At Porter academy we work with the whole child by addressing not only academic skills, but sensory motor skills as well.  These skills are prerequisite and essential for establishing the foundation for academic learning.

The developmental pyramid shows a bottom-to-top developmental sequence.  It begins with basic sensory systems at the lowest level and ends with Academic Learning at the top level.  The skills and abilities listed on each level cannot develop adequately unless the child has mastered skills at the levels below.

1. Lowest level – Sensory systems

Seven sensory systems are listed on the lowest level.  The 3 systems on the bottom row are called Secondary sensory systems, or primitive systems.  These 3 systems develop early en-utero.  Children with special needs often have under-developed primitive sensory systems, especially if they were born prematurely.

• The Tactile system provides information about light touch, deep touch, and various textures including sharp, dull, soft, and hard.  The tactile system also provides information about temperature.  Children who have difficulty with Tactile processing often seek extra touch stimulation by fiddling with objects, chewing objects, or reaching out to touch objects for inappropriately.  Some children are hypersensitive to touch and try to avoid certain textures.

 

• The Vestibular system originates in the vestibule of the inner ear.  It provides information about movement, balance, and visual tracking.  It has a strong influence on muscle tone.  Many children are either hypersensitive or hypo-sensitive to movement.  If they are hypo-sensitive, they often seek extra movement by squirming and fidgeting.  They have difficulty staying seated, and are usually “on the go.”

 

• Proprioception refers to the information provided by the proprioceptors; small sensory receptors in our joints an muscles that tell our brains where we are in space, how our bodies are arranged, and how much pressure we should use to accomplish various tasks in a smooth, coordinated way.

 

2. Second Level - Sensory Motor Skills

The second level lists sensory motor skills and abilities.  Sensory-motor refers to motor abilities that we develop based on input received from our sensory systems.  Some of the abilities that develop at this level include:

• Body scheme:  the awareness we have of the parts of our body, the size of each part, and the ways the parts connect. 
• Screening Input: the ability to screen sensory input enables us to filter out background noise or extraneous visual stimuli so that we can focus on our work.
• Postural security and stability:  This enables our bodies to make postural adjustments needed to maintain appropriate positions during activities.  For example, we don’t have to think about how to stay seated in a chair because our postural/core muscles provide information to our brain to enable us to stay seated.  In a child with good postural security, this information is processed at a subconscious level.
• Motor Planning, also called Praxis:  This skill is based on the brain’s ability to tell the body what it needs to do in order to complete a motor task.  Children who can learn a new motor task easily and perform it accurately, after one of two demonstrations, have good motor planning abilities.  Children who need multiple demonstrations or physical guidance, have difficulty with motor planning.

 

3.  Third Level - Perceptual Motor Skills

The third level lists perceptual motor abilities that develop once the lower level sensory and sensory motor abilities are intact.  Porter students work on activities designed to improve various types of perceptual motor skills.  These include fine motor, visual, visual-motor, and bilateral coordination tasks.  Teachers and therapists use a multi-sensory approach in teaching new concepts.  For example, students count numbers while doing rhythmical physical exercises.

 

4.  Fourth Level - Daily Living and Behavior Activities

The fourth level includes self-help skills such as feeding and dressing activities.  Students cannot perform these skills correctly until they have mastered perceptual motor activities.

Behavior in this context refers to the ability to maintain self-regulation in class.  Sensory processing must be developed to a functional level before students can sit calmly and quietly while concentrating on their work.

 

5. Top Level - Academic Learning

The highest level on the pyramid is attained once a child has developed all of the lower level abilities.  At this level he/she can utilize the cortex of the brain to process academic information, because lower level brain structures, such as the brainstem, are processing sensory information efficiently.

 

Our brains are designed to organize incoming sensory information and figure out how to use it.  Some children’s brains perceive information differently from the norm; as seen in one of two ways: 1) hypersensitivity to sensory input   2) hypo-sensitivity to sensory input.  Children with these processing problems need to engage in sensory activities designed to normalize their sensory systems.

 

Sensory Diets:  At Porter Academy, occupational therapists work with teachers and therapists to develop individualized sensory programs called “sensory diets”, to help meet students’ sensory needs at school.  The purpose of these sensory diets is to provide the types of sensory input that each individual child needs to help him/her be more attentive and productive in class.  Students participate in one or more brief sessions of intense sensory input each day.  Teachers and therapists utilize various sensory strategies in the classroom as well.  The right kind of input enables the brain to be more efficient in processing sensory stimuli, and prevents higher level brain structures from being preoccupied with meeting lower level sensory needs.  As a result, higher level cortical areas can concentrate on academic tasks.

 

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