In fact, the intrinsic muscles are the muscles in the hand that define the arches of the hands, bend the knuckles, and oppose with the thumbs. These OT activities using tongs are great for developing and strengthening the arches of the hands for improved intrinsic strength. This post explains more about motoric separation of the hand and here is another fun activity that really strengthens those muscles. One thing that makes a big difference in fine motor dexterity is addressing separation of the sides of the hand. This is a collection of all of the fine motor activities on The OT Toolbox. Having an understanding of hand musculature and anatomy of the hand and upper extremity is important too.įirst, check out our huge online library of fine motor activities. Range of motion of the arm: upper arm, forearm, wrist, fingers, and thumbĪ hand therapist will have various hand strength norms by using a dynamometer to measure grip strength, pinch strength of various pinches.Some of those areas include these concepts: Many aspects of motor skills impact strength and endurance in the hands. When it comes to hand strength, there is a lot to uncover. Hand strength is impacted by various components. Scroll through the activities below to find creative hand strengthening ideas to improve grip strength, pinch strength, or as part of a finger exercises program for handwriting. Today includes a collection of hand strengthening activities that can be used as hand strength activities for adults, and to develop hand strength. These ideas improve tone in the hands, increase stability in the thumb and fingers, develop and define arches of the hands, improve precision with in-hand manipulation, improve endurance in hand strength, and address hand separation into a fine motor side and a power side. Here, you will find a collection of pinching, pulling, and pushing activities, weight bearing activities, squeezing activities, and overall grip and pinch activities. The best way to improve overall strength is through meaningful and motivating activities…especially everyday play! Luckily, there are many fun ways to improve a child’s hand strength. There are many fine motor activities needed in school that will be a red flag for determining if a child has weak hands. Kids who struggle with hand strength may have difficulty with grasping a pencil, coloring, holding and using scissors, managing clothing fasteners, attaching a seatbelt, squeezing a glue bottle, opening and managing food containers, tying shoes. Hand strength is an important area of development. How do you know if a child has weak hands? Not only do we need adequate hand strength for our ADLs, it directly impacts on our ability to perform school related tasks such us cutting, writing and manipulating materials such as glue. But, through coloring and using crayons, they are improving their hand strength so they can color larger pictures or tackle more difficult fine motor tasks.Īdequate finger and hand strength is a crucial foundation skill necessary to successfully perform most activities of daily living such as opening snack wrappers, flushing the toilet, opening the tap, buttoning your shirt and so the list goes on. Think about it this way: with weak hands, it is very difficult for a child to color a coloring page. Occupational therapists use functional tasks, or daily occupations, to improve hand strength so that the clients they work with can lead functional lives: so they can have strong and efficient hands to do those tasks that take up their day. Let’s take a closer look at hand strengthening…in fun and creative ways! The activities to strengthen fine motor skills included in this post are perfect to improving grip strength, pinch strength, or as part of a finger exercises program for handwriting. Here, you will find a collection of fine motor resources and hand strengthening activities that can be used to improve tone in the hands, increase stability in the thumb and fingers, develop and define arches of the hands, improve precision with in-hand manipulation, improve endurance in hand strengthening activities.īelow, you will find hand strengthening activities for kids, hand strength activities for adults, and therapy tools to develop hand strength. There is more to developing strong and efficient hands than just using a hand grip exerciser or therapy putty to strengthen fingers. Hand strengthening and finger strengthening are a part of occupational therapy interventions, in every day tasks.
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