Tuesday, April 24, 2012

The Great Bike Giveaway!



The nice folks at PediaStaff shared the great news about the ‘Great Bike Giveaway.’ Friendship Circle of Michigan has partnered with adaptive bicycle companies to give 14 children with special needs a free adaptive bicycle for winning this contest!

How does my kiddo win? Starting April 16th through May 10th, submit a creative photo or photo of a child (yours or your therapy client) along with 250 characters describing why he/she needs an adaptive bike.

Share! From May 13th through the 18th share your submission with as many friends and family members as possible. Ask them to vote for your submission and to share with their friends and family.

WIN!!!! The 14 submissions with the most votes will win 1 of the 14 adaptive bikes!!

Adaptive bikes are AMAZING and would mean the world to that special kiddo in your life. VOTE TODAY!
Jen Dermody, OTR/L

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Follow Me on PINTEREST!

If you haven't been completely sucked into the world of Pinterest, you've got to give it a try!  I checked it out a few months ago and can officially add it to my list of addictions!    Just in case you haven't seen Pinterest and don't know how it works, it's basically a virtual bulletin board.  You set up "boards" that you can label any way you want and then you "pin" interesting pictures and ideas to your board.  There are literally thousands of pictures with just about everything from recipes to wedding dresses to cleaning ideas to pets to vacation spots.  Seriously, I'm talking about thousands of pictures!  When you see something of "interest" you simply "pin" to your board and you have a built in resource you can refer to anytime anywhere.  The really great part is that when you click on the picture you've pinned, it takes you directly to the website where it was found and you get all of the details you need!

         While it's easy to be distracted by so many pretty pictures and lots of  different topics, I've been most excited about the WEALTH of information that is available relating to Occupational Therapy and kids!  I LOVE IT!!!!  Oh how I wish that Pinterest had been around when I was in OT school or working as a new grad.  The ideas are ENDLESS!  This one little website (OK, it's not so little I suppose) has sparked a new excitement in me about OT and I'm more anxious every week to try out some new ideas with my kiddos. 

I've been having such a fun time creating boards on lots of different topics for my own personal interests.  Several "Jen's OT For Kids" readers have emailed and asked me to add a link to my Pinterest page.  I've hesitated on adding the link since I didn't intend to connect my page with my blog and had not really organized the page to be "only" OT related.  With a few more recent inquiries from readers, I've decided to add the link and you are welcome to follow along!  The page is actually set up as "Jennifer Darnell Dermody" and you should be able to get to it through the "Follow Me on Pinterest" button at the top of this page.  There is a specific "Jen's OT For Kids" board along with "Preschool Fun", "School Day Fun", "Visual Motor", and  "Sensory Motor".  You can choose to follow individual boards or the whole page.  I will try to keep adding lots of OT ideas for kids and hope you will find something helpful for your kiddos!  Pin It!

Jen Dermody, OTR/L