On The Go Fun!

It's hard to believe that the end of another school year is quickly approaching.  Being the mother of a second grader, the countdown to the last day of school has begun (27 school days left as of today).  For us, the summer means being on the go quite a bit.  I think that is the norm for most families, right?  It is during the summer months, that many of the kids I work with go on vacations and miss more therapy than they do during the school year.  Many of the parents panic a bit about this and are looking for ways they can make sure their kids don't regress.  They are also looking for things to take on the go....things they can throw in a beach bag or in a backpack when traveling and need to keep their kids entertained for long periods of time.  They want hands-on things so their kids don't spend time on some kind of device.

In today's blog, I share a dozen of my favorite on-the-go craft sets and activity sets and books that you can throw in your bag and easily take with you wherever you may be going.  They are things that can work towards a variety of occupational therapy goals but your kids won't even know it because they are super fun and the "therapy" piece is hidden from them. 

On-The-Go Jewelry Making Kit-this is a great activity set for your little craft lovers.  It contains 102 multicolored beads and  2 different colors of cords.  It comes in a convenient little carrying case making it a perfect on-the-go kit.  Making jewelry is great for working on improving hand-eye coordination, visual motor skills, increases grasp strength and manipulation skills and encourages bilateral coordination.  It is also great for helping kids become more creative as there is no right or wrong...it's just what you put together.  

Playfoam Go-if you have a little sensory seeker, this is a great on-the-go set for them.  Educational Insights Playfoam is a non-toxic molding dough that never dries out.  It can be molded into anything the imagination comes up with.  One of the best things about it is that it won't stick on anything
This set contains 8 blocks of different colored Playfoam in a portable carrying case.  The top of the case has 4 shapes on top so you can turn your Playfoam into a star, triangle, circle or square 

Melissa and Doug Water Wow-I've been a fan of these Water Wow books for ages and are great for younger children.  What I love about it is that each of the books comes with a water brush you fill up before use.  Kids use this water brush to color in pictures, learn how to write numbers, letters and shapes and complete a variety of different activities (dot-to-dot, mazes, etc.).  Perfect for car or plane rides as you don't have to worry about markers or crayons getting all over the place.  Great for working on introducing younger children to graphomotor skills (drawing, coloring and handwriting), improves hand-eye coordination, visual motor and perceptual skills and and can increase focus and attentional skills. 

Take-Along Games-this set by Peaceable Kingdom is great for keeping kids entertained while in a car/plane, at a restaurant or those down times at the pool or beach.  The set comes with 4 games that use reusable stickers (think Colorforms): Tic-Tac-Toe, Four-in-a-Row, Memory Match-up and On-the-Go Bingo.  In addition to keeping kids entertained, these are great for working on improving grasp strength and manipulation skills, improves hand-eye coordination and visual motor and visual perceptual skills and works on executive functioning skills.   

Little Travelers On-The-Go Magnetic Play Set-this tin contains 25 magnetic pieces that can be mixed and matched to create different people who are ready for some kind of travel adventure.  The tin not only acts as storage, the inside has two scenes printed on the inside where the characters can be displayed.  This open-ended toy encourages creativity in children as there is no right or wrong way to make the characters.  Kids use their imagination to come up with all kinds of characters.  This set is also great for improving hand-eye coordination, visual motor and visual perceptual skills and helps in developing fine motor and grasping skills.  You can help encourage language in kids by having them talk about their characters and what they are doing in the scenes.  

Glow Friends Neon Colouring Set-sometimes my daughter is perfectly content with the coloring pages that you may get a children's menu on at restaurants but most of the time she wants more than a couple of crayons and whatever they give you to color.  This coloring set by Tiger Tribe is a perfect for throwing in your bag, whether you are going out to eat or about to hop in a car or a plane for a long trip.  Each set comes in a sturdy box with a magnetic top and contains 36 coloring pages, 2 storage drawers, 3 sheets of stickers and 3 double sided markers.  Great for working on improving graphomotor skills, visual motor and visual perceptual skills and encourages creativity.  

On-The-Go Coloring Kit-another great on-the-go kit by Kid Made Modern.  This Coloring Kit contains a 24-page coloring book, 10 markers and  a dozen hexagon crayons (awesome for encouraging a proper grasp).  All of these awesome tools come in a super convenient canvas storage tote you can throw in any bag.  Perfect for improving graphomotor skills, visual motor and visual perceptual skills and encourages creativity while working on increasing focus, attention and organizational skills.  

