Movement ABC fine motor skills

[noblegiraffe]

DS has just been referred to the Occupational Therapist for difficulties with fine motor skills. His school did the Movement ABC questionnaire with him and his fine motor skills were in the 'red zone'.

What sort of thing could this be flagging up? Just that he needs some extra support with handwriting etc, or some underlying condition? He can ride a bike and isn't particularly clumsy so I don't think he's dyspraxic but I don't know of anything else it could be.

He's on the waiting list for ASD assessment and everything is just going slowly. He loves Lego, does Hama beads etc so I didn't think his fine motor skills were that bad. Where might this be leading, and what will OT do?

Hi. My DS (8) has seen an OT (private) for assessment of motor skills. She did lots of different activities with him and talked to us about the things he finds difficult. After the appointment she compiled a detailed report with his scores and percentiles along with recommendations for how to help him. He does meet the criteria for dyspraxia but his diagnosis is AS. Seeing the OT and having her report was really useful for both us and school. Hope you get the ASD assessment soon. The waiting is really hard.

Hi your DS sounds like ours (7). He made no progress in Y1 with handwriting and we were offered touch typing or a scribe. I'm rather envious that your school are switched on enough to refer to the OT! I politely declined our offer and paid for an OT assessment over the summer holidays so was armed with some suggestions when we started Y2. He was found to have slightly hypermobile fingers - although that doesn't stop him playing Lego or Hama either! We got him a Stabilo Easy Pencil (3mm leads) and the school got a writing slope and a sloping cushion. Those things helped a bit but really it was cracking the motivation which has helped move things on. We link computer time at home to writing stickers which come home from school and if he gets one per day he gets another treat on Friday. It took a long time to work out..... So now he can do age appropriate cursive when pressed/in school (as he seems to have got over a mental block) but he still does as little as possible. If I were you I would ask the school what prompted the OT referral and then see what you can throw into the mix to help things along. Good luck