Vision and visual skills are complex with sub-categories such as visual figure ground. Luckily, occupational therapists are equipped with the ability and knowledge to assess vision at many levels. One type of visual skill that OTs assess for is called visual figure ground. In this post, we will break down what figure ground means, how visual-figure ground it fits into vision as a whole, and some red flags we look for. You’ll find some creative figure ground activities to build this skill, too!
WHAT IS VISUAL FIGURE GROUND?
Visual figure ground is the ability to discriminate between the object of focus and the other objects that are also in view, using visual skills such as attention, visual memory, and other components of visual perceptual skills. This is a hugely important skill in reading and writing, as well as learning and retaining information.
Vision as a whole is made up of many parts. For daily activities, sighted individuals need to have visual clarity/focus (this can be adjusted with glasses), eye movement skills, and visual attention.
In other words, figure ground is the ability to see an object and ignore the background. Without this ability, it may seem like a child needs glasses even though they may have technically perfect vision at the optometrist.
Visual figure ground has to do with visual attention, and how the eyes work with the brain to understand an image.
VISUAL FIGURE GROUND: RED FLAGS
Below a general list of red flags to look for when it comes to visual figure ground. Many of these red flags are the same for other visual perception skills, as it often requires the combination of several skills to perform a task.
This is not an exhaustive list, but some ideas to work from.
Difficulty completing age-appropriate puzzles
Difficulty reading or searching for important information in a text
Unable to complete mazes, “I Spy”, word searches, etc. in a similar way to their peers
Prefers simple artwork/images to complex
Gives up quickly when looking for an item in their desk
Assumes many items are “lost” when they are in view/nearby
Difficulty coping from the board
Unable to find a toy they want from the toy box
Difficulty finding a yogurt cup in the full refrigerator
Being that the primary occupation of children is play, so it is through play that we address underlying skills such as figure ground. You’ll love this long list of visual activities that target a variety of areas, including visual figure ground.
Playing “I Spy” or “hide-and-go-seek” with familiar objects around the house can be a great way to get their brains prepped for visual discrimination of figure ground. They will use visual attention, visual tracking, and problem solving skills to win!
Reading books or engaging in other activities provided by ‘Busy Town’, ‘Where’s Waldo’, or, of course, the ‘I Spy’ series are other great places to start. There are towns of great vision books recommendations for you that work to develop skills through reading.
You can also involve younger children in these types of activities by having them sort colorful cereal into the color categories, dig through the laundry basket to find matching socks, or really, anything that makes sense in your home.
Figure Ground Worksheets
Sometimes, relating the vision skills to a reading or writing task is needed, and that’s where the figure ground worksheets come into play. Worksheets can get a bad rap, but it is possible to make worksheets functional, fun, and meaningful for kids so that they develop essential skills.
We have an awesome apple activity set that was developed to target visual skills, as well as tons of free resources for you to build visual figure ground skills!
These free printable resources target figure ground skills and cover a variety of themes.
Visual Processing Bundle is a collection of resources on visual processing skills.
One of our most popular tools to address visual figure ground is our Visual Processing Bundle. It’s a collection of printable resources, worksheets, handouts, and activity booklets geared towards all things vision.
Sydney Thorson, OTR/L, is a new occupational therapist working in school-based therapy. Her background is in Human Development and Family Studies, and she is passionate about providing individualized and meaningful treatment for each child and their family. Sydney is also a children’s author and illustrator and is always working on new and exciting projects.
This blog discusses activities for teaching letter recognition. At its most basic, letter recognition refers to letter identification. It is one of the main skills children need to know before they can name, write, or sound out the letters. The following fun letter recognition games for preschoolers are based on development and skill progression.
Be sure to read through our blog post on name practice for kindergarten for resources and tools to support letter use and recognition in children ages 5-6 or for kids at the level where they are recognizing letters in their name. These ideas are great for beginning reading for kindergarten.
What you need to know about Teaching Letter recognition
Letter recognition, or the ability to recognize and identify letters begins at a very young age. But did you know that teaching letter recognition skills starts way before kindergarten and and even before entering the classroom?
Kindergarten students are many times exposed to writing and copying letters on trace worksheets, and writing pages. But before a young child can do these skills that are part of the curriculum, knowing what skills lead up to these skills is helpful.
Even before a young preschooler is able to identify and name letters in printed context such as books or letter play activities, they are learning this skill through the immersion of seeing letters in everyday life.
Letter identification and the ability to recognize letters in printed form might occur through exposure on television, printed media, following along while a book is being read, or while engaging with technology.
There is a progression in the important literacy skill of recognizing printed letters:
Letter recognition in isolation – example, pointing out all of the upper case letter As on a letter picture book
Letter recognition in every day life – example pointing out the letter S on a stop sign
Letter identification – identifying and stating letter’s names
Letter identification in text -reading and sounding out a letter’s sound in reading or sounding out written text
Each step of teaching letter recognition skills is founded in experience and practice. This includes communication with others, exposure, and reading with caregivers.
Not every child learns the same way. Starting as young as preschool, caregivers can support children by using their interests and strengths to teach them new skills.
Children don’t need to read or write until well beyond toddlerhood, but preschoolers enjoy looking at books, finding letters on walks, and learning letters through movement.
The best way to teach letter recognition is by first covering the prerequisite skills.
Prerequisites to Letter Teaching Letter Recognition
Several areas are needed to develop letter recognition skills:
You can see that these components are founded in visual motor skills, perceptual skills, and working memory.
Before any of this can happen (and through the process), young children should be exposed to rhymes, songs, and singing the alphabet song. (Add alphabet exercises for movement fun!) Letter formation rhymes can support literacy as well. This is actually the first step in the road to literacy!
Teaching letter recognition requires Visual discrimination Skills
Letter recognition/identification is when a person is able to look at a letter and recall it from previous experience. Recognition of letters occurs both in uppercase and lowercase form. Additionally, there is a cursive letter recognition aspect as well. This blog post covers cursive letter recognition skills.
This site statesthat even before letter identification, there are a few other skills that should be taught, including visual discrimination, so the child is able to find differences among lines and shapes.
Visual discrimination can be taught in isolation through books or letter formation worksheets, or in games and activities such as Memory games, matching and sorting activities, or playing “what’s the same” and “what’s different” through hidden picture activities and puzzles. We cover this visual perceptual skill in our blog post, Wacky Wednesday book activity.
