How Do Paediatric
Occupational Therapists
Partner With
Parents?
Date Posted: July 6, 2020
Usually, when people think about paediatric Occupational Therapy, the first thing that comes to mind is dropping your child off to see an OT who will do 1:1 treatment with them. Sometimes parents aren’t present which means that they may not fully understand what the OT is working on with their child, and more importantly, don’t know how to support their child in their daily lives.
How do OT’s help parents support their kids?
At ot4kids, we have always valued working closely with parents in these ways:
What do parents think of 1:1 coaching sessions with their OT?
Parents often find these consultation meetings to be the most helpful to them in understanding their child’s needs, and parenting their kids in a way that supports them developmentally and emotionally versus using traditional parenting techniques.
How do parent coaching sessions / consultations help us (OT’s) help you?
As an OT, I find the parent consultations really effective as:
1) parents know their child best so their input and feedback are great clues into figuring out effective ways to help their child
2) it’s important to know how the child fares in their daily lives as we want them to develop skills beyond the clinic and into their ‘real’ environments for the best impact
The aim of parent consultations / coaching
Our aim is to help reduce the overwhelm that parents can feel, and to help you find simple and effective ways in helping nurture your kids.
My message to parents is that you know your child best, follow your gut instinct, and know that we can help you to be confident in helping your child to be coordinated, calm, and connected.
How do OT’s help parents support their kids?
At ot4kids, we have always valued working closely with parents in these ways:
- Parents or caregivers are present throughout our sessions
- We have regular parent-ONLY coaching sessions (similar to a teacher-parent conference but not rushed and more often)
- to review how things are going at home, identify areas of continued concern, understand rationale behind certain ‘behaviours’ and why certain sensory tools are effective and how to use them.
- Some parents do only parent consultations where they learn about sensory processing and motor skills, learn simple strategies to do with their child, and review in their OT consultations
- Sometimes even grandparents and nannies have joined coaching and / or treatment sessions which has been so fantastic
What do parents think of 1:1 coaching sessions with their OT?
Parents often find these consultation meetings to be the most helpful to them in understanding their child’s needs, and parenting their kids in a way that supports them developmentally and emotionally versus using traditional parenting techniques.
How do parent coaching sessions / consultations help us (OT’s) help you?
As an OT, I find the parent consultations really effective as:
1) parents know their child best so their input and feedback are great clues into figuring out effective ways to help their child
2) it’s important to know how the child fares in their daily lives as we want them to develop skills beyond the clinic and into their ‘real’ environments for the best impact
The aim of parent consultations / coaching
Our aim is to help reduce the overwhelm that parents can feel, and to help you find simple and effective ways in helping nurture your kids.
My message to parents is that you know your child best, follow your gut instinct, and know that we can help you to be confident in helping your child to be coordinated, calm, and connected.
This entry was posted in Home Therapy, Parents, Sensory Integration, Teletherapy, and tagged Occupational Therapists working together with parents to improve their child’s sensory processing and motor skills on July 6, 2020 by Munira.
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