Which therapy will benefit my child?

Kick Start Pediatric Therapy is a multi-disciplinary clinic, meaning we offer a variety of services all under one roof. Some clients may only come for one type of therapy once per week, while others receive multiple individual therapies. For those receiving more than one type of service, having all therapists in one space allows for strong, consistent collaboration. We firmly believe this is a main cause of our clients seeing such significant progress and why we call ourselves a “clinical think tank.”

Often, when we first speak with a family, a parent may not know what kind of therapy his/her child needs. The parent just knows that the child is behind in his/her development or perhaps has been referred from the child’s school for “help.”

Listed below are the types of individual therapies provided by Kick Start. If interested in one of these therapies or if you need help determining which service will most benefit your child, please call Esther Weisz at 847-386-6560, x2.

OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY

OT focuses on a child’s ability to participate to the fullest extent in life’s everyday activities, including playing, learning and socializing. Occupational Therapists address motor skills (gross and fine), sensory processing, play skills and self-regulation.

Children seeking OT may have challenges with coordination, balance, keeping their body still to attend to instruction, safety awareness, processing various types of input (sights, sounds, textures, tastes), sequencing a number of movements, following directions, motor planning, exploring a variety of movement (swinging, sliding, crashing), handwriting, tying their shoes, eating a variety of foods, and more.

SPEECH THERAPY

Speech Language Therapy is used to improve a child’s performance in a variety of areas including feeding, understanding language, and expressing themselves (both verbally and non-verbally.) Developing effective communication skills is one of the most important elements to socializing, creating meaningful relationships, promoting play skills, and providing the foundation for academic skills.

Children seeking Speech Therapy may have challenges with articulation, expressive communication (using language to communicate), receptive communication (understanding the communication of others), and social pragmatics (the verbal and non-verbal language of socializing). Children with feeding challenges may also need speech therapy to help with oral-motor development and swallowing.

SOCIAL WORK

Our social workers provide emotional support to children and families. This support can be individual therapy for the child, family therapy with the parents and the child, support to parents, or support within a social group. Through the power of empathy and building relationships, our social workers can help children who are having challenges with regulating their emotions and moods, as well as help children understand the emotions of other people in their daily lives, such as peers, siblings and parents. Our social workers are also available to provide case coordination and crisis intervention.

DEVELOPMENTAL THERAPY

DTs address all domains of child development. They aim to enhance, integrate, and generalize skills across environments. Our DTs use a play-based, relationship-based approach to help children engage with caregivers, peers, and the world around them.

Children seeking Developmental Therapy may have challenges with playing alone or with others, playing with a variety of toys, exploring various play repertoires, the ability to be representational and symbolic within their play, and being able to integrate the areas of development needed to play with others: language, motor skills, cognition, and emotional regulation.