Visual Memory Another great play-based activity to develop the visual perceptual memory skills needed for letter recognition, are games that challenge kids to notice differences. Present the child with a tray of everyday items, and ask them to memorize the items on the tray. Ask them to look away or cover their eyes. Take away one or more items, and have them recall the missing items.
Letter activities- Other ways to encourage letter play is through printed alphabet worksheets, puzzles, letter magnets, or other alphabet manipulatives such as letter beads. You can ask the child to sort letters based on shape, such as those that include straight lines, versus curved line, or diagonal letters. You can also sort letters by letters based on size: tall letters, short letters, and letters with a tail that hangs below the lines.
One way to encourage functional handwriting is through addressing letter size. This tall and short worksheet has a fine motor and visual motor component that can be incorporated into whole-body movement activities to teach these concepts that carryover into letter sizing and use in handwriting.
Prerequisites to teaching letter recognition begins in infancy
These prerequisite skills that support letter recognition, such as visual discrimination and memory, develop as early as infancy, when young children identify 3D objects that are familiar to them like their bottle, favorite toy, or their parents. It is important infants experience tummy time in order to develop visual motor skills, and strong oculomotor skills, as a result of time spent on the belly while looking at objects.
As children grow, their visual discrimination becomes more refined and they are able to identify pictures and written words.
Toddlers are able to point to a picture of a puppy in a book they are reading, or identify who is hiding under the blanket.
Object permanence and working memory
When a child sees an object and knows what it is called, this is referred to as object permanence. This requires working memory skill development to use what is seen, remember it, and store it for later retrieval.
While visual discrimination is the ability to detect differences and similarities in size, shape, color and pattern, cognitive ability is necessary to recognize these differences based on previous exposure, along with memory to have stored that information away in their mind’s eye to recall when needed.
This skill is typically associated with letter formation and handwriting skills. Identifying and discriminating between differences in letters allow kids to copy and write letters from memory. However, noticing and identifying the differences in the curves, diagonal lines, and lines that make up a letter are essential build up to that skill.
Hearing and saying the letter sounds associated with letters are part of the process, too. Phonemic awareness is developed initially through play, but this skill continues to develop and progress as reading and literacy skills are refined in kindergarten, first grade, second grade, and beyond.
Teaching letter recognition begins with the ability to recognize details in visual images
In more depth, students should identify likeness and differences of shapes or forms, colors, as well as the position of various objects and people. Developing discrimination skills will help children learn the alphabet and then both read and print letters a lot better.
There are numerous types of visual discrimination that children should begin to understand and develop. These include:
3D Objects
Shapes
Drawings & Pictures
Colors
Letters and Words
Sequences
Letter recognition games
The letter recognition activities and games and listed below are fun ways to instruct children in the essential skills needed for reading and literacy. It’s literally the building block to reading.
Name Recognition- Start with recognizing the letters of their name. Point out letters in the child’s name and ask them to point to letters in a book or on a sign. Children can first begin with recognizing upper case letters of their name, then moving onto the lowercase letters. Working first with uppercase letters is best, because capital letters are easier to discriminate between. Lowercase letters have many similar letters, b,d,p,g,q, and j.
Bean Bag Letter Toss – Affix upper and lowercase letter stickers to one side of each bean bag. Put a basket or bucket across from your child. As your child throws the bean bags into the bucket, ask them to name the letters and their sounds of the letters. Students can run around looking for matching letters scattered around the room.
Alphabet Play dough- Write down large letters on a piece of paper and place that paper into a sheet protector. Encourage your child to form the letters on the sheet protector with play dough of their choosing.
I Spy Letter Walk –Take a walk with your child and look for letters in their environment such as on license plates, street signs and building. Play, I Spy, searching for different letters, or letters in sequential order. The printable tools in the Letter Fine Motor Kit are a great resource for this activity.
Jumping to letters – Create a letter pathway with sidewalk chalk on a playground or sidewalk. Children can walk, run, jump, or crawl across the letters, naming them as they move forward! Change it up by asking them to walk backwards along the path. This is a fun motor planning activity.
Chasing the Alphabet – (Amazon affiliate link:)Sammy Chases the Alphabetis a book I wrote about Sammy the Golden Dog playing fetch with balls around his farm. Each ball has a letter on it. After you read the book, bring the story to life by adding letter stickers to ball pit balls. Toss the balls around a room or outside, and encourage your child to find them all, naming the letters on each ball they find.
Food Alphabet Worksheets – Pair real food items with these food worksheets. These worksheets include the letter, a food that starts with the letter, and all of the letters that make the word. As children sound out each letter, ask them to point to the letter that makes that sound.
more letter recognition Activities
Alphabet activities like the ones below support recognition skills through repetition. Alphabet recognition occurs through songs, play, and hands-on activities.
The Soundabet Song – Letter identification doesn’t just include what letters look like, it also includes what letters sound like. Can your child point to the letter name as well as the sound it makes? This Soundabet Song is a great way to teach kids how to pair the sounds of the letters to what the letters look like.
Letter Push – This ABC play dough activityuses plastic letters and play dough! Add in some fine motor skills to alphabet identification, by having children push plastic letters into play dough while they name the letter. This can be done as a circle time game, where each child take a turn pushing in a letter, or a small group time where every child has the opportunity to push the play dough letters.
Alphabet Sensory Bins – Nothing keeps my preschoolers entertained more then a large sensory bin! Adding alphabet letters or letter markers to the sensory bins for children to find and match, is one of the most exciting letter identification games. Check out these sensory bin base ideas to use in different letter recognition sensory bins.
This alphabet sensory writing tray requires users to recognize letters by uncovering them from a sensory medium. This is a great activity for recognizing letter parts such as diagonals or the curved part of a letter as the letter is uncovered.
Metal alphabet tray play – My favorite is to add a metal pan to the sensory table, and ask kids to stick the magnet letters they find in the sensory materials onto the metal pan!
Alphabet Discover Bottle – This sensory discovery bottlecan be used before naptime, bedtime, in a calm down corner, or as a learning activity. As children shake the bottle, they can name the letters that appear!
Match letters- Match uppercase letters to lower case letters, match different fonts of letters, and match letters in different environments (books, signs, on television, in print, etc.)
