The holiday season is a busy and exciting time of year, but it can also be quite stressful. Between shopping, parties, traveling, and visiting family, it’s easy for your regular exercise routine to fall by the wayside. Research has shown that physical activity levels tend to decrease the most after holidays. But, you can have healthy holidays by following a few simple steps.

That’s why it’s so important to make your health a priority this time of year. Regular exercise can actually help reduce holiday stress and keep you feeling your best. It is important to stick to your exercise routine and reduce stress. Here are some of the key benefits of maintaining your fitness routine:

Stress Management for Healthy Holidays

The holidays bring a lot of added demands on your time and energy. Exercise is a proven way to manage stress and improve your mood. When you work out, your body releases endorphins that can lift your spirits and help you better cope with the pressures of the season. Making time to be active, even just a little big each day, can go a long way in keeping you calm and centered. Use additional stress management techniques to boost the impact of exercise.

Immune System Support

Cold and flu season tends to ramp up during the winter months. Staying active can help support your immune system and reduce your risk of getting sick. Keeping up with your workouts makes you less susceptible to holiday illnesses that could derail your plans.

Weight Management for healthy holidays

The holidays are full of rich, indulgent foods that can pack on extra pounds if you’re not careful. Regular physical activity helps you maintain a healthy weight by burning calories and boosting your metabolism. It also gives you an outlet for all the extra energy you may have from eating richer foods.

If you’re having trouble sticking to your exercise routine, consider talking to your physical therapist. They can create a customized fitness plan to help you stay on track, even with a busy holiday schedule. Physical therapists can teach you exercises you can do at home and provide tips for fitting activity into your day.

Here are a few quick tips to help you stay active this holiday season:

• Schedule your workouts like any other important appointment and don’t cancel them.
• Find ways to be active with friends and family, like going for a walk after a meal.
• Keep home exercise equipment (like weights or a yoga mat) accessible and ready to use.
• Park further away from stores and buildings to get in extra steps.

So, don’t let the hustle and bustle of the holidays derail your health and fitness goals. With a little planning and creativity, you can maintain your exercise routine and enjoy a happier, healthier holiday season.

 

Navigating the complexities of language development in your child can be both rewarding and challenging. There are two ways in which children develop language, not just the familiar milestone charts seen online or at well child visits. When charts describe language acquisition and processing as a progression from cooing to babbling to first words building to sentences, this describes Analytic Language Processing (ALP). ALPs are often thought of as, “word babies”. Gestalt Language Processing (GLP) is another approach to language acquisition where children learn language in chunks or “gestalts.”

Rather than breaking down language into individual words and constructing sentences from scratch (as in ALP), gestalt processors typically learn phrases or sentences as whole units. These can be scripts or memorized phrases from movies, songs, or conversations, which they use in appropriate contexts.  The intonation or inflection of the script is copied by the child, even when the script is long and they do not pronounce all the words. Therefore, parents and caregivers will often know the script by the sound, dubbing GLPs as, “intonation babies”. GLP is less discussed or known about, despite being just as natural and typical as ALP.  Processing language as a GLP is not a disorder nor does it mean a child is autistic. However, however many people with autism are GLPs.

Supporting Communication Skills

Understanding GLP can be crucial for effectively supporting your child’s communication skills. Developing language as a GLP has distinct milestones through a process known as Natural Language Acquisition (NLA). Many children will go undetected as GLPs as they move through these distinct stages of NLA. Others will require speech therapy. Identifying the characteristics of gestalt language processing can help you determine whether your child may process language this way.

Characteristics of Gestalt Language Processing

• Echolalia: This is the repetition of phrases or scripts from others, often verbatim. Children may repeat lines from a favorite movie or recite phrases they’ve heard without immediate modification.
• Delayed Echolalia: In some cases, children may use previously heard phrases in future conversations, applying them contextually.
• Chunked Speech: Instead of constructing original sentences, a gestalt processor may use learned phrases that are contextually relevant.
• Difficulty with novel sentences: These children might struggle to create new sentences or phrases on their own but can communicate effectively using learned chunks.

Recognizing whether your child is a gestalt language processor can significantly influence how you approach their language development. While children who are analytic processors may learn language in a more conventional manner, gestalt processors often display different strengths and challenges. Understanding this distinction can help parents tailor their support, ensuring that their child’s communication needs are met effectively.  Remember, every child’s language development is different. Seeking guidance from speech-language pathologists can provide additional support tailored to your child’s needs. Together, we can foster an environment where our children thrive in their communication skills.