Scratch and Sketch Games and Puzzles Ocean World-I am a longtime fan of the the Scratch and Sketch books by Peter Pauper Press.  I recently saw this book filled with a variety of games and puzzles and snatched it up immediately for my own daughter for our next trip out to California.  It includes games like crossword puzzles, complete the pictures and connect-the-dots.  In addition to the 20 pages of scratch paper activities, there are also 20 pages of activities like Tic-Tac-Toe, the Dot Game and Sudoku.  This book is great for working on improving graphomotor skills, visual motor and visual perceptual skills 

My Brick Case: Travel Lego Box-my daughter is obsessed with Legos and insists on taking a bag full of them whenever we travel.  I love Legos because they not only keeps her entertained for hours on end, it is one of the things I recommend to all my families to help build grasp strength an in-hand manipulation skills.  This travel Lego box by ModFamily is a perfect storage case for your Lego fan.  What I love about it is that it can hold hundreds of pieces and has two base plates built onto each side of the box so kids can build and create while on the go.  **I suggest putting all your Lego pieces in a Ziploc bag and placing it in the case so when they are ready to build, they can just grab their pieces from the bag.  In addition to improving grasp strength, building with Legos encourages creativity, works on improving bilateral coordination, hand-eye coordination, visual motor and visual perceptual skills and executive functioning skills such as focus, attention and organizational skills.  

On-The-Go Stationery Kits-I have all of these stationery kits by OOLY!  I couldn't decide which ones I wanted for my daughter so just got them all.  During the summer months, I am going to encourage (actually going to force) my daughter to keep in touch with friends and family via old-fashioned snail mail.  This is a good way to work on her spelling and writing with it being a bit more fun than just practicing.  These sets by OOLY are definitely motivating her to write some letters, especially the Unique Unicorns set!  Each set comes in a sturdy plastic case and contains: 8 letter sheets, 4 postcards, 4 envelopes, a notebook, a sheet of stickers, a multi-colored pen, a mechanical pencil and an eraser.  In addition to working on improving graphomotor skills, it is a great way to work on improving executive functioning skills such as focus, attention and organizational skills.  

Wikki-Stix Traveler Set-another one of those awesome toys that I have been pushing on parents for years.  I was first introduced to Wikki Stix when at a restaurant.  The wax covered yarn kept my daughter (and husband) entertained the entire time we waited for our meal.  Wikki Stix are .  This set contains 144 Wikki Stix in 16 different colors, a 12 page activity book with different ideas for the kids to make, 2 activity sheets with games like tic-tac-toe and connect-the-dots and is all stored in a sturdy carrying case.  This set is great for working on improving fine motor and grasping skills, hand-eye coordination, visual motor and visual perceptual skills. Kids can work on creativity by building their own designs.    

Mad Libs-this is one of my families favorite things to do when we are in the car.   We all take turns being the writer (except for whoever is driving!) and take turns coming up with words.  Mad Libs are a sure fire way to make kids laugh hysterically as they read the completed story.  They are also an amazingly motivating way to teach kids about parts of language, how to spell and expand their vocabulary.  In addition to the aforementioned, Mad Libs are good for encouraging creativity and working on executive functioning skills such as focus, attention, planning and organizational skills.  Warning: depending on your child's sense of humor, you may want to come up with some family game rules before you start such as forbidden kinds of words!  There are now dozens and dozens of different editions of Mad Libs so if you have a kid who may be resistant to writing, you can probably entice them with a Mad Libs books of their favorite characters, tv shows or sports.  

I could keep going and making more suggestions for On-The-Go fun but I think there is plenty here to choose from.  While many people rely on an iPad or some other kind of tablet to keep their kids happy and entertained, there are many who prefer to keep their kids busy doing something instead.  Do you have anything that you rely on for long trips or keeping your kids occupied without a screen when at a restaurant?  I would love to hear about some of your favorites and I am sure my readers would love to as well.  I am only a click away and love hearing from all of you!

Sum..Sum...Summertime Writing!

For some kids, summer vacation is well under way.  For others, like my daughter, there are still a handful of days left.  We are so excited for the summer and a more relaxed schedule.  While many parents look forward to the more relaxed schedule, many of the families I work with, especially the older kids who will not be attending therapy due to long days at camp or because they will be spending the summers at their vacation homes, get anxious about their children regressing and losing some of the skills they worked so hard to gain during the school year.  For these parents, I often suggest things like having a pen pal over the summer (what kid doesn't love to get mail???) or keeping a journal of your fun summer activities.