Gross motor activities- Use a letter floor mat to jump on a specific letter. Ask the child to find a letter magnet and place it on the letter mat.
Learning through play doesn’t have to be stressful. Every child learns differently, and that includes recognizing letters of the alphabet. Once a child has developed the visual discrimination, expressive language and receptive language skills needed to participate in letter identification activities, notice what motivates them to learn.
Do they like to move, cut, color, dance, or sing? Pick a letter activity that you know your child will love, and they will keep coming back for more. This will result in increasing their attention span and learning new letters daily. Follow your child’s interests and you will surely have a wonderful time!
Today’s post addresses Letter Identification. What happens if your student copies letters, but is unable to recognize them? Can a student who can not identify letters learn to read? Letter identification is at the core of reading and writing, which are important life skills.
letter identification before copying and tracing
Many therapists and teachers work on copying and tracing long before their students can recognize the letters. Have you thought about what happens if your student copies and traces letters, but is unable to identify them?
Tracing is not going to teach number/letter formation if the learner does not know what those figures are. To a learner who does not know these symbols, they will be tracing lines and circles, not learning numbers or letters.
This holds true for copying letters and numbers. For example, the “H” becomes just sticks, while the “b” is a ball and a stick rather than recognized symbols.
Theoretically if a person writes or traces the letter “A” enough times, the body will start to recognize this pattern (through motor planning and kinesthetic awareness), and commit it to memory.
This only works if the learner understands what is being traced or copied, and can add meaning to it.
can a student who is unable to identify letters learn to read?
Sadly students who are unable to recognize letters can learn to read, but not efficiently or effectively. Learners who are unable to identify letters will memorize the way words look as a clump, rather than using letter identification and phonemic awareness. This holds true for math. Students can learn ways to get around multiplication and division without memorizing these facts.
Because students can “get by” this is why it is critical to insure students have the necessary building blocks for learning before moving on. Pushing students through to the next grade without having the necessary skills, is an ongoing problem. How many high school students have you seen that are unable to do simple math in their head, or spell simple words? Too many.
IdentificATION OF lETTERS FOR READING
Let’s circle back to letter identification now that you have a better understanding of the need for letter identification before teaching reading, copying, writing, or tracing.
One of the pre-reading skills kids need to be a successful reader is letter knowledge.
Letter Knowledge begins with Letter Identification which is also known as Alphabet Recognition.
Students have different learning styles, therefore they need to be exposed to new information in various ways.
Offering several different teaching styles is the key to meeting the needs of all different types of students. Sometimes this takes many trials to find the one that sticks.
I had a reluctant learner who was unable to recall or identify his letters despite repetition, flash cards, games, puzzles, worksheets, or any other activity I presented. In the past I had used my students specific interests to spark their learning. Many lines were made making Thomas the Train tracks across the paper.
This student loved Star Wars. He could name every character. Lucky for me, there are many Star Wars characters! I paired a letter with each character. We used A for Anakin, S for Stormtroopers, C for Chewbacca, and so on. At first we worked on pairing them verbally/auditorily. Then I made flash cards with pictures of each character near their name and picture. Because this was motivating for him, my student quickly learned letter identification!
activities to teach letter idenfication
Before children are able to learn to read or identify letters, you can work with them to understand what they are. This can be done by reading stories, singing songs, telling nursery rhymes, and talking to them. Once they begin to notice that stories or other items have symbols, you can point to the words as you read them. Here are some simple letter identification activities:
Point out print wherever you see them. On signs, license plates, television, books, packages, clothing, or anywhere you might find written print.
Look for specific letters in books or magazines. Ask the child to name the letter and the sound.
Make arts and crafts with specific letters. Write it in sand, shaving cream, or a foggy mirror. Letter of the week crafts are fun, too. We have printable letter crafts inside The OT Toolbox Membership.
Practice writing letters with different toys or activities. Magnetic letters, books, magazines, puzzles, flash cards, and games like Scrabble, are handy options to have letters readily available for letter identification.
Form letters out of pretzel dough, play dough, popsicle sticks, pasta, or cookie cutters for sensory letter formation.
Play a Letter Scavenger Hunt and have students look for certain letters you have hidden around the room or house. A scavenger hunt is another great use for magnetic letters. Enhance this activity by adding finding items that start with that letter.
Use a keyboard to identify letters. Keyboarding skill is a great life skill tool to have. Finding and identifying letters is a great way to practice and learn the letters in a functional way.
ot toolbox resources for letter recognition
Developmental tools for teaching letter recognition – This blog discusses activities for teaching letter recognition
The OT Toolbox Archives contain dozens of posts related to letter recognition.
Alphabet Movement Cards – Alphabet Movement Cardscombine love of letters, along with aerobic activity to work on muscle strength, tone, focus, attention, or add a much needed sensory break between tabletop tasks.
Letter Formation Themed Activities – This page includes all of our Letter Formation theme activities. You’ll find letter formation themed fine motor activities, letter printables, and A-Z therapy tools of all kinds! Plan out a week (or weeks) of activities for your whole therapy caseload. Just print and go!
Letters are everywhere!
When you start to think about letters, you realize they are everywhere! Use what is readily available to immerse your learners in knowledge. You might have to get creative once in a while, like my Star Wars guy, but that is what makes this job so fun!
Jeana Kinne is a veteran preschool teacher and director. She has over 20 years of experience in the Early Childhood Education field. Her Bachelors Degree is in Child Development and her Masters Degree is in Early Childhood Education. She has spent over 10 years as a coach, working with Parents and Preschool Teachers, and another 10 years working with infants and toddlers with special needs. She is also the author of the “Sammy the Golden Dog” series, teaching children important skills through play.
The Letter Fine Motor Kit is a 100 page printable packet includes everything you need for hands-on letter learning and multisensory handwriting!
This resource is great for pediatric occupational therapists working on handwriting skills, fine motor skills, visual motor skills, and more. Use the activities to promote a variety of functional tasks.
Teachers will find this printable packet easily integrated into literacy centers, classroom activities, and multisensory learning.
Parents will find this resource a tool for learning at home, supporting skill development, and perfect for therapy at home!
MULTISENSORY HANDWRITING
Grab the Letter Fine Motor Kit and use all of the senses, including heavy work, or proprioceptive input, through the hands ask kids build and manipulate materials to develop handwriting and letter formation skills.
