Welcome!

Hello and welcome to my blog! This blog will be discussing the use of Sensory Integration in play with children.  My name is Fiona Fraser and I am currently in my final year studying towards a Bachelor of Occupational Therapy.  During my three years studying at the School of Occupational Therapy at Otago Polytechnic, I have been exposed to many different settings and experiences on my fieldwork placements. One of these settings was Paediatrics. I have always been interested in this area and see myself working there sometime in the future.

During my paediatric fieldwork placement I was first introduced to the concept of sensory integration with children who had sensory processing problems. At first I had never heard of the term before and was interested to see how it was used within play therapy. After being involved in play therapy sessions I learnt more about sensory integration and how it can be used to increase a child’s participation in everyday activities. This made me quickly become interested to see how the different techniques were used and to see the benefits of them.

Within this blog, I plan to discuss my learning of sensory integration drawing from a variety of literature as well as some of my own reflections from placement. I plan to outline two sensory strategies that I used on my placement, these being tactile and visual strategies.