Core Skills Analysis
Life Skills and Personal Care
- Mila practiced washing their face and body in the shower, building familiarity with a personal-care routine.
- Mila worked on drying themself after showering, practicing a useful step in caring for their body.
- Mila practiced putting on their own shoes, developing independence with dressing.
- Mila followed their therapist’s directions during the routine, practicing how to carry out personal-care tasks with guidance.
Social-Emotional Learning
- Mila practiced waiting while the therapist came to the door, exercising patience during a real-life transition.
- Mila experienced a change to the usual Friday routine when someone else drove them to aqua OT, practicing flexibility within a familiar activity.
- Mila had opportunities to move through the routine while adapting to the different transportation arrangement.
Physical Development and Motor Skills
- Washing and drying their face and body gave Mila practice coordinating hand movements during everyday tasks.
- Putting on shoes involved practicing the movements needed to manage footwear independently.
- The shower and dressing tasks offered practical opportunities to use motor skills as part of a meaningful daily routine.
Listening and Following Directions
- Mila practiced attending to and following directions from their occupational therapist.
- Completing showering and dressing steps within the routine gave Mila practice connecting instructions with actions.
Tips
Tips Turn Mila’s personal-care routine into a gentle sequence-learning activity: invite Mila to arrange picture cards for washing, drying, and putting on shoes, then talk through the order together. For a playful flexibility exercise, try a familiar outing with one small planned change, such as a different route, and discuss what stayed the same and what changed. Practice waiting with a short sand timer or a favorite quiet activity, gradually making the wait feel purposeful. Mila can also help choose a towel or pair of shoes, adding meaningful choices while keeping the routine familiar.
Book Recommendations
- I Can Do It Myself by Stephen Krensky: A simple picture book celebrating a child’s growing independence with everyday tasks.
- Waiting Is Not Easy! by Mo Willems: A humorous story about practicing patience while waiting for something exciting.
- The Way I Feel by Janan Cain: A picture book that gives children language for recognizing and discussing emotions during everyday experiences and changes.
Try This Next
- Make a picture-sequence worksheet showing washing, drying, and putting on shoes; have Mila arrange the steps.
- Create a waiting-skills choice card with two quiet activities Mila can pick while waiting at the door.
- Draw a “same and different” map comparing the usual Friday trip with the changed drive to aqua OT.