Today we have a fun shadow matching worksheet for you. This forest animals activity is great for adding to a woodland animal theme, but more importantly, use the shadow worksheet to build visual perceptual skills in areas such as form constancy, visual memory, and more.
Free printable shadow matching worksheet with a forest animals theme.
Shadow matching worksheet
How are your visual perceptual skills?
My learner can see, but can’t really SEE. Wait, what? Isn’t all “seeing” the same? Not really. There is seeing in the sense of visual acuity, how well the eyes can see items up close and at a distance. Then there is seeing in the sense or perceiving an object. A person can have great visual acuity, 20/20 in fact, but have terrible visual perception. In visual acuity the eye basically has to see the object. In perception it not only has to see the object, but make sense of it. These vision issues are covered in our blog post on visual efficiency.
For example; I can see the puzzle pieces, but I can’t perceive that each piece becomes something whole, or which piece is the right shape.
This article does an excellent job of explaining visual perception, its effects, and how to improve this skill.
Armed with this information, it is critical to work on developing visual perceptual skills at an early age. Visual perceptual skills begin in infancy with facial recognition, and by school age are necessary for reading, writing, and mathematics.
When it comes to visual perception, the OT Toolbox has you covered! Check out the latest PDF free printable, Forest Animals Shadow Matching Worksheet.
You can get the shadow matching worksheet below by entering your email address into the form, or head to The OT Toolbox Member’s Club and going to the visual perception area. Use this item in a forest animals theme! And if you’re doing a forest animals theme, definitely be sure to add this Forest Animals Scissor Skills Activity. It’s a free set of printable puzzles kids can color, cut out, and put back together.
This is a great activity to build visual perceptual skills as early as preschool age. It addresses form constancy, figure ground, visual discrimination and visual attention. You can find other matching activities that support visual perceptual skill development in our free visual perception packet. It includes resources like this flower match-up, and outer space matching worksheets.
Ways to modify the shadow matching worksheet:
Laminate the page for reusability. This saves on resources, and many learners love to write with markers!
Print in black and white or color for different levels of difficulty
Cut the shapes and make a matching game instead of using a writing tool to draw lines
Talk about the animals, describe their characteristics, and give context clues to help your learner understand why certain pictures match
Other skills addressed using this forest animal activity sheet:
Attention
Behavior
Frustration tolerance
Task avoidance
Self regulation
Organization
Scanning
Fine motor skills – pencil grasp, drawing lines
In order to create a full lesson or treatment plan, therapists will need to be armed with more than just this one shadow matching worksheet. The OT Toolbox offers several free printable items to work on visual perception, including:
There are several Ipad apps available if necessary, but I recommend using electronics with caution, and following up with a real life task.
Now you know more about “seeing” better. Before working on visual perceptual skills, make sure your learner has correct visual acuity. Sometimes their struggle is due to acuity rather than perception. In this case, a pair of eyeglasses is an easy fix!
Whether your learner is working on this shadow worksheet, or any other resources by the OT Toolbox, make learning fun and motivating. There is nothing better than a learner who is excited to see what their therapist has to offer.
Want to work on shadow matching with a forest animals theme? This shadow worksheet supports development of visual perceptual skills through play! Perfect for adding to a forest animals weekly therapy theme. Enter your email address into the form below.
Or, if you are a Member’s Club member, be sure to log in and then head to the visual perception area of free downloads that are on The OT Toolbox website. Not a member? Join now.
*The term, “learner” is used throughout this post for readability, however this information is relevant for students, patients, clients, children of all ages, etc. The term “they” is used instead of he/she to be inclusive.
Victoria Wood, OTR/L is a contributor to The OT Toolbox and has been providing Occupational Therapy treatment in pediatrics for more than 25 years. She has practiced in hospital settings (inpatient, outpatient, NICU, PICU), school systems, and outpatient clinics in several states. She has treated hundreds of children with various sensory processing dysfunction in the areas of behavior, gross/fine motor skills, social skills and self-care. Ms. Wood has also been a featured speaker at seminars, webinars, and school staff development training. She is the author of Seeing your Home and Community with Sensory Eyes.
When it comes to handwriting, copying without losing place on the page impacts writing (visual attention plays a big role here), so much so that a reading stick or writing stick tool can be a huge help. Here we are showing an easy way to make a reading stick or writing stick that can be used to impact writing without missing letters or words…and why this happens.
What is a Reading Stick
Handwriting is a challenge when spacing is inaccurate. Poorly spaced letters and words as a result of visual spatial difficulties can lead to illegible handwriting.
A reading stick is a pointer stick that kids can use to follow along with words when reading and writing.
When reading from a chalkboard or smartboard, a teacher might use a large pointer stick for this task. One tip for teachers is to add a bright visual cue to the end of the pointer stick to add a visual contrast that is engaging and visual. This might be something like bright tape added to the end of the pointer stick, neon tape or post-it notes folded over the tip of the pointer stick are some ways to easily do this.
But, when kids are reading and copying from a space on their desk, they can use a miniature version of the pointer stick as a reading tool. What’s nice about the version that we created is that the reading stick can be used in many different ways:
Use the pointer stick with the visual cue at the end to point along with reading from a book.
Turn the reading stick on it’s side to follow along line by line when reading.
Use the craft stick as a spacing tool when writing.
Why use a reading stick for writing?
A writing stick is a handwriting tool that can also be called a pointer stick for handwriting. Students and teachers can use a writing stick to follow along with written work to support handwriting needs so that a student doesn’t miss letters or words when writing.
Copying handwriting work requires several areas of visual processing:
Using this pointer stick to copy words can help with copying written work without omitting letters or words. The reading stick then doubles as a spacing tool.
Using a spacing tool can be a HUGE help for some kids! This handwriting spacing tool pointer stick is a physical prompt and a visual cue that helps kids in handwriting and become independent with when writing.
There is a lot going on when a child is required to write. The visual motor skills needed to accurately copy or write written work requires the processing of visual perceptual skills along with coordination and manipulation of the pencil along lines and margins.
These are a lot of different areas that can break down and result in sloppy or illegible handwriting!
Use a spacing tool pointer stick to help with placing spaces between letters and words, assuring words, phrases, or sentences are not omitted, and when aligning columns of words, as in lists.
Handwriting Spacing Tool Pointer Stick
Affiliate links are included in this post.
Try using this spacing pointer stick to keep margins aligned too.