For some kids, that open-ended kind of writing presents an increased challenge for them causing them to avoid it at all costs.  Since I want to work on keeping my daughter's creative juices flowing over the summer and get her ready for the increased demands of second grade, I have been trying to find motivating activity books or journals that will make this seem like less like homework.  Through my research (spending a whole lot of time in bookstores browsing their journals and activity books), I have found that there are so many great books out there that help to make writing fun.  There are a ton of books that provide you with a simple writing prompt which can help jumpstart those kids that are struggling to come up with what to write about.  Depending on the child, you may even want to have a discussion about the subject before they begin writing to help them organize their thoughts.

Below, you will find some of my favorite journals and activity books that will not only work on handwriting, but will encourage creativity,  stimulate possible conversation and eventually lead to increased confidence and self-esteem.

Mad Libs-I love when I find things from my own childhood that still brings about tons of joy to today's kids.   Mad Libs have been a huge hit with my own daughter and one of the biggest benefits is that she learned all about nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs.  For kids who are able to write, be sure to take turns in letting them be the interviewer and have them write the words in themselves.  In addition to working on improving handwriting skills, Mad Libs are great for working on creativity and social skills.  For the younger kids, be sure to check out Mad Libs Junior.  Instead of having to come up with the words, they choose from lists (there are different shapes and under each shape are a bunch of words for them to pick from).  The best part of any Mad Lip collaboration between people is hearing the kids laugh like crazy as they read they completed story.

Write and Draw Your Own Comics-I have been a big fan of all things Usbourne for ages.  Now that some of my clients and my daughter are getting older, I have had to move from their coloring and sticker books to books that will meet their needs.  My daughter is a big fan of reading graphic novels so when I introduced the idea of creating her own comics, she was so excited.  In this book, kids are provided with simple step-by-step instructions and tips to show them how to create their own stories.  What's great about this book is that in addition to the templates, there are lots of ideas about characters and storylines to help those kids who might need assistance in getting their creative juices flowing.  For added detail, this book comes with a bunch of stickers to add to their completed comics.  This is a fun way to motivate kids to write, create and draw.  Additionally, it helps with executive functioning skills such as focus and attention, planning and organizational skills.
For kids who might not need the help with getting their ideas started, you should check out The Blank Comic Book For Kids.

Journal of Awesome-my daughter was given this journal by a family friend and we both love it.  I'm always struck at the increased educational demands that are placed on children and how it can have such a negative impact on their self-esteem and confidence level.  The Journal of Awesome helps to remind your child just how great they are and inspires them to remember how important the little things in life truly are.  Each page provides you with something to write about that will make you think of all the good things in life instead of focusing on the things that are going wrong or may be challenging for you.  Some of the things that they have you write about:
-coming back to your own bed after a long trip
-secret handshakes
-wearing a new pair of shorts
In addition to working on improving writing skills, kids will work on improving executive functioning skills such as focus, attention, planning and organizational skills.  They will also be encouraged to focus on the positive side of things which will help develop confidence and self-esteem.

Choose Kind Journal-one of my favorite books is R.J. Palacio's Wonder.  For those of you not in the know, the book is about a boy named Auggie who was born with significant a significant facial deformity that has kept him from attending school.  The book Wonder follows Auggie on his first year in school with the overall message being all about choosing kindness.  When I saw the Choose Kind Journal-, I bought several copies.  This was something I not only wanted to do with my 7 year old daughter, but also to share with the kids I work with.  The Choose Kind Journal- is definitely geared towards older kids are are more independent in their writing skills.  However, you can easily go through and pick out questions that you can have conversations with your child about and write their answers down for them.  This journal provides daily prompts on how children can do something kind each day through quotes and questions for the kids to think more deeply about kindness.  Some of the things they will write about are:
-what annoys you that you will choose to ignore this week?
-is there someone older in your life that you feel might be lonely?  Spend a day asking him or her questions about life at your age.  What might you want to know?
-Today is random acts of kindness day.  What random acts of kindness will you do for someone today?
In addition to working on handwriting skills, this journal can help generate empathy and kindness in children who might need support in that area.
**if you are looking for a great summer reading book, I can't recommend Wonder enough.  My daughter and I are reading it together and the conversations we have about acceptance and kindness have been wonderful.  

Me:  A Compendium: A Fill In Journal For Kids-this fill in the blank journal is geared towards the preschool set of kids and helps them to identify all their unique qualities.  If kids can write themselves, have them fill in answers themselves (do not focus on the spelling); if they can't write, do it for them.  What I like about this book is that on many of the pages, kids can either write or draw their answers.  This book is filled with kid-friendly illustrations that get the kids thinking about things about themselves, things they like and how they might see different images.  For example, one page has a picture of two pieces of bread and they have to draw what they like inside of their sandwich.  Another page has a picture of a person and they have to either draw or write what's in their brain right now.
Kids will work on developing graphomotor skills, creativity and executive functioning skills such as focus, attention and organizational skills.  This is a fun book to do with your child and can stimulate conversational skills, confidence and self-esteem as they complete each page.

