Kids with Complex Needs
Therapy for Kids with Complex Needs
Paediatric occupational therapists and speech pathologists supporting children with complex needs.
Our OCC Therapy practice is passionate in our belief that all children deserve equal opportunity to learn, grow their strengths and interests, and to live a happy, healthy life. So, we’re both experienced and passionate about supporting children with complex needs to thrive through therapy.
How our developmental therapy supports your child
Our developmental therapy is individual and tailored to fit your child’s specific needs — whether these are at school or at home. We believe in building on your child’s strengths and using these to support them in those tasks they’re having difficulty with. When we say children with “complex needs”, these might be developmentally, medically, or educationally complex needs.
How our therapy supports parents
As a parent, you’re intuitive to your child and you know them better than anyone. So your role in your child’s development is essential, because you’re their biggest advocate and their biggest support. Ensuring that our therapy equips you with the resources, the tools, and the strategies you need to continue your child’s development at home is so important to us.
The Key Areas Our Therapists Help With
Self Care
Daily Routines
Here we will support your child to structure their day and follow routine — this might include items like getting ready for school.or following an evening routine.
Eating
We’ll guide your child through participating in food preparation using cutlery, and we’ll expand their food preferences.
Sleep
Targeting bedtime routines here, we’ll help your child achieve a restful and quality sleep.
Dressing
This is where we’ll address those key parts of dressing independently: tying shoelaces, doing up buttons or zippers, and tolerating different clothing types.
Personal Hygiene
We’ll work with your child to learn increased independence in daily hygiene routines. We will support them with learning to bathe, brush their teeth, brush their hair, and use the toilet on their own.
Independence
Whether it’s a school camp or sleepovers with friends or family, we’ll build up your child’s independence.
Learning
Attention & Concentration
Targeting their focus, we’ll try and improve their classroom and homework concentration.
Planning & Organising
We’ll support your child to effectively plan their own tasks and organise their own work or belongings.
Classroom Participation
We’ll support classroom behaviour and engagement through extension, support and specialist lessons.
Memory
Here your child will develop their ability to remember multi-step instructions to complete tasks at school or home.
Handwriting, Typing, Assistive Technology
Working with your child we’ll target those key skills behind communication including writing, typing and accessing assistive technology.
Transitioning
Transitioning to a new school or even a new grade or classroom can be tricky. We’ll support you and your child to prepare and plan effectively.
Social & Leisure Participation
Social & Emotional Competence
We’ll work with your child to build confidence in playing, developing and maintaining friendships, and with management of their emotions throughout the day.
Community Participation
We’ll support your child’s access to the community here. We’ll build confidence in joining activities, using public transport, safety, going to a sleepover, and eating at a restaurant.
Sport Participation
Here, we’ll support your child’s confidence in sport and leisure activities, as well as their gross motor skills.
Communication Skills
Speech and Language Skills
We will help your child to develop oral and written language skills as well as facilitate the use of Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) if required. We will also target speech sound production.
What to Expect from Therapy
Your first assessment or session can be daunting — for both the parents and the child. When we partner with you and your child, we want to make sure we find the right fit for them and a partnership that’s going to help your child build confidence, independence, and generally thrive.
We’ll always tailor these sessions to your child’s needs too. So, we might meet them at our clinic, their school, your home, or out in the community. When working with teenagers, they may prefer we work around them. This means meeting and chatting strategies with others in their support network (teachers, parents, etc). This way, we can set up appropriate supports and strategies without involving ourselves directly.
Our therapy sessions might include:
- One-on-one time with your child, working on specific skill development
- Collaborating with parents to develop strategies and share information or resources
- Working with your child’s teacher, develop a specific plan to meet educational goals
- Working with others on your child’s support team
Assisting with specific documentation (e.g. education plans, NDIS applications) - Some teenagers might prefer that we work around them rather than direct involvement
- Developing specific programs, such as home-based therapy or training support workers
Second to None Support
Parents are intuitive, creative, and resourceful but sometimes you’ll need a bit of extra support to find the right strategies for your family. You know your child better than anyone, so we partner with you to solve problems and tailor our sessions to your child’s needs.
We’ll also set you up with all the information, resources, and tools you need to support your child. We work with teachers, other therapists to extend our support for your child. This might mean having a professional modify your home or vehicle to increase the comfort of your child’s environments, as an example.
A specific service agreement and support plan will be developed with you, so that you can be sure that you are receiving exactly the type of support you are seeking.
Applications & Agencies
Our therapists can help you with applications to funding bodies for a range of equipment and services (e.g. CAETI, Centrelink, NDIS, MASS) and assist enquiries for agency-based funding.
You can find NDIS & Medicare resources and information below.