Use the marker to make a brightly colored dot on one end of the craft stick. You could also use a small sticker, but I wanted to ensure a bright contrast between the colored craft stick and the colored dot.
Use a reading stick when reading so kids don’t miss words or lines of text when reading.
And that’s it! Show the child how to use it to keep their place when copying written work, when aligning margins, and when spacing between words.
Use the spacing tool pointer stick to help kids with spatial awareness in these ways:
Point to words when copying from a text or sheet on a desk. The pointer stick can help keep the child’s place, visually.
Align columns in math and lists of words.
Align left and right margins on the page. Keep the margin from drifting in toward the middle of the page.
The Handwriting Book is a comprehensive resource created by experienced pediatric OTs and PTs.
The Handwriting Book covers everything you need to know about handwriting, guided by development and focused on function. This digital resource is is the ultimate resource for tips, strategies, suggestions, and information to support handwriting development in kids.
The Handwriting Book breaks down the functional skill of handwriting into developmental areas. These include developmental progression of pre-writing strokes, fine motor skills, gross motor development, sensory considerations, and visual perceptual skills. Each section includes strategies and tips to improve these underlying areas.
Strategies to address letter and number formation and reversals
Ideas for combining handwriting and play
Activities to practice handwriting skills at home
Tips and strategies for the reluctant writer
Tips to improve pencil grip
Tips for sizing, spacing, and alignment with overall improved legibility
If you know a kiddo that loves all things dinosaurs, than this dinosaur free printable is for you! It’s a visual perception activity designed to develop and support visual perceptual skills such as visual discrimination, form constancy, visual closure, and other visual processing skills (visual tracking for one!) To grab this free printable dinosaur activity, read on! Add this resource to your dinosaur activities for an OT theme.
Dinosaur Free Printable
If you are working on the visual perceptual skills needed for letter formation, handwriting, or reading, then you are probably loving the recent free visual perception printable sheets that we’ve been sharing on the site.
This visual perception worksheet is great for working on skills like visual motor skills, visual scanning, visual figure ground, visual discrimination, spatial reasoning, and visual memory. Also, it’s a great way to develop pencil control by moving the pencil around obstacles as kids connect the matching pairs of dinosaurs.
Visual perceptual skills are needed for so many functional skills. You’ll find easy and fun ways to work on visual perceptual skills through play here.
How to use this dinosaur printable
This printable dino activity can be used in many different ways to support hands-on learning.
Print the page and slide it into a plastic page protector. Kids can then use a dry erase marker to work on the page over and over again.
Try these tips to use the worksheet in different ways:
Connect the dinosaurs with a dry erase marker
Place play dough balls on the matching dinosaurs
Use finger paints to place a fingerprint on each matching dinosaur
Play I Spy: Ask users to find an object that has specific colors or other details
OR, use it right on your tablet. You won’t be able to draw a line to connect matching dinosaurs, but you will be able to save the ink as kids use their finger to connect the matching dinosaurs. They will still address those visual perceptual skills by using the freebie on a tablet’s screen.
Then, use this activity along with other dinosaur activities to support development of other skills. Other dinosaur themed ideas to use along with this printable activity include:
To get your copy of this printable page, enter your email address into the form below. The printable is part of our 24 page free visual perception packet, so you can use all of the items in the packet along with this dinosaur activity. Just print and go!
OR, if you are an OT Toolbox Member, you can log in and go to our toolboxes and access this resource along with every other freebie here on the website. For this particular tool, head to our visual tools page.
Look for more free visual perception worksheets like this one, coming soon to the site.
You can check out our space theme visual perception free printable, or if you sign up for the freebie below, you’ll be directed to a page with all of the free printables in one place.
These visual perception apple theme shape stamps are a perfect way to work on visual perceptual skills and fine motor skills with DIY stampers.
Be sure to try some of these pencil control activities to help with the visual motor skills needed for handwriting and to challenge a child you know with more activities just like the dinosaur free printable.
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.
In this post you will be discovering how to create a calm classroom, specifically tips to avoid the visual noise that distracts learning in the school environment. Classroom décor and organization can directly effect the engagement level of children in any classroom or learning space. When the environment is too visually stimulating, a student’s ability to focus becomes difficult. Keeping children’s attention can become frustrating. When a classroom environment that is soothing and organized is created, children are better able to stay engaged. In this blog, you will learn about the three different ways to make your classroom visually calm.
What is Visual Noise?
When working with children, teachers think about all of the colors of the rainbow, and want to make classrooms bright and cheery. So many classroom theme sets have fun colors, bright designs, and patterns, contrasting bulletin board boarders, etc. Many believe that having a colorful classroom will keep children interested and engaged.
Visual Noise is just that: a visually distracting, or “noisy” visual scene in the classroom. A lot of teachers set up bulletin boards throughout the room with cut-outs in various themes: animal/monster/any theme , alphabet stickers, and painted murals on the walls. Maybe your classroom has a circle time rug that includes the ten different color squares. Perhaps you want to make sure all the children have something they like to do, so you have 20 fine motor choices in the manipulative area.
There is just one problem with using these types of visuals in the classroom, they are distracting!
The bulletin boards all around the room are adorable, and fun to look at. So during circle time, you might find a child gazing at the wall, figuring out what new item is there.
When there are rugs filled with colors, you may notice children looking down at the rug, maybe at the bright colors, while singing the color song in their head.
If teachers provide too many choices in one area of the classroom, children work with one toy for three minutes, then they are onto the next, without honing in, or practicing the skills that were intended.
For young children, and lots of adults, less is more!
visual processing
Humans use vision from birth, to engage with the world around them. The way your brain process what you see, impacts how you interpret your interactions with the environment, and the people around you. To learn more about vision, this amazing PDF discusses visual hypersensitivity and under-sensitivity (or sensory seeking).
There are some visual processing red flags that may indicate difficulties with visual processing or ocular motor control:
Increased sensitivity to light
Easily distracted by visual stimuli, or difficulty sustaining visual attention to an activity
Frequently squints, rubs eyes, or gets a headache after visually demanding tasks such as reading, using a phone/tablet/computer, or watching television
Loses place in reading or writing
Trouble finding things they are looking for, even when they seem to be “right in front of them”
Distractions with reading
Difficulty tracking visual information
Difficulty initiating or holding eye contact
Difficulty focusing on one piece of visual information
Increased fear of, or desire for, being in the dark
Difficulty discriminating between similar shapes, letters, or pictures
How to reduce visual noise when planning your classroom
When planning out your classroom, visual stimulation is important, however there are many ways to make sure there is reduced visual noise, so the environment is not overwhelming.
