand is not defined as the “skilled” hand.

Difficulty with movement– Children with unmet sensory needs can present as fidgety and uncoordinated, making clothing fastener management quite difficult.

Low Muscle Tone– Children with sensory processing difficulties quite often present with low tone. Weakness in the arms, shoulder girdle, and core can prompt the child to stabilize on table surfaces or with accommodating positioning. These issues along with tone and strength weaknesses in the hands then prevents the child from manipulating clothing fasteners or enduring the length of a buttoning/zippering/etc task. Fatigue can limit training sessions or prevent the child from completing clothing fastener tasks in an efficient manner

Poor motor planning (dyspraxia)– A vestibular dysfunction can result in poor motor planning with the child having trouble in planning out the sequence of buttoning and unbuttoning clothing, or engaging a zipper into the chamber, then pulling up the pull. It can be difficult for these children to generalize what they have practice on a dressing board to clothing on the body. Likewise, generalizing skills they have practiced with one sweater (and one size buttons/clothing material/ button hole opening/etc) to another sweater or one zipper to another zipper can be difficult.

Proprioceptive Issues and clothing fasteners:

Seek sensory feedback– Children who present with proprioceptive dysfunction may seek out sensory feedback. Snaps or zippers can be a source of sensory feedback in an inefficient manner.

Inefficient body awareness– See below.

Inefficient grading of movement– Managing clothing fasteners can be difficult for the child who has trouble grading the amount of movement needed for positioning their arms and maintaining position while fastening clothing. These children might grip the zipper pull too lightly or too tightly making fastening a zipper difficult. Buttons might pull off of clothing when the child with grading issues attempts to button or unbutton clothing.

Poor motor planning (dyspraxia)– See below

Tactile Sensory Needs and clothing fasteners

Hypersensitive to touch (Tactile Defensiveness)– The child with tactile defensiveness may have trouble manipulating clothing fasteners. Certain clothing materials can be offensive to children with tactile defensiveness. The texture of a zipper or Velcro can cause an adverse reaction. Stiff collars or zippers, belts, and rough clothing textures and fasteners can cause a negative reaction from the child who is hypersensitive to touch. These children may prefer clothing without fasteners or refuse to wear winter coats or jackets with these offensive fasteners.

Hyposensitivity or an under-responsiveness to touch– The child with hyposensitivity to touch may present during an attempt to complete clothing fasteners. These children may fail to realize that they have omitted buttons or snaps on their clothing.

Poor tactile discrimination– Children who have difficulty with discriminating touch have difficulty manipulating items and using their hands without looking at what their hands are doing. These children may be unable to perform the steps of buttoning and unbuttoning, zippering, and snapping clothing fasteners without visual cues. They might perform these tasks in peculiar manners with inefficient grasps. These children may seem to touch their clothing fasteners excessively, such as run their fingers up and down the zipper. They enjoy the sensory feedback from running their hands over clothing fasteners.

Poor tactile perception– The child with poor tactile perception will have trouble with perceiving the location of button holes without visually looking at the fasteners. They will have trouble identifying the two sides of a zipper by touch.

Poor body awareness– Children with sensory processing issues often times have trouble with body awareness. They have difficulty knowing where their body is in space and how to move it in order to perform tasks. Moving the arms in order to perform fine motor tasks such as buttoning and unbuttoning a sweater can be quite difficult.

Poor motor planning (dyspraxia)– Sensory processing issues may present with resulting dyspraxia or motor planning difficulties. These kids have trouble organizing and following through with the movement needed to perform tasks such as buttoning and zippering. These children will have trouble with precision of fine motor manipulation, making engaging a zipper and buttoning and unbuttoning very difficult.

Visual Spatial Processing and clothing fasteners:

Difficulty seeing with eyes working as a “team”, particularly when managing fasteners on the body.

Difficulty shifting gaze from different planes when managing fasteners on the body.

Confuse or mis-align buttons to button holes. May present with increased difficulty when managing buttons on the body.

Difficulty with sequential tasks in buttoning or zipper management.

Looking at all of these different areas, it is easy to see why the child with sensory processing issues has trouble with managing clothing fasteners!