In addition to keeping us alive, breathing is the power source of our voice. Effective breathing facilitates clear speech sound production, adequate loudness of voice, quality of voice, and endurance when speaking. When we do not breathe effectively, the loudness and quality of our voice deteriorates, making it difficult for us to be understood. Shortness of breath is usually due to an underlying medical condition and may or may not be optimally managed. So, how does shortness of breath affect voice?

Affects of Shortness of Breath on Voice

Shortness of breath results in a quieter voice, limits sentence length, changes the flow and rhythm of speech, and can result in a change in vocal quality such as hoarseness.

The most effective breathing to support voice is diaphragmatic breathing. This is same as belly breathing. Diaphragmatic breathing improves our voice by allowing us to inhale more air and control the air we exhale using diaphragm muscles rather than throat muscles. Diaphragmatic breathing allows us to reduce vocal strain and speak with more relaxed muscles of our throat and vocal cords.

Basic Steps for Diaphragmatic Breathing

1. Sit or lie flat in a comfortable position.
2. Relax your shoulders by rolling them down and away from your ears.
3. Place one hand on your chest and one hand over your navel.
4. Breathe in through your nose. You should feel your stomach moving outward while your chest remains relatively still.
5. Purse your lips and exhale slowly for about the same amount of time as in step 4.
6. Repeat these steps.
7. If you start while lying flat, try to complete the same steps sitting up, then when standing. When standing, back up against a wall. This will help keep your back straight and your head and neck over your spine.

As with learning any new skill, it may take practice to breath effectively.  But the result will be a stronger clearer voice.

Fine motor skills development in pediatrics is a crucial aspect of a child’s overall growth. Fine motor skills are honed through play as children engage in a wide range of activities that involve intricate hand and finger movements. Through play, children have the opportunity to refine their fine motor skills, which involve coordination and dexterity. Engaging in activities such as building with small blocks, threading beads onto a string, cutting with scissors, and drawing or coloring not only encourages creativity and imagination but also fosters the development of precise hand movements and hand-eye coordination.

These playful experiences provide children with the chance to strengthen their ability to grasp, manipulate, and control objects, laying a solid foundation for tasks that require intricate hand movements, such as writing, drawing, and performing everyday activities independently. But, how do I know what my kid should be able to do?

Fine Motor Skills by Age

Age Range	Activities
0 to 6 months	– Grasping something with both hands (3 months) – Grasping something with one full hand (5 months)
6 to 12 months	– Pinching things with their thumb and one other finger – Transferring objects from one hand to the other – Picking up and dropping toys and putting them in their mouth
1 to 2 years	– Stacking three small blocks – Turning knobs – Beginning self-feeding with utensils – Turning a few pages of a book at a time
2 to 3 years	– Turning single pages of a book – Holding a crayon with their thumb and first two fingers (not a fist) – Making small cuts with scissors – Rolling, squeezing, and pulling putty
3 to 4 years	– Stacking a tower of nine small blocks – Drawing copies of circles – Using their non-dominant hand to assist and stabilize objects while using them
4 to 5 years	– Cutting continuously with scissors on a line – Printing their name and numbers 1 through 5 – Dressing and undressing without help
5 to 6 years	– Cutting out simple shapes with scissors – Coloring within the lines – Using a three-fingered grasp of a pencil
6 to 7 years	– Tying shoelaces by themselves – Writing consistently on lines – Writing most numbers and letters correctly

Despite being aware of what activities to do, children may still be struggling to meet these milestones. An occupational therapist can further assess and develop a plan to address fine motor skills for children to be successful in their everyday lives. Check out MomLovesBest for more information regarding fine motor skills and various activities to explore.

Crawling, once considered a key developmental milestone in early childhood, is no longer universally regarded as essential for typical development. Experts now understand that each child’s motor skills progress at their own pace, and while crawling plays a role in strengthening coordination and muscle control, many children may skip this stage entirely without experiencing any developmental delays. Some children move directly to scooting or walking. However, physical and occupational therapists feel that crawling is still important.

Physical and occupational therapists often emphasize the importance of crawling in child development due to its wide-ranging benefits. Crawling plays a crucial role in building strength, coordination and brain development. And while some kids can skip crawling without any issues, others may be more affected. Things like strength and movement symmetry can be impacted, especially for kids that only scoot on their bottom.