Think about how you feel when you go to the spa. Those deep earthy wall colors calm your bodies and nerves instantly! The Montessori and Reggio Emilia educational philosophies advise visual components as a way to keep their classroom calm and focused.
The Reggio Emilia philosophy recognizes the environment as the child’s third teacher. What is in a child’s environment, how it’s organized, and what it looks like, directly impacts what a child will learn that day.
two ways to make sure your environment is visually calming
Colors – When picking out colors for your classroom, whether it be for the furniture, rugs, or wall decor, the best way to support a calm visual classroom, is to choose more natural colors. These include blues, greens and browns.
Choose toy baskets, or white bins, as opposed to brightly colored ones.
Consider turning toy shelves around or covering with neutral fabric to further reduce visual noise.
Choose predictable carpet rugs (Amazon affiliate link) like this one, instead of random colorful squares. Carpet samples of neutral colors are an excellent idea to create boundaries while limiting visual distraction.
When decorating your walls, allow for empty blank space, and use more of children’s artwork. Consider the use of cloth and fabric.
Classroom Organization – When choosing how many activities and materials to place in each are of your classroom, keep in mind that less is more! When children have too many options to choose from, this can create a short attention span, and overwhelm from choice overload.
Organization in the classroom can mean stacks of papers, tons of sticky notes, messy desks, and disorganized files, too.
In a typical preschool classroom, there are 8 areas of learning: art, fine motor, science, reading, dramatic play, block, large motor and snack! When you use furniture to visually create specific spaces for each center, the classroom is organized, and children know what is expected of them in each area.
Older classrooms may not have the toys, block areas, and motor components, but there are designated areas: group areas, centers, desks, cubbies, or lockers, teacher areas, information centers, etc. All of these areas can be considered when it comes to visual input.
This blogfrom Lovely Connection, on preschool classroom set up, includes important aspects to think about as you plan your classroom layout. She includes information about including noise, popularity, supervision, boundaries, space, and the race track (when kids run around the room in a circular pattern!)
What happens when children are still overwhelmed, even when the environments are visually calming?
When a child feels overwhelmed for any reason, having a calm down corner, that is easily accessible and they can stay in as long as they need, is a must have. My “Soothing Sammy Emotions Program.” is an effective calm down area because students are excited to spend time with the adorable golden retriever Sammy. Not only does “The Sammy Program” teach children how to calm down, it guides them through communication and problem solving situations in a visual way that isn’t overwhelming.
Check out this great blog about visual processing and visual efficiencyfrom the OT Toolbox archives. When a child has visual processing difficulties, they have a harder time taking in visual information, and processing it in order to make sense of it.
Thisvisual processing bundle, also available in the Toolbox, can support children who are demonstrating visual processing challenges.
The Sensory Lifestyle Handbook (also available on Amazon) written by Colleen Beck of the OT Toolbox, is a great resource to start understanding sensory processing disorders.
A final note about visual noise
Visual noise doesn’t only occur indoors, it can happen outdoors, especially if there is a lot of activity and sunlight. Being mindful of the visual stimuli outdoors, is just as important as setting up an indoor classroom.
If you have a child who is having a hard time visually processing their environment outside, these visual sensory activities can be completed outdoors to support their sensory system.
While considering visual sensory overload in the classroom, also be sure to check out our resource on auditory sensitivities in the classroom. Both are very useful in setting up an inclusive classroom environment for success.
Classroom themes are adorable and cute! When planning your classroom, keep in mind how “busy” and overstimulating different colors and amount of objects can be. This will help keep your students calm and engaged. Although everyone processes their environment differently, anyone can all benefit from a more calming environment, especially when learning new skills!
Jeana Kinne is a veteran preschool teacher and director. She has over 20 years of experience in the Early Childhood Education field. Her Bachelors Degree is in Child Development and her Masters Degree is in Early Childhood Education. She has spent over 10 years as a coach, working with Parents and Preschool Teachers, and another 10 years working with infants and toddlers with special needs. She is also the author of the “Sammy the Golden Dog” series, teaching children important skills through play.
In this post, I have highlighted references to vision books that can specifically be used in therapy interventions to support the development of visual processing skills. These are the Top 9 Books for addressing vision concerns, that might be incorporated into visual therapy, or occupational therapy activities. Each of these visual skill building books covers aspects of visual perception, visual processing, and visual motor skills.
After reading Visual Problems or Attention, check out the Visual Screening Packet available on the OT Toolbox to further assist in diagnoses and treatment.
For more information on vision skills, check out this post from the OT Toolbox archives.
Vision Books
Looking for books on vision, visual motor integration and visual perceptual skills? Check out the list of books below that are chock full of information and treatment ideas!
Many of these books have reproducible pages, or can be laminated/placed into plastic sleeves to be reused.
Vision Book: Eyegames
The list of vision books below are linked to Amazon affiliate links for ease of searching, however they can be also found by googling the titles.
This vision book is an easy read about vision deficits, and how they impact function. It has a checklist of red flags to be on the lookout for. There are also loads of great therapy activities to target each skill deficit. Activities are geared for a variety of function levels, along with easy task gradation. Activities are designed to be completed in the home, clinic, or school settings.
The next set of vision books are created by Bridgette Sharp, and Bridgette O’Neil. These books make for a great set of tools to have in your bag.
The Visual Tracking Exercises Book is a beginner book for developing tracking skills. As a bonus, you can use this with learners who are working on left/right awareness as well. Worksheets are varied with numbers, shapes, patterns, color, and black and white fonts, to help keep things interesting.
As it says in the title, this visual perception book is for your advanced learners who are continuing to work on strengthening their eye muscles, gearing up for chapter book reading, and increased desk work. Patterns become more complex, and are in black and white only.
It can be helpful to read more on what is visual scanning and check out the red flags section and then use this vision book if needed.
This visual scanning beginner book has a variety of simple grid patterns with large colorful pictures for younger children, beginning learners, pre-readers, and children who are behind in reading readiness due to tracking and scanning issues. The images are large, colorful, and have plenty of variety to keep them engaged in therapy.
