In adolescents, OT’s work with children with a variety of difficulties, including, amongst others, sensory processing disorders; dyspraxia; ADHD; autistic spectrum disorders; learning difficulties; neurodevelopmental diagnoses and genetic disorders.  Adolescence is a time of major transitions as well as significant emotional, physical, and cognitive changes which can be difficult.

The main objective of occupational therapy for adolescents is to help them to maximise their potential and to live satisfyingly full lives with as much independence as possible. This is done through helping them to develop skills that enable them to execute the meaningful activities that form part of everyday life.

The assessment may be completed during one or two sessions, depending on the type of evaluation and your adolescent’s  ability to cope with the demands of testing. Typically, parents do not remain with an adolescent in the testing room.

After the assessment a feedback meeting is held with the family as an important part of treatment planning so that therapist and family can set goals together. As children move into the adolescent stage, our assessment begins to incorporate more discussion with the adolescent about individual needs, interests, and concerns. The adolescent may participate in the feedback meeting in order to discuss the plan for therapy.

Individual occupational therapy sessions are usually provided initially once each week and last one hour.

We are trained in the area of sensory integration but use other approaches and frames of reference depending on the needs of your adolescent .

Through occupational therapy intervention an adolescent’s strengths are built on by meeting them where they are at whilst challenging them to develop skills that they have difficulty with. A warm, nurturing and appealing environment is created for the adolescent and they have fun during sessions. Occupational Therapy also helps to develop an adolescent’s self-confidence, sense of achievement, and emotional well-being.

Areas of focus may include:

This involves the larger muscles of the body and needs whole body movements. It enables the adolescent to execute everyday functions such as walking, running, engaging in sports and maintaining an upright sitting posture at their desk. Gross motor skills also include eye-hand coordination skills such as ball skills. Someone with gross motor difficulties may dislike engaging in physical activities and tend to avoid them.

Gross motor abilities can impact on fine motor abilities e.g., someone who struggles to maintain an upright sitting posture at their desk may find fine motor activities such as handwriting, drawing and cutting, challenging. This in turn could impact negatively on their focus in class and may affect their ability to learn.

This involves the coordination of small muscles in the hand and fingers along with movements of the eyes. It includes smaller actions such as threading beads, cutting, colouring-in, drawing, handwriting and picking up items between the thumb and fingers. While experiencing fine motor difficulties they may display avoidance and disinterest in these activities. 

This is the ability of the brain to receive and make sense of information coming through the eyes. It can impact on reading and writing; knowing which lines to write on and recognising sight words, copying words from the blackboard; finding an item in a busy background, recognising letters and numbers; mathematical skills; learning basic concepts and building puzzles.

Visual motor integration involves integrating visual perceptual skills together with fine motor skills. This allows us to use our eyes and hands in a coordinated and effective manner e.g., eye-hand coordination, copying patterns, forming shapes, letters and numbers and eventually handwriting.

are everyday behaviours linked to self-regulation, problem solving and social interaction. 

These include the following abilities:

• Impulse Control- Being able to think before acting

• Emotional Control- Being able to keep emotional responses in check

• Flexible Thinking- Being able to adapt to unforeseen changes

• Task Initiation- Getting a task or activity started

• Working Memory- Being able to keep information in mind for the purpose of completing a task

• Self-monitoring- Being aware of how one is doing during or after completing a task.

• Planning and prioritising- Being able to set and achieve goals

• Task initiation- Taking necessary action to begin a task or activity.

• Organisation- Being able to keep work areas, play areas and materials in an orderly manner.

Enables one to study and learn effectively. Good study skills can increase a child’s confidence and can reduce anxiety about tests and deadlines.

Skills focused on include the following:

•Exploring different learning styles 

• Organisational Skills

• Time management

• Summary techniques