SPATIAL AWARENESS

Can anyone help with any suggestions or has anyone had this before?

I childmind a girl aged 23 months, I've looked after her since she was 6 months old. She is adorable but I am a little concerned about her lack of spatial awareness as she is starting to have accidents, especially now she has started to become more adventurous on larger play equipment.

To give a little background, until she was about 14 months she got about by moving around in circles on the spot, she was a very late crawler and couldn't roll over until after she had been crawling for a while, in fact she was the only child I have ever known who would lie still while having a nappy change because she couldn't move away as she was unable to sit herself up or rollover. She eventually walked at around 17 months and even though she has been walking for some time now she still walks with a baby toddle. At 20 months she couldn't step up the tiniest step (or even a slightly raised pavement) and would sit on her bottom and shuffle up or down before getting back up on her feet to walk again. I brought this to the parents attention and between us we encouraged her to step up and down and now she is doing it fine.

When she tries to sit in a child-sized chair she will reverse herself up to it without glancing around and sit down where she thinks the chair is, more often than not she misses the chair completely. I have tried to encourage her to look behind her when stepping back but she has no understanding at all and every time the same thing happens.

Now she is joining in with others on bigger play equipment she is having frequent accidents, for example last week she was playing on a little tikes climbing frame and stepped back off the platform banging her head as she fell, she seems to have no awareness of where she is. A couple of days later she done exactly the same thing. Today at our childminding group she was playing on a slide, climbed the four steps, went to sit down (without looking down or behind her) and sat back too far missing the seat altogether. She fell with a thud to the ground banging her head again.

At home she is not encouraged to take any risks when playing and is followed everywhere or worse still carried. This could be why she doesn't look around or take the risks because at home someone is always ther right behind her?

Any advice or suggestions will be appreciated as I am getting concerned!!

One suggestion from a childminder at our group this morning was that the parents might need educating to allow their child to take more risks and develop normally.

What would you do?

Julie xx

[sarahnev707]

I would look at the age and stage information from the eyfs and see exactly which points you are flagging up concerns about. Everyone who works with under 5s will be using eyfs from September, so it is good practice to base your thoughts around this. Be careful though not to treat it as gospel... we all know different children develop at different rates and she might just be a little slower than others. The eyfs will also help you to highlight the positives for parents ... areas where she is forging ahead in her learning and development.

Then I would speak to the child's parents and encourage them to have a chat with the health visitor.

Meanwhile you can use lots of techniques to encourage her to take a little risk - maybe play balancing on a skipping rope or jumping in and out of hoops. Draw a hopscotch on the paving stones ... anything that will help her to look before she leaps but she's not going to hurt herself because there is no actual danger.

Have a look at the signs and symptoms here but be very careful about labelling a child, especially to parents. I am giving you them as an aid to suggesting where the problem might lie, not as a diagnosis, as that is not our place to give - http://www.durhamdyspraxia.org.uk/signs.html.

I hope you find the support she obviously needs.