This Ready to Scan vision book is for more advanced scanners, or for kids/learners who are skipping lines when reading or copying. It’s a great resource for building endurance and eye muscle strength. As a bonus, use the patterns for reversal training and directionality!
Like it’s title says, this book has something for everyone. This is a great place to start your toolbox for visual skills. Patterns work through a progression, starting with large images, moving onto smaller images. They present a variety of pictures and geometric shapes, both in color and black/white. This book is a great place to create home programs with and homework from each session.
If you’re looking to change it up from geometric patterns and pictures, this book is a great option. The book consists of a variety of exercises using sight words. Use the pages to work on discrimination and word shape training as well.
Start by reading up on what visual tracking is and then go from there with this vision workbook.
The visual skills book, Brain Training for Reversals, is a brain training vision book consists of exercises specifically for reversals of b-d-p-q. Exercises range in complexity to address all skill levels. These brain training worksheets can also be used for scanning, to practice reading, and directionality. You can also use these worksheets similar to an eye spy game, by having the child look for all of one letter.
Visual Discrimination Book
Visual discrimination is a visual skill that impacts reading, writing, math, comprehension, and learning.
The Visual Discrimination book is great for grades 2-8 and focuses on finding patterns and solving problems through the use of colorful geometric patterns and images. This is great for critical thinking skills, along with working on spot the difference (visual disclination) tasks.
Book 9 is a higher level book, so save it for your older, more high functioning learners, or adult learners who are working at this reading level.
Spot the Difference Vision Books
Another great resource are “spot the difference” books! (affiliate link) There are hundreds of spot the difference books to choose from. These books not only address visual discrimination, but can also be used to work on following directions, scanning, item location in a busy environment, and general visual processing skills.
The Visual Closure Workbook is a 65 page digital file designed to impact visual perceptual skills for reading comprehension and efficiency, and the ability to visualize a complete image or feature when given incomplete or partial information.
Visual closure skills are essential for reading with fluency. It’s necessary for written work to happen without concentrating on each letter’s lines and curves. Visual Closure allows us to comprehend words and letters without actively assessing each line.
Challenges with puzzles, identifying sight words, copying in handwriting, math tasks, and other reading or writing activities require visual closure skills.
This workbook includes:
Information on visual closure and visual processing
Red Flags Indicating a Visual Closure Problem
15 ways to use the workbook and strategies
More Visual Closure Activities (use these tactics to grade the visual closure activities to meet individual needs, challenge, users, and support the development of skills)
Workbook – Level 1
Workbook – Level 2
Workbook – Level 3
This workbook is designed to provide background information on visual closure as a tool for understanding this visual perceptual skill. It’s a guide for advocating for common visual closure difficulties through the included screening tool broken down as “red flags”.
NOTE* The term, “learner” is used throughout this post for readability and inclusion. The previous information is relevant for students, patients, clients, preschoolers, kids/children of all ages and stages, or whomever could benefit from these resources.
Contributor: Kaylee is a pediatric occupational therapist with a bachelors in Health Science from Syracuse University at Utica College, and a Masters in Occupational Therapy from Utica College. Kaylee has been working with children with special needs for 8 years, and practicing occupational therapy for 4 years, primarily in a private clinic, but has home health experience as well. Kaylee has a passion for working with the areas of feeding, visual development, and motor integration.
One thing occupational therapists love is using fun toys to develop skills and this magnetic marble run fits the bill. We found this Tumble Trax magnetic wall marble run and loved the ways to support fine motor skills, visual motor skills, and gross motor skills. Let’s take a better look at how to use a marble run to support development, and break down the activity analysis for this particular magnetic marble run toy.
Amazon affiliate links are included in this post.
How to Use a Magnetic Marble Run
Use this magnetic marble run in so many ways to work on a variety of skills. From fine motor, to core strength, to visual tracking, to crossing midline…this marble run can be so helpful.
We covered how to support skills such as visual tracking using marble runs in a different blog post but here, we hope to cover more ways to support development with a simple toy.
Because this marble run attaches to the wall using magnets, and because the magnetic marble run pieces are movable, there are so many ways to support development.
Some of these skills include gross motor development, visual motor skill development, fine motor development, and more.
Use a Magnetic Marble Run for Gross Motor Skills
Use the magnetic marble run on a vertical surface to address skill development:
Work on core strength by working on a vertical surface.
Address visual shift and upright posture by working at a plane equal or slightly above the head and line of sight.
Work on postural control
Address changes in positioning to bend, squat, and challenge different muscle groups by bending to retrieve marble run pieces and place them on the magnetic surface.
Work overhead to visually track and shift vision in different planes.
Address balance and coordination skills
Incorporate breathing
Use a Magnetic Marble Run for Visual Processing Skills
Move magnetic marble run pieces to target specific visual motor skills:
Work on visual tracking to watch the marble run through the track.
Address visual scanning skills to shift vision to the next area the marble will move
Incorporate eye-hand coordination skills
Address visual perceptual skills such as figure-ground, visual closure, visual discrimination, etc.
Address visual motor skills by copying designs using the movable track pieces, included with the Tumble Trax Magnetic Marble Run set. (affiliate link)
Use a Marble Run for Fine Motor Skills
Address crossing midline to move a marble to a starting point across the midline.
Trace the track with fingers.
Pick up and manipulate the marble onto the Tumble Trax (affiliate link) ledge.
Strengthen hands, including grip and pinch to manipulate and move the track pieces against the magnetic surface.
Attach it to a magnetic wall or board, garage door, and even the refrigerator. It’s a fun way to play and work on the skills kids need.
Learning Resources Tumble Trax Magnetic Marble Run
This marble run attaches to the refrigerator or any magnetic surface for endless visual motor integration exercises. Visually tracking the marble is a skill builder for reading and writing tasks. Kids can address the form copying skills needed for handwriting with this interactive toy.
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.
Looking for more ways to support fine motor skills, visual motor skills, sensory challenges, and gross motor skill development? Grab one of our therapy kits to work on so many areas!
Working on fine motor skills, visual perception, visual motor skills, sensory tolerance, handwriting, or scissor skills? Our Fine Motor Kits cover all of these areas and more.
