DEVELOPMENTAL THERAPY

Communication/Language Development - Communication or baby “talk” begins at birth.  The cry of a newborn is language.  To a tiny baby, language is any sound or gesture that makes a caregiver respond.  Babies learn to communicate before they are able to say words. As a child grows her modes of communication will increase as well. Communication between people can take many forms, including spoken words or sounds, gestures, eye and body movements, and touch.  Children need to understand both verbal and nonverbal means of communicating thoughts, feelings, and ideas.  Adults can help children develop such skills by encouraging communication and providing ample opportunity for children to listen, interact and express themselves freely with other children and adults.

Cognition- “I wonder what he is thinking.”  Cognitive development means learning how the world works, what fits where, how to make things happen, and that objects have shapes and move in predictable ways.  Cognitive, or intellectual, skills include the ability to think, to reason, to make adjustments to different play situations and to solve problems.  As children learn and grow their thinking capabilities expand and become more flexible. Adults can guide children’s thinking skills by responding to their child’s interests with new learning opportunities and answering their questions with information and enthusiasm. You can almost see the wheels turning in the child’s mind as they investigate everything in their path.

Adaptive/Self-Help Skills – The development of self-help, or sometimes known as self-care or adaptive skills, is largely dependent on a child’s own maturation and internal motivation, and on parental influences.  Self-help skills include dressing/undressing, toileting, bathing, and self-feeding. Some children insist on doing things for themselves very early, while others are more passive and dependent.  Ultimately, a child cannot develop into an independent and autonomous individual until self-care skills are mastered.

Social/Emotional Skills – The ways a child interacts with caregivers and plays with toys make up her social skills.  All children need a physically and emotionally secure environment that supports their developing self-knowledge, self-control, and self-esteem and at the same time encourages respect for the feelings and rights of others.  Interactions with adults and caregivers can profoundly affect a child’s social development.

Physical/Fine Motor Skills – Physical development progresses from large motor activity, or gross motor development, to small muscle activity, known as fine motor development.  This directional growth can be observed as an infant gains control of her head, chest, trunk, and then legs to turn over.  To crawl/creep, she gains control of over her back and leg muscles, and to walk, she gains control of her neck, shoulders, back, legs, feet and toes.  An infant then moves on to develop control of her arm movements which begin from erratic waving to accurate reaching; progressing on to hand control which develops from accidentally bumping and hitting to purposefully touching. Reaching then occurs first with an open hand grip. Then the fingers develop from a reflexive pinching, grasping, and reflexive releasing to controlled opening and closing.  Infants and children need plenty of practice in order to master all these characteristics of motor development.