Bilateral Hand Use - Page 93 of 94

Therapy Snowman

Make two circles (one big and one small) from construction paper, to be used as stencils for the snowman’s body and face. You may also make a stencil for a hat.

Let the child trace the circles on a white construction paper and trace the hat on a piece of fabric.

If needed, trace the child’s circle to make a wider line to assist with cutting accuracy.

Ask the child to cut the traced shapes.

On a separate piece of construction paper, have the child glue the circles and the hat: the big circle on the bottom for the body and the small circle on the top for the snowman’s face.

Ask the child to draw the snowman’s face using markers or crayons.

Cut out a stripe from the tissue paper for the scarf and let the child glue it on the snowman.

For buttons, let the child glue pom-poms, buttons, or stickers on the big circle.

Use the wooden sticks or branches for hands.

If you wish to work on handwriting skills, let the child write a story about the snowman.

Multi Step Shamrock

Print and cut the provided picture below of a shamrock (about 7 inch in size). You will use this as your stencil.

Provide the child with a green or white page of construction paper.

Ask the child to trace the shamrock on his paper using the stencil you made.

Instruct the child to cut out the shamrock.

Allow the child to spread some glue over the shamrock he cut. You may use a paint brush or a craft stick if the child avoids sticky materials.

Place the different manipulatives in front of the child inside a shallow container or a paper plate.

Instruct the child to glue the different objects on the shamrock transferring the objects from the container to his paper using the tweezers or the tongs.

The child may also use his fingers to reinforce pincer grasp and in-hand manipulation skills.

You may also have the child crumble pieces of tissue paper into small ball to work on dexterity and strengthening of the small muscles in your child’s hands.

Big Tac Toe

Help the child cut 4 equal pieces of masking tape. Each piece should be about 3 feet long.

Use the masking tape pieces to make a large tic tac toe board on the floor.

Use the construction paper to cut shapes (each player should have his own shape). You will need 5 pieces of each shape. Let the child help you with a cutting of the shapes.

If working on writing skills, each player can write his name on his shapes.

Instruct the child to lay prone next to the tic tac toe board.

Using the pieces you cut, play the tic tac toe game by placing the pieces while keeping your body prone and reaching with your arms out to place the pieces on the board (i.e. crossing midline).

For grading: instead of writing your name on each shape, you can write your initials or any other word as appropriate.

Stickplane

Use the wooden sticks or craft sticks as the airplane wings.

Let the child paint or color the sticks with markers and decorate with stickers.

Once sticks are dry, instruct the child to glue on stick at the bottom of the clothespin and one stick at the top.

Using pincer grasp, instruct the child to pinch and open the clothespin while placing the third wing in the middle.

You can have the child glue the middle stick or do not glue the middle wing to allow the child to practice his grasp by removing the middle stick for a two wing airplane model.

Sunflower Handprint

Let the child cut the following pieces:
– 4-inch circle out of brown or black construction paper
– Stem (12-inch by 3-inch rectangle) and leaves out of green construction paper.

Use a large construction paper as the background and glue the stem from the bottom up. Glue the leaves to the stem.

Paint the child’s palms with yellow paint and instruct him to print his palms on the top part of the paper to form the flower petals.

Glue the 4-inch brown/black circle in the middle of the palm prints.