Activities, Activities, Activities!

Today in Innovative TR we had one more group facilitating their short activity. There's was called "Model, Clay, Artist" and was an activity that needed people to be in groups of three. One person chose to be the artist and blindfolded themselves while the model moved their body into a certain shape for the artist. Then, the artist felt the position of their arms and legs and then molded the third person, the "clay" into that same position, trying to accurately replicate the model's while still staying blindfolded! It was a fun activity for sure, but we discussed as a class how to make it less touching oriented and more imitation oriented for certain client groups with disabilities that may feel uncomfortable with touching other people's bodies. We decided the activity should be focused more on working on learning how to make body positions and creativity instead of randomly feeling the other people and trying to imitate them.

             The rest of the evening we focused on discussing and creating specific goals for games/activities in a therapeutic setting. We first talked about specific goals for the simple childhood game of Red Light, Green Light. 
          A few of the goals we determined as a class were: to follow directions, have leadership roles, engage in competition and healthy physical activities and to include everyone! We also talked about the possible limitations for the game: physical needs, processing time, and auditory skills. However, we decided that the game could be easily modified to include everyone by making small changes such as having more adults help direct the kids and allowing more time to process the commands.

We also talked about the train game, where all of the kids are involved in a human "train" and have to follow certain commands such as switch, reverse, tunnel, and whistle. This game works on processing and cognitive training. Other ideas we came up with as a class that have similar goals were Captain's Coming, Fish&Whales, Frogger, and Blob Tag! (Coming from working in a summer camp environment for the past 5 years has got all of those children's games completely engrained in me, so I will definitely be using those as my go-to games when working with peds in the future!!! :) )

      Our final class activity was to pick a certain population, (ours was Alcoholism) and to create three different "fashion/design" related competitions that would have three specific therapeutic goals.(Mr. Lewis inspired us by showing a clip from "Project Runway"'s show using materials from a hardware store to create clothing!) For our population, we decided to have them create jewelry together using the 3 unusual materials of silverware, different types of cloth (like jeans, etc) and keys! The 3 main goals we had for them were to 

1. Develop new social skills

2. Find a new enjoyable hobby/leisure activity

3. Gain a sense of accomplishment/success

We decided on a 2nd activity that has the same goals to be creating hair accessories with the same materials. The last part of the project was to think of a completely different activity that had nothing to do with fashion but would still allow our clients to meet the same goals. We decided that a dessert baking competition would definitely fulfill our goals and would be super fun as well! Who doesn't like desserts?!

While thinking back to my days of summer camp, I remembered a really cool activity that we did with a wide range of age groups...Parachute Games!!! There are so many different variations on parachute games... Shark & Lifeguard, Anaconda, etc.. One basic one that I've played with younger age groups is a simple game where everyone has to grab a handle on the parachute and begins to shake it. The leader gives commands to the group to change the action of the parachute by making small waves, big waves, put it down on the ground, put it way above your head, etc. Adding fun little toys like plastic bugs, bean bags, and stuffed animals can be put in the middle of the parachute and can be catapulted off by the kids. (Having them each go find a creature that flew off and bringing it back can be fun too) Music can be added to the game and can be related to different motions with the parachute (stopping or starting when the music does, rotating handles when the song changes, etc) 

Parachute games can easily be modified for kids with any kind of disabilities. Kids with physical disabilities or who may be in wheelchairs can still participate, but may need some assistance with holding onto the parachute. Maybe the handle can be attached to their leg or another part of their wheelchair that will allow them to participate in the movements. For kids with cognitive disabilities, leaders can assist the children in following the directions properly. Even kids that have visual/auditory impairments can enjoy the game because there can be many different senses incorporated into it. 

       Another slightly complicated version this game can progress into is having everyone put the parachute above their head creating space for them to walk/run underneath and saying certain commands like "If you are wearing red, go to the other side of the parachute," or "If your birthday is in May, go to the other side." LIke I said, there a a million and a half variations of parachute games but they can definitely adapted for anyone with any type of disability. The kids I work with at camp absolutely love even the simplest of parachute games and just think being able to use a parachute is super cool! (and it is...even for adults like me!)

I really like this website for ACTIVITY IDEAS!!!!  There are a lot of good ones that relate to the outdoors as well!