Squeezing Ball between Feet

 One of my cutie pies turns three this week and is leaving hippotherapy. She demonstrated some very nice motor planning, coordination and strength to squeeze a ball between her feet and lift her legs while I counted.  When we let go of the belt, she realized that she needed to  grasp the handle for added stability and she did great. She also enjoyed touching the ball with her feet as I moved it around. When her foot touched it I made the ball squeak.  Many of my 2 year olds do not have the motor planning skills to do this, so I was impressed !

Another client demonstrates in the video how he can pull the rings while stabilizing the bottle with the other hand. This is a great way to teach young children to use hands together and experience working with both the right and left hands to do the skilled part of the task.
The pulling gives sensory feedback and strengthens the arms and hands. He also problem-solved to switch hands before starting again and worked on counting 1,2,3