Occupational Therapy Rubber Band Pencil Grip

The tip grip protocol.

Occupational therapy rubber band pencil grip.

You can look it up online for a tutorial. Rolling a pencil in your fingertips turning a pencil over to use the rubber or opening a bottle top by rotating the lid between your fingertips. Please contact your school ot if you would like more. I believe the tip grip protocol was created by jan mcclesky an occupational therapist from the handwriting clinic first strokes program.

Kids with poor fine motor skills often find pencil grips uncomfortable. Teachers are typically responsible for providing handwriting instruction. Some of the main aspects of pencil control come from how the pencil is held and how it is manipulated whilst in the hand. It is a way to adapt the pencil using a the pencil grip that has been cut in half to promote a proper grasp with appropriate joint positioning.

When a teacher determines that a student is having problems producing legible writing he or she often consults an occupational therapist feder majnemer bourbonnais blayney morin 2007 in fact handwriting difficulties are the most common reason for referrals to occupational therapy in school age children feder. Hand therapy exercise is used for a variety of applications in rehabilitation centers sports medicine facilities hospitals and clinics for. A pinch between the pads of the thumb and index finger of the pencil. If you give a pencil grip to kids without working on their fine motor skills they are likely to just keep using their poor grasp over the pencil gripper.

What this pencil grip might be good for. Tactile cues like a rubber band and using small items in the palm can help to separate the parts of the hand and promote more mature grasps. When you think about it most poor pencil grips are a child s way of compensating for a lack of skills elsewhere. Adjusting your pencil grip or manipulating a button or a zipper with the fingertips.

Hand therapy exercise is combining occupational and physical therapy modalities to help rehabilitate the hands fingers and wrist disorders and injuries by using physical methods and devices such as grips balls bands stacking cones and weight bars. Ideally occupational therapists are looking for the following features when it comes to pencil grasp.