Parenting｜Training children’s hand muscles starts with daily practice. Occupational therapist will wake you up with 5 fun labor exercises
After the epidemic, children spend more time at home, but due to limited space at home, opportunities for physical exercise are reduced. For children to grow up healthily and be able to cope with daily life, flexible hands are very important. Through observation, parents can already know whether their children have problems with insufficient hand muscle strength so that they can be improved as soon as possible. Heep Hong Society Occupational Therapist Cindy Ho shared simple exercises that can be done at home. It turns out that doing labor is also a good way to train children’s hand muscles.
Insufficient hand muscle strength in children affects self-care, play and learning
Cindy said that the key to hand muscle strength is to first understand the development principles of children’s muscles. Basically, it starts from the proximal end. The proximal large joints include the coordinated use of the scapula, elbow, and wrist. After the proximal large joints are stabilized, Only then can the flexible development of the distal joints be established; and the distal joints are the joints of our fingers. “Actually, to put it simply, it’s like a tree. The trunk of the tree is the trunk. The roots must be firmly rooted so that the branches that grow out can develop lushly. So we need to see whether the hand muscles are strong enough, and also Whether the child’s trunk, shoulder blades, elbows and wrists are strong enough to support it.” If the hand muscle strength is insufficient, it will affect the child’s performance in self-care, play and learning, which is what occupational therapists call “the child’s occupation” ”, daily activities are actually included.
In terms of self-care, in fact, putting on clothes, zippers, buttons and other actions require a certain amount of strength; when eating, using a knife and fork or chopsticks to pick up food and unpacking food require the strength of your fingers; when going to the toilet and wanting to flush, press the If the flushing switch is not strong enough, or if the towel is not dry when washing, an adult must be asked to help. In terms of games, many toys are operational games, such as pressing buttons with fingers. However, if children have insufficient small muscle strength and may not know how to press the buttons with their fingers, they will instead use their palms or large joints, which are easier to control, to press the buttons on the toys. When older children play origami, pull cables, or climb, they may choose to avoid or not play because they feel they are not strong enough.
As for the aspect of learning that parents attach most importance to, many parents are worried about their children’s copying performance. Children with weak finger strength may not be able to use the first three fingers (tripod grip) to hold the pen, and rely on the power of the palm to hold the pen with their fists, or they may I can hold a pen but am unable to write. The lines are crooked or out of bounds. I feel tired after writing for a while. The above are all conditions of insufficient hand muscles. Poor performance in these three aspects will affect the child’s physical, mental and emotional development. If self-confidence is affected, other emotional problems may also arise.
Causes of insufficient hand muscle strength
Occupational therapists will understand the child’s situation at home and analyze the reasons for the child’s insufficient hand muscle strength. Cindy pointed out that in addition to the child’s birth or his own innate factors, acquired factors such as living habits directly affect the lack of small muscle strength. Congenital factors such as trauma at birth, resulting in neuromuscular damage, or low muscle tone, will hinder muscle development. Nervous system problems, such as sensory information processing, abnormalities in the reception and response of touch and proprioception, can cause insufficient muscle strength. As for the problem of living habits, a large part of it comes from parents. Cindy summarized 3 factors from clinical cases:
1. Parents are overly helpful
Occupational therapists usually ask children about their self-care performance at home, such as whether they eat by themselves, what tableware they use; whether they can button their clothes properly and whether they can button them, etc., to understand what the child knows how to do. To a certain extent, there are also daily opportunities for him to use his hands. Cindy has come into contact with many children with weak hand muscle function in her work. “If we see a child in the senior class who still needs to be fed and doesn’t know how to pack his schoolbag or even do the buttoning, we will usually say, ‘ “Hong Kong child.” She pointed out that parents often feel that children are slow or not neat enough, so they help. “Appropriate help is reasonable. Parents want their children to have a sense of success, but if they help too much, or even “help all”, the child’s opportunities to use his hands will be greatly reduced, which will affect the development of his hand functions and his natural strength. It won’t be enough.”
If parents help too much, the children’s opportunities to use their hands will be greatly reduced, thus affecting the development of hand function. (Getty Images)
2. No time for children to exercise
Cindy noticed that today’s parents tend to be knowledge-oriented and pay more attention to learning. In their free time, they usually spend more time reading books and studying. They don’t have time to do strength training activities for their children. “In fact, I go climbing outdoors and go to the supermarket with my family. Helping children to carry things after shopping, or even pretending to be Spider-Man and crawling around on the floor at home are some activities that exercise upper body strength.” These activities in daily life can help children build muscle strength invisibly, and parents can pay more attention to them.