Many children have several of the above issues that present as a result of sensory concerns. Bilateral coordination or low tone concerns may be accompanied by evidence of poor sensory processing. Observations of issues described above may be part of the explanation for difficulty with fine motor manipulation, but it is important to note that every child is different and what is described here may not be the entire story. Strategies and descriptions here will not explain every issue with clothing fasteners when sensory issues are present.

So, what is to be done to help kids with building independence and carrying over skills to allow kids to independently managing buttons, zippers, snaps, and buckles on their clothing?

RELATED READ: Zipper Activities for Kids

Sensory Strategies for clothing fasteners:

Some children with tactile discrimination difficulties have trouble processing the the spatial or temporal information gathered through touch during tasks such as managing clothing fasteners. Intervention for tactile dysfunction can be done along with intervention for dyspraxia. Deep pressure, activities that provide tactile sensation with temporal and spatial qualities, brushing the skin, using vibrating stimulation to the skin, and tactile play activities can help with discrimination needed for clothing fasteners.

Sensory needs may benefit from heavy input through the hands, strengthening, positioning, visual and verbal cues, practicing fastener management on the body, and practicing fasteners while seated or standing.

Sensory Strategies to Help Kids with Clothing Fasteners

Affiliate links are included in this post.

Provide vibrating tactile sensory input with this Orbeez foot spa. Typically, this toy is used with water beads for a sensory play activity. We filled ours with crafting pom poms in various sizes and textures. The vibrating bottom provides a vibratory tactile sensation, which is perfect for the hands. We explored the textures of the crafting pom poms as the foot spa vibrated and shook the pom poms. Add additional components to this activity with small hidden toys that allow for visual discrimination, tactile perception, and awareness of body movements.

Clothing fasteners and sensory processing issues using vibrating tactile sensory tools

More sensory strategies that can help with independence in clothing fasteners:

A weighted weighted blanket can be a source of heavy input for proprioception needs.

Dress your child in layers that provide deep sensory input. Try a fitted short or long sleeve shirt under clothing.

Outline the button holes with a dark color thread or marker for easy visual perception.

Try a zipper pull or a fidget key chain fidget tool attached to the zipper pull.

Deep pressure through the hands is a technique that sometimes helps when manipulating clothing fasteners.

Try using fingerless gloves in stretch material when practicing clothing fasteners. The fingers are able to manipulate the buttons or zippers and the hand and joints receive deep pressure and warmth.
Trial sensory brushing protocol for tactile awareness

Clothing fasteners and sensory processing issues using fingerless gloves

Functional Skills for Kids

March 14, 2022June 24, 2016 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

As an Occupational Therapist, function is the number one goal for working with clients. Whether in the school, clinic, acute setting, or home, all goals of an Occupational Therapist revolve and are based on functional skills.

One thing about occupational therapy professionals is that we love to be creative. I love to use my experience and knowledge to come up with creative ways to meet common goal areas. Take a look around this site and you will find everything from DIY pencil grips to a “egg-cellent” way to work on shoe tying.

Be sure to check out this massive shoe tying resource, too.

Whether there is a diagnosis or not, a developmental delay or not, or just an area of weakness or strength…Kids can build on their strengths to modify, adapt, and address goal areas with one thing in mind: Functional Independence.

This is a place to guide you to areas of functional skill with hopes to bring kids closer to confidence and independence.

This is the place where you will find all of activities designed to promote functional skills of kids. From handwriting to scissor skills, to dressing, and self-care: click around to find a lot of ideas to build independence, adapt, accommodate, and modify functional skills.

Functional Skills for Kids and independence in kids for self-care tasks like dressing, feeding, clothing fasteners, and more.

This post contains affiliate links.

Functional Skills for Kids and Childhood Independence

Functional Skills for Kids series by Occupational Therapist and Physical Therapist bloggers

Handwriting Functional Skills

Scissor Skills

Self-Dressing Skills

Shoe Tying

Zippering

Buttoning

Toys to Help Kids Learn to Dress Themselves

Potty Training

Kids Cooking Tasks

Play

Self-Feeding

You’ll love these resources on helping kids thrive in all aspects of theri occupational performance:

the handwriting book The OT Toolbox — The Handwriting Book is a resource for meeting the needs of every individual when it comes to all aspects of handwriting.

