My son, P, 10 years old boy was diagnosed with mild to moderate “Autistic Spectrum Disorder”, “Speech Sound Disorder”, “Developmental Coordination Disorder” and “Attention Deficit / Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) Combined Type”. He has had Occupational Therapy, Speech Therapy and Physical Therapy since he was three and half years old.
We installed a swing at our home at the beginning of January 2021 based on our Occupational Therapist (Yoshie Kanemiya)’s recommendation. We have seen significant improvement for P during the past few months.
· Balancing: P has been learning how to ride a bicycle (without training wheels) for the past few months. After exercising and using swing regularly, we have seen how this has helped P in his biking ability. He is now able to ride his bicycle without assistance along straight sections and curved section for approximately 0.5 km (8-10 times from the entry to our cul-de-sac, around the cul-de-sac and back) without stopping.
· Concentration: We homeschool P and have a tutor come to our home to assist in reading and composition subjects. Both P’s tutor and I have noticed that his concentration has improved. His concentration is longer, which allows him better opportunity to comprehend math and reading subject material, which shows in his responses to question.
· Space perception and hand awareness: For a long time, P’s writing used large letters (outside of the lines), and was a long continuous sentence without spaces in between words. We have noticed significant hand writing improvement and he started to be able to put space between words on his own.
· Self-regulation: Throughout the day, we find that P goes on his own to the swing to regulate his emotions and sensory processing needs. We have noticed fewer meltdowns throughout the day. In addition, all of our kids like to practice their math flash cards, phonogram review and other memorization activities while on the swing—the swing provides a rhythm for them to process the question and then respond (i.e. one swing to read the question, one swing to respond). They LOVE it and it helps them to be able to concentrate better during the times that we move to the table for other school work.
If space at your home allows, we would highly recommend you to install a swing and have it as part of your children’s exercise. All four of our children have enjoyed using the swing so much. We have experienced how exercising on the swing helps them in many areas as shared above.
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