Soft play as a treatment for ADHD apparently.....

[StarOfLightMcKings3]

www.ymcalsw.org/Blog/why-are-we-doing-soft-play

lol

I probably wouldnt take a child with ADHD to our local soft play TBH.

Too many cats bum faced yummy mummies

I don't know about it as a treatment for ADHD, but soft play has been amazing for ds1. As I understand it, it provides pd roprioceptive anvestibular input which is something ds1 requires.

We go to see an OT weekly and essentially it is just soft play for an hour. We try to replicate what we do there at home and also take him to soft play couple of times a week. ds1 is making very good progress and we think the OT/softplay has definitely a big part to play in it.

I can't take ds to soft play. The acoustics are terribly echoey and he ends up wired.

Having said that i used to take Dd3 who has ASD quite a lot, there was a piece of equipment there which had a spinning pole with a little platform on it, she used to go round and round and round and round

Only problem was if someone else went within 5 metres of her or the pole thing

A lot of soft play is very similar to SI OT.

Dd1 improved remarkably when she had her SI OT (have posted about it before) initially. She is now doing another course of it, and we are seeing improvements once again.

Soft play itself is the work of the devil though. It is nice to go somewhere where there are so many other children warranting hard stares and catsbum faces though

yes, that could be tricky. DS1 is under sensitive to most things so getting him to new places is not an issue.

star Is your ds having any occupational therapy? we see these people once a week and I really rate the guy who ds has therapy with. I also know silverfrog went there as well and her dd was lots better at coping with supermarkets, shopping centres etc. just saying.

xposted with silverfrog

Ds1 had ot that was essentially soft play. Lots of assault courses, jumping, rolling around on things. It really calms him down, if you can do it, do do it.nwe have an annual pass for our local place, which I take them to when ds1 is getting a bit much.

Hopscotch are fabulous and DM there certainly knows his stuff. Sadly dd1 is not seeing him again, but couldn't make the crazy journey to hopscotch work for us.

DS has quite a lot of SI in his school. He has group OT and then and individual one weekly, plus SI strategies are used throughout the day.

DS actually won his place at the school based on his sensory needs, rather than his SALT needs. It's what swung it because most LA's are piss poor at the SI stuff.

I have a bit of a love-hate thing going on with SI, because whilst I don't deny his needs I'd rather that he was just made to sit still and listen to the teacher rather than be taken out every time he fidgets, to be squashed or jump of a tower or whatever.

As DS' holidays are longer than the majority, we can get to soft play places then, and it isn't so bad, except for the mothers of toddlers that really don't like him being amongst their babies.

God what total guff on that website.
I've a lot of time for OTs and OT (we are shortly embarking on a big piece of ABA research with them) but what has been written there is nonsense.

Nowt you can't get frrom going on a walk.
A walk that is free of course.

Soft play is great for ds too- I think he is mostly a sensory seeker. The only trouble is he is too old now for most local facilities. I so wish his secondary (ss) was more sensory (and asd) aware. The local respite centre has a sensory facility and some local soft play centres have sn or ASD evenings without upper age limits and judgy adults.

Bouncing on a gym ball has really helped DD..hard to believe I know..she has severe ASD

It's basically saying soft play is important because play is important, and soft play, is play.

It's as if it has been written by someone who does not understand what they are writing about.

oops, I missed the lol in the main post. sorry star I think I killed your thread.

The idea in principle is good, but the article is worded pretty badly.

silverfrog oh the journeys, I hate driving into London every week. It takes me couple of hours to get there and another couple back for one hour of therapy. But at the moment, the benefit outweighs the time spent in the journey so we are going to continue with that.

Can you go to their other center in Kent, I hear DM does see clients there on saturday.

I hate driving in London too. We used to go on the train - up to Victoria, change and wait for a bus, then a 10 minute walk at the other end. All in all it took us close on 7 hours in total for the hour of therapy - madness.

Yes, we go to the Kent centre now (thanks, I think, to you for making me aware of it!) - 25 minutes in the car, much more civilised! DMdoes come down, once a month, but only to oversee afaik. Dd1 sees another OT instead. A shame, but she is still making good progress.

"I'd rather that he was just made to sit still and listen to the teacher rather than be taken out every time he fidgets, to be squashed or jump of a tower or whatever"

I agree with the sentiment, we are facing similar and i still cannot quite work out what is the right balance. The workshop by AP has really got me thinking because there was no mention of sensory needs but in the videos they did get kids to focus on tasks with a system of reward tokens. I know the videos are only half truths, but Does that mean with enough practice, sensory issues can be overcome?

silverfrog that sounds similar to what we are doing now, but I don't think I could do it using public transport.
If I could make some room in the house, I am going to buy some of the equipment they use and set up a therapy room in the house for kids so they could practice everyday and but I don't know if it will be overkill.

public transport was the obvious solution for us - we have a good (free) car park in town, 2 minutes walk from the station. 30 mins to Victoria, then transfer to bus. 10 minute walk at other end.

it was the timetabling that caused a few issues, as the connections weren't brilliant. but it had to be done, for Tribunal.

definitely not overkill setting up a room - I have one in mind for when we build our extension - will be a multi-purpose room opening onto the garden, using the back half of our garage. we would have one by now if we hadn't spent 4 years in rented accommodation chasing provision...

you have obviously given it a lot more thought than I would have. so do you mind me asking what are your plans for the room so I can shamelessly copy them. you can PM me if you like.

We are also in rented accommodation so I am thinking of buying a portable frame like this to use. It is stupid amount of money but I know somebody who can make these for me for a fraction of the price.

star really really sorry, I have just realised that I seem to be crashing a lot of your threads lately.

ha! no concrete plans as yet - alas, still a pipe dream (as is the extension )

will be in the next few years, I guess.

our set up (both family and house structure) just lends itself to having the garden room option. we have 2 adult children () who quite like their own space/not being woken at the crack of dawn by small children (however delightful dd1's singing is, it really is an acquired taste at 7am!), so having an annexe is a good option. so need sofabed etc in there.

so the room needs to be multi-purpose. we have an odd set-up garage-wise - we have 2 single garages, one behind the other, with a courtyard inbetween. the rear one is no earthly use to anyone as an actual garage, so the obvious choice to sacrifice when we get building (the kitchen will extend out alongside the rear garage).

so we will end up with a room with patio doors onto the garden (outdoors is really important to dd1, and will give me somewhere to loaf about while the children are all in the garden ), with tracks and hooks for swings/platforms. and then some mats/climbing frames on one wall.

and err, that's it for planning so far

that frame looks good, especially if you can get it cheaper. ikea do soem good swing chairs, and I did have a link for a hammock company that did some interesting stuff too - cross between swing chairs, and hammocks. hang on a sec.

have found this site - not the one I was thinking of, but similar stuff.

the swing chair stands are good, and am eyeing up some of the hammocks for the garden too.

also fancy one of these for the garden, under a shade. having been eyeing that up for a few years now.

Wow, i know that link, i bought a hanging chair from them last year for ds1 which we never used. Thanks very much for that. Some really useful stuff there at a fraction of the price from Rompa.

Your plan sounds fantastic, I was also going to include some calming visual/music stuff in the room similar to their centre in kent.