Festive Fun

Get your younger clients into the festive spirit by theming some popular therapy activities with a Christmas twist

With the festive season just around the corner, we take a look at how you can transform the occupational therapy activities you conduct with your younger clients. From winter-themed sensory sensations, to Christmas baking and biscuit decorating, it’s time to harness the magic of Christmas and combine it with the power of OT. PLAYDOUGH SNOWMEN

You may have some readymade white playdough in your OT toolkit already, but if you need to whip up a batch of your own, it couldn’t be easier. You just need flour, salt, water and oil, with the optional addition of glitter if you want to make your snow look twinkly. There are many recipes for making playdough online to give you the correct quantities depending on much you need, you can also colour it with food colouring to make a whole rainbow of colours. Once you have your playdough, it’s time to set to work on those snowmen. Kids will enjoy making the body and head for the snowman by rolling the playdough in their hands to make circles, working on their hand strength and coordination. They can then work on their fine motor skills by making the eyes and carrot nose, and using buttons to decorate. The end result will look great and you can create a whole family of snowmen of all different shapes and sizes.

CHRISTMAS BAKING

Find a simple biscuit recipe to prepare (BBCGoodFood.com is always a good place to look for this), look out some Christmas cookie cutters and set out an array of sprinkles for kids to work with. Rustle up some icing by using icing sugar and a little water, adding to make the right consistency for letting kids spread over the biscuits. Using a range of Christmas biscuit shapes, from trees and baubles to bells and presents, you can encourage little ones to get creative and try some intricate details by picking up silver balls individually to place on or use small tongs to pick up larger sprinkles and edible decorations. The best thing about this activity is that you all have a tasty treat to enjoy at the end.

The memory tray game is a great way to work on children’s memory skills, recall, attention and focus. You can make this a festive themed game by ensuring all of the items you put on the tray link to Christmas or winter. Use items like baubles, chocolate Santas, tinsel, stars, candles, ribbon and anything else you find in your toolkit. Give children a minute to observe everything on the tray and then take it away and ask them to list all the items they remember from it. You could also remove the tray and take one item off before returning it and asking the children to figure out which item is missing.

CREATE A SENSORY SCENTED BOX

Sensory boxes are a fantastic tool to allow kids to explore their senses. Christmas-themed boxes can indulge the senses with a mixture of scents, textures and sounds. A great option to fill out your box with is dyed, scented rice and pasta, simply add dry rice and pasta to a bag with a splash of vinegar, some red or green food colouring and some peppermint essence for that wonderful candy cane smell. Lie the rice and pasta on a tray overnight to dry out then pop it in the box and find some fun items to add in for kids to play with. Mini baubles and tinkly bells are great additions, as are fluffy pom poms, foam shapes and toy stars. Introduce cupcake cases and little spoons to allow kids to scoop and fill the cases until their heart’s content.

MAKE SNOW

It is very unlikely we will have a white Christmas this year so we will have to make do with making our own snow! Making snow can be a great sensory activity to get children involved in, and it can be used for making pictures or creating snowy winter scenes. Mix equal parts of cornflour and bicarbonate of soda, then add a very small amount of water gradually until the mixture comes together and crumbles creating a snow like consistency that can be sprinkled around.

MAKING SNOWFLAKES

Paper snowflakes are a wonderful activity to allow children to practice fine motor skills using scissors. This simple activity only requires some scissors and some paper, but it can be wonderfully creative and fun, while also developing fine motor skills, grasp and focus. Encourage your kids to experiment with cutting different shapes out of the folded paper to see the different snowflakes they can make. You can then also go on to colour these in or add some glitter to make them sparkly and festive.

MARSHMALLOW SNOWMEN

These tasty treats are perfect for kids to create and eat straight away or add to a hot chocolate on a frosty day. All you need is marshmallows, chocolate chips for the eyes and buttons, fizzy laces for a scarf, an orange gummy sweet for the nose, a chocolate (maybe a Rolo) for the hat and pretzels for the arms. Simply melt a little chocolate in a bowl, add three marshmallows onto a wooden skewer stick and use the melted chocolate like glue to start decorating. Make hot chocolates and let the kids start melting their marshmallow snowmen in them for a tasty treat.

CHRISTMAS CARDS

Getting crafty and Christmassy can produce some wonderful and personal cards that can showcase children’s talents and develop their skills. This messy activity will get the creative juices flowing, and using a large array of craft items, glitter glue, pasta shapes and Christmas-themed confetti can create some beautiful cards from your younger clients. It allows them to express their creative side and they can choose someone special to make their cards for. You know these are going to bring a smile to someone special when they are made. For some amazing OT-led winter activities check out TheOTToolbox. com.

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