I Like.....Activity Book-similar to Me, this activity book is geared more towards younger children (but kids of all ages will have fun filling it in) and can be done with a grownup if a child might need more help.  Kids can fill in the blanks while writing a letter to someone (encourage a child who can write to fill in the answers without worry about the spelling), draw toppings on a pizza or circle multiple choice questions about themselves.  The illustrations by Sara Walsh are beautiful and kids will love looking back at this as they get older.  In addition to working on improving graphomotor skills, it can encourage conversation and creativity skills.  Also great for working on improving executive functioning skills such as focus, attention, planning and organizational skills and improving confidence and self-esteem.  

642 Things to Write About: Young Writer's Edition-this book encourages children ages 4-8 years to become more creative writers through over 600 prompts.  If you have a younger child, you will have to write their answers down for them but I would encourage you to have them draw a picture to go along with the story.  Older kids who are independently writing should write on their own.  For kids who might have a hard time organizing their thoughts for writing, you may want to have them talk through their response before writing and help them outline what they will write.  This will help improve executive functioning skills such as focus and attention, planning and organization.  Some of the things that your child might be asked to do are:
-write a story that includes a streetlight, a bear and a kid with a jar of honey
-describe your dream house (have your kid draw a picture at the same time!)

In addition to improving creative writing and graphomotor skills, kids' confidence and self-esteem will improve.

Just Between Us:  a no-stress, no-rules journal for girls and their moms-as a mother to a young girl, I aim to have meaningful conversations with her as often as possible.  Sometimes it ends up being much more challenging than others to get her to share her feelings with me, tell me about her day or talk about a variety of things.  When I saw Just Between Us, I was so excited about a way to deepen our conversations over the summer.  Through a variety of writing prompts, quizzes and questionnaires, moms and daughters get to know each other a little better and helps encourage conversation in a stress-free way.  I love how it includes pages for mom and daughters to make lists about things and has lots of free space to encourage writing about things that come up at any given time.  It's important to establish guidelines as a unit about using this book.  Make sure your daughter feels safe that the information she shares with you will stay between the two of you.  And make sure you are having fun while getting to know one another just a little bit better.
Some of the things moms and daughters will write about are:
-answering 20 different questions about yourself (page for mom and for daughter)
-things I talked about with my mom at your age/things I wish I had been able to speak to her about (mom)

And because I never want to leave anyone out, I found these other journals for parents and kids to complete together:
Between Mom and Me: A Mother Son Journal
Dad & Me: Journal for Fathers and Their Sons or Daughters




Scribbles and Doodles:  Kid's Summer Journal-this summer journal is intended for children 6 and up and most appropriate for kids who are generally independent writers.  The 90-page journal has a kid-friendly design with the top half of the page meant for writing about your day and the bottom half blank space for drawing.  While it is meant for kids to keep track of what they did each day during the summer, I had a different idea for my own daughter when I saw it.  When I saw this book, I immediately thought of how it would make a great journal for keeping track of her daily reading.  Since my daughter has been journaling about her reading all year in school and is now obsessed with reading chapter books, I figured she wouldn't mind doing a daily writing activity.  She was especially excited about the idea of having the space to draw a picture about what she read that day.  
In addition to working on improving writing skills, Scribbles and Doodles works on improving creativity skills and executive functioning skills such as focus, attention, planning and organization.  

Putting this list together has been so much fun.  Perhaps it is because my own daughter will benefit so much from so many of the books that I have suggested.  I think it was mostly fun because I was able to discover so many great books that not only encourage children to write, but make it fun and motivating at the same time. During the summer, we want to keep our kids thinking, want them to continue to let their creative juices flow and prepare them for the increased demands of the next school year.  Most importantly to me, is that kids realize just how fun writing can be and how many ways there are to work on this skill.  The added bonus for me is that we can boost a child's confidence and self-esteem by making this kind of work as much fun as possible.

A few final important reminders/tips to make summer writing as successful as possible:
-find fun writing instruments to make summer writing more fun/less work.  My favorites are the Super Duper Scented Gel Pens by Ooly and the Cadoozle Colored Mechanical Pencils.
-focus on the content and not the quality....in other words, don't correct spelling or suggest changes.  If you start to micro-manage what your child is creating, you run the risk of them not wanting to participate at all.
-make this fun for your child....if you are going to set aside time each day or a few times a week, make them look forward to it.  I plan on picking up a special snack that my daughter can have while she is writing.
-if your child has decreased hand strength/endurance, encourage them to take breaks.  Maybe start the writing activity with a quick strengthening activity like playing with Discovery Putty or building with Legos.  My new fine motor obsession, which I will blog about soon, are Plus-Plus toys.  

