How is your child at non-preferred activities?

[brachysira]

So the OT assessment was pretty much just what a summary of what I said to them, and much was extended...for instance, they asked, does she do buttons?  I said, she's never tried so probably not.  So the report says, mother reports that child cannot do buttons, zippers, and other self-help tasks.  Well, she does do zippers and might do buttons...  They said, mother reports child dislikes climbing.  Well, she doesn't dislike it now--I guess she just had to warm up to the park.  The main thing that seemed to stand out to them in the evaluation is that my child kept asking to do other things.  Like, they had a play kitchen, and my child asked to play with that instead of walk on the balance beam.  A child was playing Operation, and my child wanted to sit down and play instead of stringing beads.  They said my child had no tolerance for the swing but that was because after she did it a bit, she spotted a jungle gym and wanted to play on it so said she was done swinging.  They gave her a very long chunky puzzle and she wanted to talk about the pieces but not put them in, but she hasn't done chunky puzzles since she was 1--but she does like harder puzzles.  They said she probably had trouble in school because she seemed really distractable and had extremely poor visual attention.  But she is the most focused student at her preschool when they do organized activities, although she does tend to have mini-tantrums at school when she can't get exactly what she wants.  

I think she may need help being a bit more flexible, but I actually think it's good that she asked if she could play Operation--she didn't insist and did what the therapist wanted. She did the chunky puzzle after we told her she had to.  She wouldn't get back on the swing, but never in her life have I insisted she swing if she didn't want to, and no one really insisted then, so I don't really think it was notable...  

So ,we are doing OT, but I really feel like she's doing all the things she wasn't doing that caused me to seek an assessment...since when I went to the doctor about this it was 2 months ago.  But I think it will be fun for her and we only pay $20/appt, so it's not that much more than some other things she does, so we'll do it, but I may quit when school starts since I'm not completely sure she needs this.

[seadragon2013]

DS struggles with non-preferred activities. His lack of flexibility around such activities is one of the reasons we are pursuing an evaluation with EI. It's hard to introduce him to new ideas and skills because he is not open to trying them. I think sometimes it's because the activities are hard for him, but other times it is because he gets somewhat stuck in other preferred activities. He hyper-focuses on activities like playing trucks, but is very distractible in activities like reading or doing art projects.

I think all three year olds can be stubborn about about preferred activities to a greater or lesser degree. From your description, no one thing that your DD did in the evaluation really stands out as unusual to me (obviously not an expert) for a three year old, but it's very possible that there was an overall pattern to her behavior, KWIM? In future appointments I would probably try to flesh out with the OT what patterns they are noticing in her behavior that are different from what they expect to see. As long as you think they have no conflict of interest, I'd be inclined to take their advice, since even a small increase in flexibility now can have a cumulatively large effect over a kid's ability to succeed academically and socially.

BTW, I do love hearing stories about your DD. She sounds like such a firecracker in the best way possible

[brachysira]

Thanks, seadragon2013. She definitely stands out... We have often wondered if DD needs some help with her hotheadedness and spirited child tendencies, although they didn't observe any tantrums or anything except very good outgoing preschooler behavior as far as I could tell. She did trip on the stairs when were having her climb up and down in an obstacle course, and that's something she does...and they say it is lack of body awareness and visual attention--so they are hoping they can brush different parts of her body so she pays attention to them more and that sort of thing... I was just surprised that the report mentioned many times how she had to be encouraged to do the activities and how she was distracted by other activities and was not inclined towards non-preferred behaviors--because I thought she did what they asked pretty well. And we always sort of thought it was an asset that she asked for what she wanted and wasn't afraid to address adults, and also that she always seemed to be looking around and asking lots about what was going on around her...so although it is actually good if they can talk her into looking where she's going, I really don't think she should stop looking around...

[creepyeyeball]

I don't know. I feel like it's perfectly normal for a 3yo to want to pick what she does. Your descriptions sound completely normal to me.

And I guess I ask myself why she needs to be swinging when there is something else she wants to do? Why does she need to do the chunky puzzle if she's not interested? I feel like child-led play is much more productive.

I get that we want our kids to be flexible and able to submit to doing things they don't want to do, but it's absolutely normal for a 3yo to be strong-willed and not something that needs yo be pathologized and treated with therapy, IMO.

[brachysira]

creepyeyeball, yeah, what I was worried about when I asked my doctor was that she was tripping and falling all the time, she seemed like she couldn't ride a trike, she wasn't cutting and stringing beads, and it seemed like she had some weakness in her core because she didn't not look like the other kids when doing some things at gymnastics. My mom bought her some cute tiny beads, and she totally did it--apparently she was just not into stringing boring items, and at the assessment she cut paper like a pro. And she's quit tripping mostly and I think maybe she was just falling a lot because she was really tired. But now they are like, but she won't do non-preferred activities without encouragement, and I'm just like, um, who will? But I don't think they'll really do anything to mess her up--I'll be there--so we'll give it a try.

[kleigh926]

The short answer is, she whines and sometimes throws fits every time we ask her to do something she doesn't want to do, unless we bribe her with a treat or an activity that she decides could be equally enjoyable at that point in time. I'm seriously not understanding how a 3-year-old resisting a non-preferred activity could be considered abnormal. Isn't whining and defiance kinda the name of the game at this age, or is my child especially difficult? Haha.

[photomama1990]

I have to bribe my child to do swimming lessons. I'm not ashamed to admit that. Haha. Her behavior seems completely normal and nothing is standing out as crazy (I have a degree in child development). I too would continue OT, it can't hurt, but I'm not sure I would deem is absolutely necessary.

[expatmama]

As an adult I'm pretty crap at non-preferred activities, so I am not surprised my kid is as well. I hate team sports and still cannot throw a football or hit a baseball and I'm ok at life at this point.

DS2 seems interested in board games at first, but the focus doesn't last. His big brother played a ton of games by 3. However we turn DS2 loose at the pool and he is a social butterfly, getting all of the big kids to play with him (sometimes even throwing a football -- and he doesn't get that from DH). So he's great socially in those settings, can share and take turns.

There are many things to worry about with my kids, this is not one of them. And I still have a sink full of dirty dishes because that is one on my non-preferred activities.

[beenandgone]

My kids all have this "I don't want to and you can't make me" attitude towards things they don't want to do. It's so frustrating. For dd1, that is math class in school. For ds1 is clean up. Except for loading the dishwasher. The boy would rather I throw away every toy instead of picking it up himself, but he has epic meltdowns if I put a plate in the dishwasher without letting him so it.

My kids are so weird.

[brachysira]

My child was pouting because we didn't have a penny to ride the horse at the grocery story. I said, "when things are disappointing, you have to stay cool." She said, "I don't want to stay cool!"

It's not even all that often that I try to get my child to do things she doesn't want to do. I just spin it so she wants to do it, or we don't do it if it doesn't matter. We went to the splash pad and the kids weren't feeling it, so we went to the park. Whatever. Maybe she's not building life skills to be able to slog through a bunch of math problems, but there's enough stress with ordinary life daily disappointments that we are mostly just trying to manage the minimum.

[hereweare]

We don't really push stuff he doesn't want to do. If I have already gathered all the supplies to do something and he wants to do a different activity I say let's do this for a little bit and then we will do that; it works most of the time.

We went bowling yesterday and he did really well for a while, but when he wanted to collect super letters to put in his notebook, he listened to us when we said you have to wait until you go one more time and then we will walk around.