Dyspraxia -- help and advice needed 5 years old

[mongo123]

Hello everyone. Is there anyone with a child who was diagnosed with dyspraxia. If so i am looking for encouragement on what has helped your cjild from age 5 onward. What helped for school?keeping up in PE, sports etc, self care . So my son has issues with motor imitation so repeating karate moves, pe exercises, copying a drawing, doing funny faces or tongue movements ..literally anything involving using his body to imitate is challenging to execute. However he is a good student and keeps up academically and can read and write pretty well. He can ride a bike with training wheels, a scooter, play cricket except for catching and run etc. He has dofficulty with positional instructions like stand between jeff and judy. Or stand an arms length apart ...he gets so confused with following such instructions. Theoetrically however he understands prepositions.

How do i help him in terms of primary and making sure he doesnt feel "slow"

Which sport or extra curricular might be a good fit (i want him to find something he can like and excel at) is karate prob a total no go? He has trouble in seim class with holding his breath under water amd positioning his arms for the strokes etc.

How was it as they got older? Any tips?

He does OT ince a week and plays outside almost every day. I encourage any interest he has and he is into singing, cooking, paddling around in the pool, painting and drawing (not too good but he enjoys it)

Thanks for your help.

Our physiotherapist recommended horse riding, and swimming (although DS can't swim due to coordination difficulties).

DD was diagnosed about a similar age. I don't think a lot of the stuff that's helped her was specific activities - but more finding the RIGHT instructor running the activities as there's a lot of dross out there in the kids activity world just set up to deal with very neurotypical children.

Dancing - DD loves dancing - first dance school was a disaster (the mums would make Dance Moms look tame) and once we got over the little cute 3 year olds factor - we were bullied out of there pretty damned fast. Then we found an amazing lady who was teaching dance in a local church hall - not running the competition circuits anymore but just because she wanted to pass her love of dance on to the next generation - she was amazing, went away and researched and adapted her teaching style - and was just the most utterly lovely lady going. Sadly Covid lockdowns and the hall being very obstructive about reopening meant she decided to throw in the towel and retire - and we still do really really feel her loss now.

Karate - we tried that with some limited success - but that was largely the class setup meaning there was a hell of a lot of hanging around and the youngsters being ignored in favour of the higher belts with pushy parents.

Swimming - again, took a few goes to find a good setup - and a long time to get out of the beginner group and begin to make some progress... then covid hit... just back into it now finally.

The one we've tried recently (they wanted to join their friends) is kickboxing. I was sceptical as it's a one that seems to recruit really heavily and thought it might be another one seeing the kids as cash cows - but it's really well setup - lots of additional helpers so the kids aren't left standing around for ages to get one go at punching a pad and then can correct the kids and placement and things and she seemed to really enjoy that.

The other one which has had a HUUUUUGE impact was Scouting - starting with Beavers and we've now moved up to Cubs. Again, very dependant upon getting a good setup (we tried Guiding but the Rainbows group just did endless crafts and colouring in and we were getting more and more upset at attempts being cack-handed) but it's given her a massive boost in confidence, they've had her doing things like ropes courses and camping and really supported her from a distance (I did have to do three laps of the campsite to retrieve everything she'd lost on an overnight stay though).

We do have other issues in that her speech is affected, and she really did struggle no end to write until very recently - but she's holding her own.

Thank u so much for your detailed reply. I really appreciate it . So it seems the right instructor and 1:1 vs a group setting can make a big difference when starting off. I think i will start him with 1:1 karate and swimming . I have lined up some 1:1 vocal training lessons and keyboard also since he loves singing and music. Scouting starts at 7 so i already reached out to soneone for more info as i def feel he will benefit from it. Keeping fingers crossed !! As he gets older i do feel running and cycling are also great individual/lifestyle physical activities. He currently rides his bike with training wheels great ...but then we have to see how he will do without them...which is another worry but will keep at it with him cuz this little boys determination is unlike anybody ive ever met and hes so worth it!