Referral for fine motor skills - what to expect?

Kari

I took Juliet to her 9M check-up this morning and requested a referral for Justin for his fine motor skills through Child Development Services. He only hit half the benchmarks for a typical two-year old and he's 3 years, 4 months old. Anyway, I'm curious what to expect. Anyone been through this before?

The benchmarks I read online were that a child 24-36 months old should be able to:
[list=*]
[*]string beads (yes)
turn single pages in books (no)
snip with scissors (yes)
hold crayon between fingers, not in fist (no)
show one dominant hand (yes)
imitate circular, vertical, and horizontal strokes (circular only)
paint with wrist action, creating dots, lines, and circles (again, circles only)
rolls, pounds, squeezes, and pulls clay (yes)[/*]
[/list]

His daycare provider mentioned to me last year that he was the messiest eater for a 2-year old she'd ever taught. This is comparing him to about 80 other kids. He has difficulty using a spoon or fork, can't put on his own shoes or socks, can't remove or put on a pull-up, and is just learning to take off his own shirt (and only if it's loose on him). I noticed last year that his art projects were always fairly recognizable compared to his peers because of the messy coloring or lack of detail. I'm not sure how much I should attribute to him being a very active child with a short attention span who's easily frustrated . . . or how much might be a developmental delay.

Any idea what to expect from the evaluation?

old mama

From the OT who has done evaluations on some of my foster and adopted children...they will ask you a lot of questions about what he can and can not do. She will give him blocks to stack, beads to string, a pencil or crayon to hold and write with ect. it is hard to get services for fine motor skills at his age in our state. But if he does not qualify for services the least they should do is give you specific ideas on how to work with him and age appr. list of what he should be able to do. With my youngest son he wasn't able to do some of the things just because I had not given him too much opportunity to do them on his own.

babymakes3

Being a kinder/first grade teacher I can say for my kids with fine motor stuff our ot starts wiyh gross motor. She may have the kids crab walk, tub of war, whell barrel race, monkey bars. Then slowly moves into using their pitchers. 1 fun activity is hiding pennies in a ball of clay and the kids have to pinch them out. Also spinning tops, using those poppers that always surprise me. The kids love it and it is all play to them.

em'smoms

I am a pediatric OT, I work mostly with school aged kids but have done pre-school as well. The OT will most likely do a standardized test that looks at fine and gross motor skills- old mama is right on with some of the tasks, you will be able to be in the room with him. They may also have you fill out a sensory processing questionnaire as sensory processing issues can also affect motor development. It will be mostly fun for Justin and should feel like playing, unless he tends to get frustrated with new tasks or tasks he perceives as difficult or truly struggles with. Good luck, you should get some really good feedback on his levels and like old mama said if he doesn't qualify you should get some ideas to work with him yourself!

Kari

I just got the initial phone call today to talk about his skills. It was a message on my machine so I'll call Monday and get the ball rolling. Thanks for all your info!