Links for aids - fine/gross motor, asd, hypermobility, hypotonia

[Catchingmockingbirds]

Hi, has anyone got any good links of sites with useful aids, for instance easy grip cutlery, pencil grips etc?

My son has asd, hypermobility, hypotonia, I'm not sure what specifically is causing it or just a mix of everything but he has poor gross and fine motor skills so struggles with a lot of things. I'm just looking for a site with aids I can buy to help him. I've been searching with no luck.

Thanks.

www.crossboweducation.com/Pencil_grips.htm

Thanks crossbow, do you know any sites I could get cutlery from too? DS is currently using his hands to eat as he finds cutlery so difficult but he's almost 6.

Thanks blackeyed that should be

Can't remember where we bought ours from, but Junior Caring Cutlery might help with his eating. Ds1 really struggled until we bought his on the advice of his OT.

Loads of sites online sell them if you Google and you can get them on Ebay and Amazon as well.

Thanks so much moose, that's exactly the set I was looking for. He used them with his OT and there was a real improvement with him but we were there for 2 hours while they were trying out different things and assessing him and I didn't manage to find out where to get them.

fledglings too

Thanks agnes, I've just found the peanut ball on that site great for DS.

Hi again

By chance, I have just been for an OT assessment with ds2 (NT, but with hypermobility and hypotonia) and they have given me a really useful sheet with some contacts and suppliers on.

Peta for childrens scissors

Special Direct for large ultragrip pencil grips which stabilise the whole hand. Ds2 is 8, average sized and needed a large one of these to fit his hands.

They recommended Fledglings for caring cutlery and rulers with handles, writing slopes (although I think they are too pricey here) and again flexi-type childrens scissors.

They tried ds with lots of different pencils and pens and I think you would need to do similar with your ds, same for pencil grips really - a lot of it is trial and error. For ds2, he found the chunkier the better really, hence the large sized grip. His second best was the stabilo chunky triangular pencils with finger indents, but his finger was still inverting even with those. (Don't buy them from that website by the way, you can get them cheaper by Googling or off Ebay or Amazon.)

Ds1 (ASD, hypotonia and some hypermobility) used to use one of the those Stablio Easy Ergo pencils and you can get those in Tesco, but he now prefers the chunky triangular ones as well.

They also recommended Box of Ideas for practical ideas and advice for people with co-ordination difficulties. Only had a quick look at it myself, but it might be of some help.

Has he had a full OT assessment? If not, see if you can self-refer or get the school nurse to refer you. The one we had this morning was excellent and they have come up with such a lot of things that will help ds2.