3. Children have insufficient opportunities to explore with their hands.
Occupational therapists will be concerned about what children like to play, whether they have played with clay, paint, or used paint brushes to draw, or used scissors to do work, etc. These tasks with more artistic elements are actually good activities to exercise hand function. Unfortunately, some parents are afraid of dirtying the house and worrying about the danger of using scissors, so they avoid things like work. In other words, there are very few games where children can explore with their hands. The most common ones are playing with phones and tablets. Cindy understands that many parents may be working parents. Sometimes they want to take more rest and let their children play with electronic products, so that the parents can be free to do other things. “So parents should think about their living habits and see how they can be improved and give their children more opportunities to use their hands.”
Reference standards for parents to judge their children’s hand muscle ability
Cindy explained that the development of small muscles in children aged 0 to 6, that is, preschool children, is very important. Children under 6 months old usually focus on exploration. Because they do not know how to flexibly control their fingers, they will use their palms to pick up toys, and they like to pick up things and put them away. Explore the mouth; by 7 to 12 months, the fingers begin to become flexible, and they can use their fingers to pick up toys, usually the first three fingers. The activities of coordination with both hands will increase, and they know how to use two “chacha” to knock, or use their fingers Press the toy button. By the time children between 1 and 2 years old have improved their finger control and hand-eye coordination, they will know how to use their first two fingers to pick up some small beads, insert coins, twist and turn bottle caps, etc., and even tear off the Velcro of shoes.
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By the age of 7 to 12 months, children can generally hold toys with their first three fingers, and their hands-on coordination activities will increase. (Getty Images)
As for children aged 2 to 3 years old, the coordination of their hands has improved again. They will know how to play with winding toys and roughly use the first three fingers to hold a pen to imitate some horizontal and straight lines. In terms of self-care, he has the ability to take off his shoes and socks by himself, and can use a fork and toothpick to pick up food. Children who enter kindergarten K1 at the age of 3 to 4 generally know how to use scissors to cut straight lines along the lines; they know how to thread beads together with both hands, and can hold a pen to draw some simple lines, such as H, V, “mouth”, etc. Children at this age already have a rough idea of buttons, wear shoes, socks and coats, and can use chopsticks to pick up rice.
Children who enter kindergarten K1 at the age of 3 to 4 are generally able to draw some simple lines, such as H, V, “mouth”, etc. (Getty Images)
When children go to K2, they are 4 to 5 years old. Children can do simple origami, such as folding handmade paper in half or diagonally. They can control the coloring of simple patterns without going out of bounds, and can copy some simple Chinese characters. In terms of self-care, he can put on and take off T-shirts by himself, know how to fasten jacket zippers, tear open food packaging bags and use a knife to spread jam, etc. Until K3, that is, between 5 and 6 years old, children’s hand functions have developed and matured, and they can basically meet the needs of daily life, such as twisting towels, tying their own shoelaces, using rulers and staplers and other stationery, and copying some Complex Chinese characters. Their first two fingers are strong enough to use nail clippers to cut nails, and they even know how to tear open covered packaged food such as jelly cups. These movements and activities are very specific indicators that reflect the progress of children’s small muscle development to parents.
Work to improve hand muscle development 1. Printing
Printing can improve children’s grasping ability and finger strength. Printing is suitable for children of different ages. Cindy suggests that parents can adjust the difficulty and complexity according to the children’s abilities. Use different sensory stimulations to train children’s fine muscle development foundation. For example, children aged 1 to 2 can be arranged to do palm prints and finger prints; children aged 2 to 3 can use some grasping objects to make prints. Such as toilet paper tubes, cut fruits and vegetables, such as potatoes, radishes, bell peppers, apples, etc. Children aged 3 to 4 years old have more flexible fingers and can use some small cotton balls and use clips to hold the cotton balls to print paint. Print pictures, or use your fingers to hold cotton swabs to make dots, or even use LEGO bricks of different shapes to print paint on them.