What are the Benefits of Crawling?

First, crawling helps develop core strength and balance. As babies move on their hands and knees, they work various muscle groups, including the arms, shoulders, legs, and core. This physical strength is important for future activities like walking, running, and climbing. In addition, the movement helps babies improve their balance and stability as they learn to distribute their weight between their hands and knees. It also promotes weight shift to the side, allowing a baby to use each side of their body efficiently.

Crawling also promotes coordination and motor skills. When a baby crawls, they use a “cross-lateral” movement, meaning the opposite arm and leg move together. This motion helps the brain connect both sides of the body, improving coordination. This type of movement also encourages hand-eye coordination. This is essential for tasks like writing, playing sports, and even driving in the future.

Another key benefit of crawling is the stimulation it provides to the brain. It activates areas of the brain responsible for spatial awareness and problem-solving. Babies learn to judge distances, navigate obstacles, and explore their surroundings, all of which contribute to cognitive development.

Occupational therapists also recognize that crawling is important for sensory processing. The pressure babies feel on their hands, knees, and feet helps develop their sense of touch and body awareness. This sensory input is critical for children to understand where their body is in space and how to move it effectively.

Crawling is a foundational activity that helps develop strength, coordination, and sensory awareness that therapists feel are still important for a child’s overall development. Here are some activities you can do with your child at home.

From the earliest stages of infancy to the formative years of toddlerhood, stacking blocks represents more than just a playful activity. It serves as a cornerstone in the developmental journey of children, offering insights into their cognitive, motor, and social growth. So, let’s explore the fascinating milestones associated with stacking blocks and why they matter in childhood development.

Early Foundations: Exploring Shapes and Textures

Firstly, for infants and young toddlers, stacking blocks begin as a sensory exploration:

• Grasping and Manipulation: Initially, infants grasp blocks to explore their textures, shapes, and sizes, developing fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination.
• Cause and Effect: Knocking down stacked blocks introduces basic concepts of cause and effect, stimulating curiosity and early problem-solving skills.

Cognitive Milestones: Spatial Awareness

Then, as children progress, this activity evolves into a more intentional cognitive challenge:

• Spatial Skills: Arranging blocks to fit together requires spatial reasoning and understanding of shapes, sizes, and dimensions.
• Planning and Sequencing: Building taller structures involves planning and sequencing actions, promoting logical thinking and concentration.

Stacking Blocks Helps Motor Development

Stacking blocks is a tactile experience that refines motor skills, fine-tuning coordination and control:

• Precision and Control: Balancing blocks and carefully placing them enhance fine motor skills, fostering dexterity and finger strength.
• Hand-Eye Coordination: Aligning blocks and stacking them vertically improves hand-eye coordination and spatial precision.

Social and Emotional Growth: Collaboration and Persistence

In addition to cognitive and motor skills, block play encourages social interactions and emotional development:

• Collaborative Play: Sharing blocks and building together fosters teamwork, communication, and negotiation skills.
• Persistence and Resilience: Overcoming challenges, such as unstable structures or collapsed towers, teaches patience, perseverance, and emotional resilience.

Milestones for Stacking Blocks

• Infancy (0-12 months): Grasping and exploring blocks, beginning to knock down stacked towers.
• Early Toddlerhood (12-24 months): Experimenting with stacking blocks vertically, developing basic building skills.
• Late Toddlerhood (24-36 months): Building taller structures, sorting blocks by size or color, and engaging in more complex imaginative play.

Encouraging Block Play: Tips for Parents and Caregivers

• Provide Varied Blocks: Offer blocks of different shapes, sizes, and textures to stimulate exploration and creativity.
• Join in the Play: Participate in block play to model skills, encourage interaction, and celebrate achievements.
• Create Safe Spaces: Ensure a safe environment for stacking and building activities, allowing children to explore and experiment without constraints.

Stacking blocks is not merely a pastime but a pivotal developmental milestone that supports children’s cognitive, motor, social, and emotional growth. Therefore, as they engage in block play, children hone essential skills that lay the foundation for future learning and problem-solving abilities. Finally, by recognizing the significance of stacking blocks in childhood development and nurturing these skills through play, parents and caregivers empower children to explore, create, and thrive in a world of endless possibilities.