GIVE A HAND

Language Skills

Chatty Chores!

Asking your child to help you with household chores is a great way to boost his independence skills but also offers him an opportunity to practice all his language skills.

Between 2 and 4 years your child’s comprehension of complex phrases and structures is expanding. While doing the chores, children learn the verbs that describe the actions they are doing such as clean, tidy, fold, sort, etc.

When your child is helping with tidying the room, he can practice understanding spatial terms and orientation terms. For example: you tell him to” pick up the blocks from the floor” or “put the cars inside the box”

Around age 4, your child can follow complex directives that include 2 steps. For example: when you tell him to set the table, you tell him: “first, we put the plates, and then we put the forks and spoons.”. He will learn that things are done in a given order. Sequencing helps children develop organizational skills.

Around 2 years, children develop their vocabulary, and household chores are a great way to help do so in a functional manner related to daily life routines. During these activities, your child will use words such as clean, spray, broom, laundry, wipes, wet, sticky, messy, sloppy, etc. Around this age also, your child will start to combine nouns and verbs, for example: “wash dishes”, “mop floor . He will also start to combine adjectives and nouns, for example: “dirty clothes”, “ wet floor”.

If you feel that your child has difficulty in doing household chores without your help or if you have to constantly repeat what he/she should do, don’t hesitate to ask why does my child have such a hard time, and keep in mind that it could be because he did not understand what is needed to be done!

This is one of the signs that a child has difficulty in his receptive skills and language skills. It is advisable that you learn more about your child’s language development and what is expected for his age by filling ONESTI’s screening checklist and talking to our professionals.

ONESTI programs are tailored to provide you with individualized strategies and techniques to support your child and help him overcome those difficulties.

Challenging Behaviors

Do you think that your 2 year old little gentleman is still too young to clean up his toys, and that it’s still too early for your 4 year old little princess to start helping you in folding the laundry?

No it is not! This age isn’t too young to get them to learn responsibility! If anything, this is the perfect time to slowly teach them about helping out at home, and this will help you avoid resistance and challenging behaviors at a later age.

Many toddlers at this age love to see people noticing their help, so getting them used to using a sticker chart reward system is a great option.

Children with challenging behavior often have difficulties engaging in activities of daily living, including household chores. Having household responsibilities is one of the first steps towards future independent living.

Talking to our professionals at ONESTI will help you take the right steps and follow the best techniques that will lead to encouraging your child to become more responsible, helpful, and cooperative.

Grasping & Eye Hand Coordination

Hold and Fold

Open the door knob, set the table with a dish, utensils, cup, … to put on the dinner table, fold a blanket, pick up toys and put them in the box, all these tasks need good grasping and eye hand coordination.

Grasping is the way we secure things between our fingers and the palm of our hand, meaning the way we hold things. Eye hand coordination is when we join our visual and motor skills, allowing for the hand to be guided by the visual stimulation our eyes receive.

Any problem with these two skills can make small tasks hard to accomplish.

ONESTI will help you assist your child to find his way of holding and manipulating items in hand. In addition to providing you with exercises to enhance your child’s grip and eye hand coordination skills.

Sensory Tolerance

Squeaky-Clean

If your child refuses to help around at home, there may be good reasons for that. He may not want to help in setting the table because the clatter and rattle of dishes and utensils are too much for him to handle. Or you find him running away once you turn on the vacuum cleaner. You might ask him to help out in cleaning the house, but the strong smells of the different detergents are overwhelming. Or maybe the texture of the sponges and brushes are unbearable for him.

How Can ONESTI Help You

If you find yourself in a similar situation and want to know the reasons behind your child’s resistance to help around the house, fill ONESTI’s “Independent Me” checklist to help you learn more about your child’s sensory preferences and how you can adapt the environment to suit his sensory needs. Our  “Sense in Harmony” program will provide you with individualized sensory exercises to decrease discomfort, increase his sensory tolerance level, and have a helpful hand around.