Today’s episode is all about WHY we love sensory strategies for EVERY classroom!The idea is to create an inclusive, sensory friendly classroom that all students can benefit from, while also providing individualized sensory strategies to the students who need a little bit more.Make sure you stay til the end of today’s episode where we answer a listener question! Be sure to check out all of the links below for additional resources! Be sure to check out the show notes on our blog at &n...

Dr. Hailey Arnold is a chiropractor and functional medicine practitioner; however, she is best described as an entrepreneur. Constantly finding solutions to problems, Dr. Arnold spends her days formulating nutritional products and genetic tests for children of all ages. She is an active clinician, educator, public speaker, and published author. With a passion for neurosensory differences and autoimmunity, Dr. Arnold has created multiple businesses that allow children to get healthy natur...

We’ve gotten asked many times about how and why we started our entrepreneurial journey. So today, we’re diving in! We started out as outpatient pediatric COTAs (Certified Occupational Therapy Assistants) and saw a gap in our space. So we took a leap to try to fill that gap (almost 4 years ago!) and thanks to you wonderful listeners, we just reached 200 podcast episodes! We’ve learned a lot along the way and this episode is full of our tips and tricks for success in starting a new bu...

Kim Wiggins, OTR/L, is an experienced occupational therapist specializing in the treatment of children since 2001. She is a full-time therapist at a City School District in upstate New York, owner of www.OTKimWiggins.com, and has been a nationally known speaker since 2011. Kim is certified in Mobile Devices for Children with Disabilities, Puzzle Art Therapy, Handwriting Without Tears, Zaner Bloser, The Size Matters Handwriting Program, The Listening Program, and as an Irlen Screener. Be ...

We had someone message us asking what a day in the life of a COTA looks like!We (Rachel and Jessica) are both Certified Occupational Therapy Assistants, Licensed in the state of Idaho (COTA/L). We worked with children in an outpatient clinic setting for over 7 years and in this episode we share what a “typical” day looked like in the clinic. We also share some tips for fellow therapists! Don’t forget to listen to the end, where we answer a listener question! Be sure to check ou...

Jennifer Jo Brout is the Director of the International Misophonia Research Network. She is a New York State Certified School Psychologist, a Connecticut Professional Licensed Counselor, and holds a Doctorate in School/Clinical-Child Psychology. She is the mother of adult triplets, and is a Misophonia sufferer herself. Disappointed by her own experiences with the state of the field when seeking help for her own child in 1999, Dr. Brout began efforts to establish better research practice, ...

So many children struggle with the process of independence with toileting skills and we’ve talked about it in previous episodes - check out the show notes for those episodes - but today we are going to break down the actual skills required for each step of the toileting process plus give you some activity ideas to address each skill! In OT, we call this an activity analysis: A breakdown of a task into each step that is requiredIdentifies physical requirementsIdentifies specific skil...

Matt Sloan is a certified occupational therapy assistant specializing in sensory integration therapy. Matt is also a fitness professional, coach, and has worked as a special education teacher and adaptive PE teacher. Matt has been involved in education for over 25 years working with kids and adults of all abilities in a multitude of settings.Matt now runs Sensory Fitness - a program developed to incorporate sensory integration therapy and fitness that is intentional about exercise, games, and...

We got a question on instagram that we’re going to answer in today’s episode!When doing sensory activities, should I continue the challenging activities or push through them with my child when my child has adverse reactions? Such a great question! We dive into this topic and discuss the ‘just right challenge’ as well as provide some examples of what this looks like for different situations. We give you our fav. tips and tricks for navigating the ‘just right challenge’ as well as ans...

Today’s episode is a 1-on-2 with a fellow OT where we dive into all things primitive reflexes! We talk about a variety of challenges related to primitive reflexes as well as we really got to nerd out on all the activity ideas! If you’re a therapist working with children, this episode is GOLD! But don’t shy away from this episode if you’re not a therapist - there are some great ideas for kiddos who are struggling with anxiety, how to help kiddos move into a variety of positions ...