You’re nearing the end of your NAPA intensive and are likely wishing it wasn’t coming to an end. You might be wondering, how can I continue all this awesome progress I’ve seen my child doing at home?
The last few days of the intensive you’ll spend going over your child’s home program. Try these tips while you’re still at NAPA to help make your home exercises successful:
If you haven’t already been doing exercises at home with your child, it may be a tricky transition to make. My son and I love doing our exercises together but this wasn’t always the case. It took a little while to adjust to doing exercises with mom, but we figured it out together, and now it’s something we both enjoy. Don’t give up! You’ll build up to longer sessions.
Consistency: Find time most days to do exercises. Even if it’s just five minutes one day, it will help your child get used to working with mom or dad and establish that this is something you’ll be doing together daily.
Rewards: Use whatever is motivational for your child to reinforce that doing exercises together is a positive experience. When we first started it was lots of video. Then, over time, we were able to move away from video to food rewards or earning stickers for a sticker chart. We even did quarters for his piggy bank for short while!
Sharing: Show the therapists you work with at home some of your child’s new exercises so they can incorporate them into their sessions.
I hope this helps you get your home exercise program up and running! Carrying over exercises from his intensives has been one of the best things we’ve done to continue his progress. It’s worth it. Good luck and have fun!
Leslie is a NAPA mom who is as experienced in intensive therapy as one can get; making her the perfect person to highlight home program best practices. We love seeing the progress her son Winston makes from incorporating NAPA exercises at home.