The Toilet training Book, a developmental look at potty training from the OT and PT perspectives — The Toilet Training Book is a developmental look at potty training from the perspectives of occupational therapy and physical therapy practitioners.

scissor skills book — The Scissor Skills Book teaches all aspects of cutting with scissors, from form to function.

Independence with Dressing Skills

September 21, 2023April 20, 2016 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

dressing skills for occupational therapy

Here we are covering dressing skills as an ADL that are used in occupational therapy dressing interventions, as well as dressing skills for preschoolers and all ages, specifically the underlying fine motor skills needed for dressing skills.

These self-dressing skills are typically initiated in the toddler years, however if a toddler has little to no awareness or regression in these skills, a look at toddler behavior red flags may be in order. Self-dressing is part of child development at this stage. Let’s cover this in greater detail…

Dressing skills

“I can do it myself!”

It’s a phrase that most parents hear at one time or another as their child begins to develop the skills needed for independence in self-care. Sometimes, however, there are factors that interfere with appropriate development of function.

Parents may wonder when their child will begin to pull on their shirt or don shoes and socks with independence. The ability to dress one’s self with independence requires the development of many fine motor skills.

This month in the Functional Skills for Kids series, we are exploring Dressing as an activity of daily living. Stop by to see all of the posts in the series here.

Fine motor skills needed for independence with dressing. Kids and parents will like these ideas to build independence. Part of the Functional Skills for kids series by Occupational Therapy and Physical Therapy bloggers.

Dressing Skills that Require Fine Motor Skills

Pulling on socks, managing buckles, and tugging on a hat. There are many portions of self-dressing that require fine motor skill development;

Pulling socks off requires a pinch grip, strength in the hands, and bilateral coordination.
Putting socks on requires arch development, opposition of the thumb, intrinsic hand strength, bilateral coordination, wrist extension and ulnar deviation.
Pulling pants up requires eye-hand coordination, bilateral coordination, and wrist and hand stability.
Fastening snaps and pulling up zippers on pants (Clothing fasteners will be addressed in another month’s topic)
Donning and doffing undergarments requires pinch grasp
Threading a belt through belt loops requires bilateral coordination, prehension grasp, pincer/tripod/functional grasp and wrist positioning
Fastening a belt buckle requires tripod grasp and bilateral coordination, hand dominance or preference, extended wrist and ulnar deviation.
Donning and doffing a shirt requires bilateral coordination, crossing midline, extrinsic and intrinsic muscle strength of the hands, and forearm supination and pronation.
Donning an doffing a coat requires bilateral coordination, crossing midline, extrinsic and intrinsic muscle strength of the hands, and forearm supination and pronation.
Clothing fasteners such as buttons, zippers, snaps, buckles, and ties require intrinsic and extrinsic muscle strength, prehension grasp, in-hand manipulation, hand preference and bilateral control and eye-hand coordination.
Pulling on boots requires a hook grasp of the hand, strength, and proximal stability.
Donning a winter cap requires precision grasp, bilateral coordination, and motor planning.
Shoe tying and one handed shoe tying require motor planning, visual perception, fine motor skills, balance, and more.

If it seems as though every step of dressing requires fine motor skill development, that is because it’s true! Each step of each dressing task requires many fine motor skills.

Fine Motor Manipulation Skills that are Necessary Independent Dressing

Let’s break down these fine motor skills a bit to see how they are helping a child complete tasks independently.

Fine Motor Skills Needed in Dressing:

