Reaching into Bag Activities

The scanning activity board that I wrote about last time was very successful this week. It showed me just how bright some of my nonverbal children are as they followed directions to remove ONLY the named yellow fish. I will be doing the same activity asking them to remove only hearts or only stars.

I finally finished making the bag pictured below that I knit out of grocery plastic bags. I think there will be many uses for this but so far I have used it in the following two ways.













I clipped the bag to the basketball stand and stored 4-5 balls in it. Then when I wanted to do a ball activity- I clipped it to the horse tack. The children then needed to reach far to their sides to reach into the bag for a ball, rotate their trunks and toss the ball into the hoop placed on the other side of the horse.
I also used the bag to carry activities on the trail. Now the horses can do the carrying for me. My favorite activities to use on the trail rides are:

• Pulling clothespins off the mane to insert into a small basket
• Stretch toys
• Small bottles filled with water and little plastic pieces to shake
• bubbles
  

Barbara Smith, M.S., OTR/L author of, The Recycling Occupational Therapist
Horseot.com