Check out the seasonal Fine Motor Kits that kids love:
Today’s post is all about finger isolation: what does finger isolation mean, why this fine motor skill is important, and even finger isolation exercises and activities to support precision and dexterity in the fingers. As children develop dexterity in fine motor skills, more precision and refined movements allow for coordinated skill work. It’s through this motor skill that one can do specific tasks that use only one finger or several fingers.
Finger isolation is needed for daily tasks, and finger games are just one way to build this skill.
You may have heard of finger isolation as a component of fine motor skills that kids need for dexterity and precision. Today, we’re discussing this important motor skill, how finger isolation impacts function, and activities to build finger dexterity. So, what is this motor skill that allows us to point, hold up a single finger, or make fingerprints? Let’s discuss!
What is finger isolation?
Finger isolation is the ability to isolate and use the fingers one at a time in functional tasks. The fine motor skill of finger isolation is the development of being able to “isolate” or individually use each finger of the hand. Counting one finger at a time, tying shoes, typing on a screen or computer keyboard, finger games like “Where is Thumbkin?”, and opposing one finger to the thumb are examples of finger isolation. One way to target this is using typing programs to improve finger isolation.
When children are developing they begin to use each finger individually; as infants, children tend to use the hand as one solid unit. Finger isolation is one of the first important developmental milestones that leads to children’s ability to write well with a pencil, type on a keyboard, play a musical instrument, tie shoes ect!
If you’re wondering how to see if your child has good finger isolation, you can ask yourself:
Does your preschooler or kindergartner avoid pointing?
Do they tend to gesture in the direction of an object instead of pointing?
Do they use their whole hand to grasp objects rather than one or two fingers when that makes more sense for the size of the object?
Do they struggle to manipulate coins, turn a page of a book, tie shoes, or other task requiring refined movements?
Then adding a few finger isolation activities and games might be helpful for your child!
Development of finger isolation
Finger isolation typically develops in the baby at around 6 months of age as they begin to pick up small pieces of cereal. It progresses to pointing, and then separation of the two sides of the hand with in-hand manipulation. Finger isolation is so important in fine motor dexterity in every task that the hands perform.
There are other components of fine motor skills that contribute to the precision of isolating fingers in activities:
Separation of the sides of the hand-Separating the sides of the hand isolates the precision side of the hand from the power side of the hand allows for, and requires isolation of fingers and joints during motor tasks.
In-hand manipulation-In hand manipulation includes moving objects within the hand and refined isolation of digits and joints on the fingers contribute to this skill.
Arch development– This hand strength allows for fingers to move in isolation of one another.
Opposition- Finger and thumb opposition of the thumb to the fingers also plays a role in finger isolation. This ability to oppose the thumb to a single digit allows for more refined and precise grasps on objects.
Open thumb web space- Similarly, to oppose the thumb to the fingertips, an open thumb web space is necessary.
Finger Isolation and Screens (apps and games)
From a very young age, many small children are efficient at using tablets and phone apps with finger isolation to point, swipe, and move through images on the screen. However, when kids are scrolling the screen, and using their finger in isolation on a tablet, they typically use only one finger (the index finger OR the middle finger) and do not exert strength on the screen.
They are not receiving feedback through the muscles and joints of the hand (proprioception) to build motor plans for fine motor tasks. They are not establishing a “store” of fine motor experiences.
You then may see that single finger is stronger and more dominant in tasks such as pencil grasp or tying shoes. This concept is similar to the dominance of a hand or side of the body. Equally of interest is this post on deciphering the difference between dominance and ambidextrous. It’s all related, and to the occupational therapy professional, so interesting to read about the connections!
So, how can you build and develop finger isolation? There are many ways to build finger isolation skills. You’ll also find more finger isolation activities along with a craft that can help kids become more aware of this fine motor skill. Below are small motor tools to help with development. Add these finger strength exercises to your therapy plans or home programs.
One great way to develop precision in a single digit of the hand is to instruct the individual to tap each finger to their thumb (give them a demonstration so they can mirror you!),
Isolation of the individual fingers really develops with hand strength and coordination through the use of hand clapping games and finger rhyming songs. Show the individual finger and hand games such as “Where is Thumbkin?”, “Itsy Bitsy Spider”, and other rhyming games that involve hand motions.
Overall, fingerplay songs are a powerful tool to support the development of finger isolation!
Pop bubbles
Play “I spy” with items around the house and encourage your child to point
Counting on fingers one at a time
“Itsy Bitsy Spider” (this is a great beginner motor plan with easy finger isolation hand motion)
Shadow hand puppets using a flashlight
Dampen fingers to pick up small items such as glitter, confetti, other small items
Teaching common finger expressions such as “A okay”, thumbs up, finger guns etc
“Lizard fingers”: this is one of my favorites that really makes kids laugh, stick small pieces of tape on each finger and have kids pretend to be a lizard and see what they can pick up around the room! (Make sure to have small items that can actually be picked up, we’ve had a couple failures with this activity!)
Other finger isolation ideas here on The OT Toolbox:
Using a pointer finger to trace shapes in foam, slime, various sensory mediums
Make “spaghetti” strings by rolling play-doh between the index finger and thumb
Make a “finger soccer board” by folding up a small piece of paper into a triangular shape and have your child “flick” the “ball” into the goal
If there is ever an easy craft that you and the kids make, this is it. These button rings are as cute as they are effective in developing the skills needed for tasks like maintaining a pencil grasp, shoe tying, and managing clothing fasteners.
These super cute button rings are a craft that my kids loved making. They wore these rings every day for a while there. (This mom did, too!)
To make the rings, cut the pipe cleaners into small pieces. You’ll want them small enough to fit little fingers, but a little longer in order to add the buttons.
Thread the buttons onto one end of the pipe cleaner.
Twist the two ends together and tuck the end of the pipe cleaner on the outside of the ring (so it won’t rub up against the skin).
You can add extra buttons and layer different colored buttons for fun rings.
Finger isolation activity with rings
When wearing the rings, incorporate finger isolation by placing rings on different fingers.
Ask your child to hold up the finger with a specific colored button or pipe cleaner.
Try tapping fingers with the rings one at a time by calling out a colored ring and asking your child to play a “SIMON” type of memory game.
Working on fine motor skills, visual perception, visual motor skills, sensory tolerance, handwriting, or scissor skills? Our Fine Motor Kits cover all of these areas and more.
Check out the seasonal Fine Motor Kits that kids love:
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.