Extrinsic Muscle Strength: The extrinsic muscles move the fingers and thumb in full flexion and extension. They enable a power grasp on functional items. The extrinsic muscles are essential for cohesive work alongside the intrinsic muscles of the hands during dynamic grasp patterns.
Intrinsic Muscle Strength: The intrinsics allow us to use graded movements, shape the arches of the hands, and enable dexterity and precision. They control the flexion and extension of the Metacarpophalandeal joints and power movements such as finger adduction, finger abduction, thumb abduction, thumb adduction, thumb flexion and thumb opposition.
Prehension: There are three types of prehension grasps-static grips, gravity dependent grips, and dynamic grips.
In-Hand Manipulation: This fine motor skill typically develops around two years of age. Between 2-3 the child progresses in palm-finger translation and shift. However, at this age, they may prefer to manipulate objects between two hands instead of within one. Read more about in-hand manipulation skills here.
Hand Preference and Bilateral Control: From the age of 2-3, a child will switch hands to avoid crossing the midline, They may show use of a preferred hand, but it may switch between activities.
Eye-Hand Coordination: Eye-Hand Coordination is accuracy of reach and control of the arm in space, guided by vision. During dressing tasks or any functional skill, the reach should be accurate and controlled, and directed by the shoulder’s stability and mobility. In reaching for items, the hands and eyes should work together with smooth visual tracking of the hand and with the eyes guiding the hand.
Precision of Release: There should not be immature releasing patterns noted during dressing tasks. These might include flinging or dropping objects. Rather, the child should be able to release items while their arm is positioned in space and with controlled motions. Read more about precision of release.
Motor Planning: During functional tasks, there should be coordinated movements with appropriate positioning and posturing. Read more about motor planning here.
Separation of the Two Sides of the Hand: Separation of the two sides of the hand allows for stability and power with precision of the thumb, pointer finger, and middle finger.

Biomechanical Postural Control in self-dressing

Before the fine motor skills can be used in functional tasks, such as dressing, there are biomechanical skills that are prerequisite.

These are proximal stability skills that enable distal precision and control.

Postural Control– Proximal to the arm is the upper body. Postural instability will effect the use of the forearm, wrist, hand, and fingers and complicate the motor planning and use of the hands in functional reach. When we reach with two hands, we shift our weight and move our body’s center of gravity. Without dynamic control of one’s posture, shifts in weight will result in over or under reach of distal motions.
Shoulder stability with motion– Fine motor use of the hands requires stability of the shoulder joint. The joint needs to maintain stability even during motion and in all planes for controlled arm positioning.
Control of the forearm– The arm between the elbow and wrist moves in supinated and pronated motions. Supination is essential for many precision tasks and allows us to see what our fingers are doing in tool or fastener use. Pronation is typically used for power grasps and hook grasps in functional tasks.
Wrist Position– A functional wrist position is essential for precision grasp and manipulation. Extension of the wrist controls the length of the finger flexor muscles to an optimal position for grasp and precision. Positioning the wrist in 40 degrees of wrist extension allows for efficient muscle function. The wrist also moves with radial and ulnar deviation. A position of 15 degrees of ulnar deviation promotes stability and force in the ulnar side of the hand.
Palmer Arches- While palmer arch development is a component of fine motor skill development in itself, it is also a proximal stability source for precision of the distal fingers. Appropriate arch development provides positioning and stability to allow for fine motor dexterity of the fingers.

Tips to Promote Independence in Dressing Skills

When fine motor skills are the problem area behind decreased independence in self-dressing, it is helpful to build individual skills.

Children should be provided with many repetitions of self-care skills in environments where dressing tasks are happening naturally.

Dressing practice happens at the beginning and end of the day but there are many opportunities for working on the fine motor skills needed in dressing tasks.
Donning shoes and socks can happen before going outdoors and when coming into the home.
Toileting is a way to practice lower body clothing management throughout the day.
Children can further build independence with dressing through pretend play by using dress-up clothes.
Repetition can be a strategy for increasing opportunities for practice.
Provide various dress-up clothes in different social roles for many ways to practice dressing skills.
Encourage role play as a technique to build fine motor skills in dressing: Children can dress a baby doll.
Provide alternate opportunities to practice fine motor skills needed for dressing such as toys to help kids practice dressing skills.

Fine motor skills needed for independence with dressing. Kids and parents will like these ideas to build independence.

Develop fine motor skills needed for functional tasks with these activities:

Gross Grasp Activities

In-Hand Manipulation Activities

Motor Planning Activities

Open Thumb Web Space Activities

Hand Dominance Activities

Grip Pattern Activities

Precision of Grasp and Release Activities

Teach Buttoning Skills with Heart Buttons

August 11, 2022January 21, 2016 by Colleen Beck OTR/L

Teaching kids functional skills like how to button their coat happens naturally during a day’s progression. You help your Toddler or Preschooler into their coat before an outing and sneak in a few verbal cues while you show them how to slip the button through the button hole. Then, before you blink your eyes, they are saying “I do it, Mommy!” and your little one is on their way to independence. This would be a great addition to a Valentine’s Day theme in occupational therapy.

