Spring Themed OT Activities

Bunny cross gross motor game

First, print out or make a spinner out of regular printer paper. On the spinner, write animal themed actions such as “hop like a bunny” or “fly like a butterfly”. Then, hide plastic Easter eggs around the room. To play the game, you must spin the spinner and whatever action it lands on that's how the player must navigate around the room to find an egg and return it. This activity helps target motor planning and it also helps the child recall auditory and visual information.

Spring Yoga

This activity helps target shoulder and wrist stability. Children who have shoulder and wrist instability often write with their arm “floating” up off the table surface, use their whole arm to manipulate and move a pencil, and other small motor actions. Yoga uses postures, breathing and mindfulness to calm and energize the body. Yoga develops strength, flexibility, bilateral coordination and the ability to ‘cross the midline’ and process sensory information. Yoga fosters imagination whilst also teaching self-regulation, focus and calming of the mind and body. With this activity you can replace basic yoga positions with fun spring themed animal names.

Easter Egg Pass

Sit on a partially inflated beach ball or on a yoga ball and let the kiddo balance a plastic Easter egg on a spoon. Then drop the egg into a basket. While this activity may seem simple it’s actually very fun and can help target posture and trunk stability. This would help improve positioning in the classroom, like sitting upright and handwriting positioning, and in functional tasks in general.

Spring Play Dough Press Activity

Gather spring items like cookie cutters, flowers, feathers, small animal toys, etc. as well as Play Dough. Let your child press these items into the play dough. They can also hide the items in the Play Dough and try to look for them or they can match the items to the impressions they previously made. This is a great way to promote endurance and strengthen the muscle of the hand.

Flower Breaths

This controlled breathing strategy uses deep breathing and engages the diaphragm in order to regulate the children's emotional state and help them reach a calm and alert state so that they can focus. Tell your child to close their eyes and imagine them blowing a dandelion fluff across a field using deep and slow breaths.