Printing is suitable for children of different ages. It uses different sensory stimulations to train children’s fine muscle development foundation. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Work to improve hand muscle development2. Wave rolling painting
Parents and children can hold one side of the tray with drawing paper with each hand, print the waves or ping-pong balls with paint and place them on the paper, and then roll the waves or ping-pong balls at will to create different line drawings. Hold them firmly. The tray can be used with both hands at the same time, which can train hand-eye coordination and improve the stability of children’s upper limbs. Another way to play is to put the drawing paper in the tray and use waves to print different colors. Then the parents and children hold the pens respectively. Keep their arms still on the table and try to only move the first three fingers. Take turns like playing football. Use the pen to “kick” the waves and create line drawings while improving children’s use of the first three fingers and hand-eye coordination.
Parents and children can hold one side of the tray with drawing paper with each hand, print the waves or ping-pong balls with paint and place them on the paper, and then roll the waves or ping-pong balls at will to create different line drawings. (Photo: TEACH PRESCHOOL)
Work to improve hand muscle development3. Mud and glue activities
Using clay and glue to make different shapes and patterns can not only unleash their creativity, but also exercise children’s hand functions, such as pinching, rubbing, and pressing with their hands. They can also use different clay tools such as impression molds, roller sticks, and scissors. Glue tools to train children to use their hands and control their strength. If you use too much force, the clay strips will be flattened; if you use too little force, they will not form into strips. Therefore, clay clay activities can train the strength of your hands. When children reach the K2 and K3 stage, they can also use clay and glue to build different English letters and Chinese characters, allowing children to learn through play.
Using clay and glue to make different shapes and patterns can not only unleash children’s creativity, but also train children to pinch, rub and press with their hands. (Getty Images)
Work to improve hand muscle development4. Bubble paper drawing
This work can recycle the bubble paper for packaging received from online shopping. Parents cut the bubble paper into small pieces, and then the children use a paintbrush to fill the bubble paper with different watercolor colors and print it on the drawing paper. They can use their fingers one by one during the process. Pinch and pop the bubbles, which not only provides auditory stimulation, but also satisfies the tactile and visual senses, and improves children’s tool use, hand coordination, and more importantly, finger strength. In addition, parents can let older children use scissors to cut bubble wrap into different shapes, fill in colors and add different decorations to create shapes of flowers, animals, and vehicles, allowing children to use their own creativity.
Parents cut the bubble paper into small pieces, and then the children use a paintbrush to paint different watercolor colors on the bubble paper and print it on the drawing paper. This can improve children’s tool use, hand coordination, and more importantly, finger strength. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Work to improve hand muscle development5. Paper painting
We can use long paper strips with folded stars, or ask the children to cut the paper into strips of different thicknesses, and then roll up the paper strips with a pencil. Different methods can be used to roll the paper strips. You can roll it from beginning to end in one pass, roll it from both sides to the middle, or you can roll it from head to tail in opposite directions to create various changes. Afterwards, ask the children to use their creativity to arrange and paste all the paper rolls into different patterns to create a beautiful picture. Parents can also use a thicker or smaller pencil as a rolling tool according to the child’s ability, which can actually improve the child’s use of hands, finger flexibility and strength control.
Parents can also use a thicker or smaller pencil as a rolling tool according to the child’s ability to improve the child’s use of hands, finger flexibility and strength control. (Getty Images)
Other activities to improve small muscle capacity
Cindy added that if you want to improve children’s small muscle abilities, you should not only train the hands, but also not ignore the proximal joints, and do some upper limb control exercises. In addition to working, parents can usually arrange for children to go to the park to play, do some climbing activities, or play a rickshaw game at home: the child supports the floor with his palms, and the parents lift the child’s legs and let him move forward with his hands. . In the advanced version, you can pretend to be a crab. First, ask the children to lie down and look at the ceiling, then use the strength of their belly to lift their buttocks and support their bodies with their hands and feet, like a table. If they are strong enough, they can move it. These activities can exercise children’s upper body control and muscle strength.
As for daily activities, it is necessary to increase children’s participation. For example, you can ask children to help with housework. Easier and safer things include wiping the table, taking things or throwing away garbage, or using clothespins to hold clothes, peeling orange peels, etc. They can also dress themselves, pull zippers and buttons, etc., to improve children’s fine muscle function in daily life.
“Eye Movement Coordination and Writing” Parent Practical Workshop
In addition, Heep Hong Society will organize “Eye Movement Coordination and Handwriting” parent practical workshops on three consecutive Friday evenings starting from November 3.Occupational therapists from Heep Hong Society will be on hand to teach parents how to improve children’s eye control and writing skills at home. Interested parents canclick this linkSign up!
Heep Hong Society Occupational Therapist Ho Kin-yah (Meitu)
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2023-10-24 07:15:56
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