NOW, I am a huge supporter of teaching kids to do things like buttoning and shoe tying in a natural setting, with real buttons and shoe laces and on their body. BUT, sometimes a child just needs a fun way to practice the skills that make up the task of buttoning a button. Other times, it’s just fun to practice buttoning so that kids can show off what they can do and get a little boost of self confidence.

This Buttoning Skills Activity is easy to put together, fun to do, and a creative way to practice buttoning. Before you know it, your little “do it myself”-er will be buttoning their pajamas up in a flash. For now, we play our way to independence!

Teach kids how to button with this easy DIY buttoning teaching tool for fine motor practice and play, with hearts. Perfect for Valentine's Day

Teach Kids Buttoning Skills with a DIY dressing board

This post contains affiliate links.

So, we’ve practiced buttoning with egg cartons and tissue paper. Today, I’ve got a new idea for you. We used Foam Hearts to practice precision in fine motor skills while working on the motor control and dexterity needed for buttoning. This was such a fun activity for my preschooler to do. She can button large buttons on her body at this point, so it wasn’t hard for her to practice these motor skills. BUT, adding the novel component of flimsy fabric and fragile paper made her practice the fine motor control that she needs for buttoning small buttons and many fine motor tasks.

To make a DIY heart button activity, you’ll need just a few items.

Foam Hearts

Heavy Cardstock

Stiff Felt Sheet

Embroidary Thread
(we received ours from www.craftprojectideas.com)

Scissors

Embroidary Needle

This is an easy project to throw together, and equally adaptable to your child’s age and fine motor needs. We made out Buttons with Foam Hearts, but for a child who needs more help with buttoning skills or has weaker fine motor control, use cardboard or plastic buttons.

Sew the foam hearts/buttons along the edge of a piece of felt. We used a thicker felt sheet for more control. A thinner piece of felt would be more like fabric of clothing, so if you are working on certain aspects of buttoning, like controlling the material with two hands in a coordinated manner, you can make your buttoning project with fabric or thinner felt.

Use a cross-stitch pattern to simply sew the Foam Hearts
in an “x”. This is a great real-life skill activity for older kids. Threading a the large needle is a nice fine motor task and the project is so simple that it’s a great beginner sewing activity for kids.

Fold the felt over and add snips for button holes and you have a nice portable practice activity!

We practiced buttoning with the felt a few times and then added another way to practice. I marked button holes on a sheet of thick Cardstock
. After cutting the holes with scissors, my preschooler practiced pulling the foam buttons through the holes. Using paper to practice is a real workout for little fingers as the paper will tear with too much force. The point for this part of the activity is to practice pushing the button through the hole and pulling it out. The paper is a great reminder that the button slides through the button hole easily when both hands are working together in a coordinated manner.

TIP: Snip the cardstock or Stiff Felt Sheet
button holes just a bit longer than you think you need to for kids who are working on buttoning skills. You can also cut the hole wider for easier buttoning. This is one way to grade the activity for kids who need help learning how to button their clothes.

More ways to teach kids buttoning skills using this DIY button project:

Lay the fabric on the child’s lap as a beginner task. This is a good way for the child to see what they are doing as their hands are working together on the buttons.
NEXT, lay the fabric on the child’s lap, BUT position it so that it would be if the child were buttoning a coat on their body. Make sure the buttons are on the child’s lap and not on their truck for easier accessibility and success.
THEN, position the buttoning activity up higher on the child’s trunk to simulate buttoning a shirt or coat on the child.
Finally, move on to teaching buttoning with real-life articles of clothing.

Occupational therapy Tip:

Be sure to provide real clothing items along the way of teaching buttoning skills, while adding in fun motor planning activities like this DIY Button activity or our egg carton buttoning activity. Learning through play in creative ways is fun!

This post is part of the Activities for Kids blog hop. This month, each blogger is posting about hearts. Stop by to see what our friends have come up with: