Sensory processing As a child grows and begins to explore their surroundings they learn to firstly notice and register information from their senses, then process it and respond appropriately – this is sensory processing. Sometimes young children when processing through their senses their information can become muddled and they may appear too intense or the information is slow to be noticed. When children have difficulties processing information from their senses they might either appear over responsive and / or under responsive to particularly sensory input. Strategies that can support children with sensory processing difficulties can be either arousing or calming. Arousing activities include running, jumping, hopping or using a trampoline. Calming actives include ‘heavy work’. This involves pushing, pulling, carrying activities where a child needs to weight-bear using their hands or legs. Heavy work activities can be calming for a chid that is over responsive to sensory input and help refocus a child that is under responsive or sensory seeking or can help body awareness for a child that is slow to register information from their senses. Some ideas for heavy work include: wall presses, row row your boat, animal walks such as donkey kicks, bear walk, worm crawl, pushing hands together for 10 seconds, roll tummy on exercise ball, digging in the sand/garden, raking leaves, carrying heavy bags, or even vacuuming. Do children have a place that can go to when Recognising a child’s sensory processing needs becoming overwhelmed, where they can feel calm and rested, ie a tent, large bean bag to crawl under or sit on, weighted blankets or toys? There are seven sensory systems: hearing, sight, smell, taste and touch, vestibular and proprioceptive senses that can affect the way children respond to their environment. Visual Our visual system helps us to see what we need to see and filter out what we don’t need to focus on, such as finding items in a busy room and matching or sorting items in our daily lives. Avoiding behaviours (over responsiveness): Staring into space or avoiding eye contact, covers, squints or rubs eyes, trouble determining distance, dizziness or nausea from stimuli, skittish of moving objects, can seem clumsy, avoids bright lights or sunlight. Seeking behaviours (under responsiveness): Seeks visual stimulation, holds items close to eyes, may shake or move head during fine motor activities, unaware of changes in setting, seeks out patterns or visual stimulation, trouble focusing on objects, stares at bright lights. Arousing options: flashing lights, contrasting patterns, bright colours or light, quick movement, unfamiliar environments, clutter. Calming options: kaleidoscopes, bubbles, pastel colours, dark spaces, smaller spaces, dim lights, familiar spaces, uncluttered spaces. Tactile/touch Our skin and mouth help us discriminate between size, texture, shape and temperature. This sense also helps us to respond to light touch (which can often be arousing, or alarming for some) and deep touch (which can often be calming such as deep pressure or massage). Avoiding behaviours (over responsiveness): avoids messy play or getting hands or face wet, large crowds overwhelm, walk on toes, new textures can cause emotional response, avoids certain fabrics, physical contact can be overwhelming, overly ticklish, dislikes hair being brushed or washed. Seeking behaviours (under responsiveness): high pain threshold, mouths objects, touches everything, hurts others by kicking, pinching and hitting, not aware of being touched by others. Arousing options: light touching, being cold, rough textures, labels on clothes, messy play, water splashing, hair being touched or washed, baggy clothes or different textures to what they were not wearing ie not their clothes. Calming options: deep pressure, being warm, cuddles, soft or silky materials, squeeze toys, tight clothes, massage, weighted toys or blankets. Auditory/sound Helps us hear accurately which sounds are important and those that should be tuned out. When our auditory processing is disordered it can make people feel disorientated, disorganised and overwhelmed. December 2023 { 34 }
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