Vranch House is an Independent Day School in Exeter for children with significant physical difficulties, a centre for the treatment of outpatients and a provider of various therapies in other schools in Devon.

Last updated: 17/05/2012

Fine Motor Group

Mainstream school Outreach Programme - Fine Motor (Chimps) group

This programme lasts for half-a-term.

Criteria for group membership

Attending mainstream school
Prior full assessment by a physiotherapist or occupational therapist
Difficulties with handwriting/fine motor skills
Self-esteem possibly at risk
Age 6 – 11 (there are 3 levels to suit differing ability ranges)

Number in group: 6 maximum
Staffing: Senior occupational therapist & therapy helper

Aims of group

To facilitate the development of the child’s fine motor skills
To establish good writing posture
To develop the child’s ability to form letters correctly
To develop fluency & accuracy/pencil control
To develop effective use of cutlery
To develop the child’s self-esteem
To help the child to develop listening skills and ability to respond to instructions
To develop the child’s ability to behave co-operatively in a group situation

Group structure

Six-week (half-term) series of 1x hour sessions to include the development of skills, strategies & techniques to improve various aspects of handwriting & fine motor skills.

Evaluation
Each child receives a certificate at the end of the term and a booklet containing all the child’s work.
A progress report is provided for home and school.
At the end of the half-term, the child’s future therapy needs are discussed.

Other skills we work on:

Attention & concentration
Listening to instructions
Following instructions correctly
Taking turns
Listening whilst others speak
Taking pride in presentation
Sitting still
Working co-operatively in a small group – sharing resources
Self-evaluation – judging what has been done particularly well
Developing self-esteem and self-confidence

Chimps handwriting & fine motor skills programme

Each half-term block of therapy input focuses on the following:

Handwriting posture
Pencil grip
Fluency & accuracy
Letter formation
Letter joins (if appropriate)
Scissors skills
Creative activities
Use of cutlery
Self-evaluation

Creative activities, paper/pencil tasks, home sheets

We use creative activities as well as pencil & paper exercises
We may send some writing or creative activity home each week and would really appreciate it if the children could complete it and return it the following week. Hopefully, these activities are fun to do!

Letter Formation

We do the letters in ‘movement patterns’ – i.e. focusing on the principle movements necessary for particular letters families.
These letters families are in line with the National Literacy Strategy

Curly-caterpillar letters (anti-clockwise round letters) LETTERS: c, a, d, g, q, o, (e, f, s)

Bouncing letters(down & retrace upwards in clockwise direction) LETTERS: r, b, h, m, n, p, (k)

Long ladder letters (down & off in another direction) LETTERS: i, l, t, u, j, y

Zigzag letters (letters with diagonals) LETTERS: k, v, w, x, y, z

We hope that the children will enjoy these sessions – we aim to have fun as well as to work hard.

Vranch House

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