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You are here: Home / Featured / Organize Your Sensory Child

Organize Your Sensory Child

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When thinking about the topic of organization for children with Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD) I wanted to start by asking you a simple question.Sensory Processing Disorder and how to keep your child organized - part 1 of 3

Are the kids with SPD naturally inclined to disorganization and chaos?

I don’t necessarily mean that they are messy people, but more about their state of minds being chaotic. Is your child trying to make and create a routine when he engages in sensory seeking or avoiding behaviors? Does the sensory activity bring organization of the mind? Does avoiding sensory activities help maintain organization?

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I think the answer to this question is generally yes. The reason is that for whatever reason children with sensory processing difficulties are either under or over sense their environment. All children are naturally born as sensory creatures. They explore the world around them through the senses of touch, taste, smell, sounds, and sights. They are like little scientists trying to figure out their worlds by using sensing activities such as putting everything in their mouths, having to touch everything in the store even when you’ve asked them not to – babbling or screeching just to hear how it sounds… This is how they understand their world and learn about interacting and staying safe in their environment.

When something is different about how you organize and understand your world, it means that you need to engage in either significantly more or significantly less sensory activities in order to keep order within your own body and mind. Children with Sensory Processing Disorder are often described as being unregulated. With the lack of calmness and order within their brains, we see disorganized, anxious or seemingly out of control little people.

 

Sadly, many people interpret this as a child that is poorly behaved and poorly parented. The truth is: your child is trying to gain control! I don’t believe that children try to misbehave when they are engaged in disbalanced sensory seeking and I don’t think that they are being unreasonable when they are sensory avoiding. They are doing the things that make sense for them.

They do what they do to organize their brains and help them to function within their environment.

The treatment for children with SPD is often consists of helping the child to organize their body and mind. Deep pressure, massage or water play can do a great job helping to bring calmness for some. When a child is in tune with his internal organization, he will be more likely to appear calm on the outside. It supports focus and learning and that in turn can further help the child to develop effective strategies for both their academics and finding other coping techniques for their SPD challenges.

The internal functions are therefore very important in supporting your child. However, it also needs to be said that the external environment plays an incredibly important role when we are looking at the overall management of sensory issues.

Children who are sensory defensive often require a calm environment in order to feel safe. These children very often appear cautious and anxious. In a disorganized environment they may be more wary of sensory surprises and therefore are spending more time being on high alert instead of the usual business of children which is playing to learn. They tend not to be risk takers because they are trying to prevent overstimulation of the areas that are particularly sensitive to.

As parents of sensory children, we learn pretty quickly that loud, crowded places disbalance our children, turning them into little animals that hear, see or understand no word of reason. We sometimes forget that our homes or classrooms may also be contributing. A “loud” environment that is visually noisy or full of many other sensory events can be just as difficult for a sensitive child. When we try to minimize the sensory chaos for them, we can lower their response dial down to a more manageable level. This is of course of huge benefit for the kids, but it can also be helpful for us as caregivers. Dealing with an epic meltdown is difficult regardless if it was caused by a busy mall or bright lights, classroom music, or too many posters up on the wall.

Looking to continue the conversation of organization for the kids with SPD? Check out Organize Your Sensory Child – Part 2

Sensory Processing Disorder Seeker is not easy to understand and every child has a different story. My posts are about my sensory seeker son, but I really hope that some of this can help you if anything I share can help you or someone you know. 

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« How to Dress Up for Healthy Lifestyle!
Organize Your Sensory Child – Part 2 »

Comments

  1. Tara says

    April 21, 2014 at 11:40 am

    I am familiar of this because of a friend of mine. It’s important to bring awareness to others of this once it’s been figured out, especially at school. It makes a difference in their whole childhood for sure in school or in social environments. This is a great post, so thanks for posting, I will be sharing. 🙂

  2. Jennifer Medeiros says

    April 21, 2014 at 12:11 pm

    What a scary place the world must be for these kids! I cannot imagine how overwhelming things can be. Great points for helping all kids get a bit more organized!

  3. Jenna M Wood says

    April 21, 2014 at 1:13 pm

    I think it’s fascinating to learn more about sensory seekers, and really helps me to understand the depth of the children and parents learning to live with it. But I can imagine this also makes these children so wonderful to see grow and very expressive as well!

  4. Kerri (TheMaven) says

    April 21, 2014 at 1:30 pm

    These are great tips! I am going to have to use them for my son, who has Autism.

  5. Patty says

    April 21, 2014 at 1:41 pm

    You are really educating me on a disorder about which I knew nothing. Thank you for bringing this awareness to me and so many others.

  6. Roechelle says

    April 21, 2014 at 2:34 pm

    These are great tips for sure. I used to nanny for a family whose son had this disorder and it was very hectic

  7. Tina @ My Highest Self says

    April 21, 2014 at 4:42 pm

    Great post, thank you for sharing this. It’s so helpful to know what children may be going through.

  8. Stacie @ The Divine Miss Mommy says

    April 21, 2014 at 4:56 pm

    This is interesting. I always have thought that my son has sensory issues. However as he has gotten older, he seems to have outgrown most of them. Same thing with my nephew.

  9. Michele Brosius says

    April 21, 2014 at 4:59 pm

    Great post! I have worked in the early childhood field for 20+ years, long before we truly understood SPD. I have worked with many children with some level of senory disorder. It’s amazing how just a few simple techniques and adaptations can make a huge difference.

  10. Amanda Ripsam says

    May 1, 2014 at 1:29 am

    found you on the special needs links. I’m glad I did because I have a hard time keeping my daughter who has sensory needs organized. It’s been hard to keep up as she get’s distracted by so much on top of having ADHD and a rare genetic disorder. Thanks for posting loved the ideas

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Trackbacks

  1. Organize Your Sensory Child - Part 3 says:
    May 8, 2014 at 5:38 am

    […] this is your first visit, you might check out Part 1 and Part 2 of the organization for kids with Sensory Processing […]

  2. Organize Your Sensory Child - Part 2 says:
    January 16, 2017 at 11:33 am

    […] See part 1 of this article here […]

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