While I want to say it the most important message from this blog is that kids will become better writers, that would be a lie.  I really worked hard to find books that would help kids get a better sense of who they are, help in create relationships with people they might write with each day, encourage kindness and empathy and help kids become more confident in their skills.  

Keeping writing fun and as stress-free as possible is the ultimate goal with each of the books I suggested. If you have any journals or activity books that you recommend, I would love to hear about them.  I am always a click away and love hearing from all of you.  

Let's Build These Cars and Take Them For a Test Drive

As the holiday season approaches, I've been keeping my eyes peeled for hot toys and games to add to this year's gift guide.  Parent are already asking me what they can get their children and what they can suggest that others get them.  While parents want to get things that their kids want and will like, they also interested in getting things that will help them reach some of their therapeutic goals.

I've always been a fan of Legos and have quite the collection that I use at home and at work.  For some of the older kids on my caseload, working with Legos can be motivating and get them to work on a number of skills.  They are great for working on increasing hand strength and improving manipulation skills, which  is important for handwriting, cutting and all kinds of other academic activities.  It helps with executive functioning skills, especially improving organization, problem solving and focus and attention.  At the end, the kids have a final product that they have built themselves and there is a tremendous amount of pride.

Many of the kids I work with are under the age of 5 and have significantly decreased grasp strength and poor fine motor skills.  Therefore, regular Lego sets are typically not appropriate for them and end up causing more harm and frustration than good.  In the past few years, Lego has expanded their Duplo products and there are some pretty amazing ones to choose from.  The other day, I was looking around and stumbled upon the Creative Cars set.  First of all, I was impressed with the affordable price tag of $20.  The set comes with 40 different colored blocks in a variety of shapes, including windows, sirens and other truck parts.  With those 40 Duplo blocks, you can create tons of different cars and trucks, including a dump truck, a police car or a tow truck.  The set comes with a poster that shows you all the different things you can make.  The best part is that the pictures are big and make it very easy to follow the directions.  Depending on the child you are working with, you can make something small and simple or bigger and more complicated.  I like that most of the cars and trucks use less than 10 pieces (most of them are closer to 5 or 6 blocks) so they can complete them in a short amount of time.  After the kids have built all the different vehicles, you can ask them to try and create their own.  If you have kids who need to work on being more creative, you can put a handful of pieces in front of them and have them come up with their own creation.  

Some of the other occupational therapy skills that can be worked on using the Duplo Creative Cars set are:
Improve Grasp Strength-as previously mentioned, all Legos, no matter the size, are great for working on increasing grasp strength and making those little muscles in the hands stronger.  Many of the kids I work with tend to avoid working with manipulative kinds of toys because they are hard for them so it's important that I find things that are interesting and exciting to them.  I've only been using these for a couple of days, but I can tell you that the kids are loving them and asking to build more and more cars instead of giving up after just one.  

Improve Bilateral Coordination Skills-building with Duplos are great for working on bilateral coordination/using two hands together during activities.  For so many of my little kiddos at work, this is a difficult thing for them.  I spend a lot of my time telling kids to use both hands.  Even with blocks and other manipulative toys, I watch kids not use two hands and they get frustrated because the blocks aren't sticking together.  Bilateral coordination is important for so many things, including handwriting, cutting and other academic activities.  It's important to find motivating ways to work on this skill, and this car set is proving to be very motivating!
Improve Visual Motor/Perceptual Skills-as I mentioned earlier in this post, the set comes with a poster with pictures of all the different cars and trucks that you use as a reference when building with the blocks.  This is great for kids to work on improving their visual skills, such as visual tracking and visual perceptual skills.  Kids have to be able to look through and scan the big pile of blocks to find what they need to build the car or truck of their choice.  Once they have all their pieces gathered, they need to be able to be able to look at the diagram and figure out what pieces go where.  It can be tricky sometimes because some of the pieces look really similar so I have the kids double check their pieces before they begin building.
Improve Executive Functioning Skills-there are so many executive functioning skills that can be worked on when building with this Duplo set.  First of all, being able to follow the directions and maintain their attention is very important in order for children to be successful when building their cars and trucks.  They also need to be able to sort and organize their blocks before building.  Sometimes kids can frustrated when things aren't easy and give up easily.  Being able to ask for help instead of giving up and getting upset is a really important skill that can be worked on as well.  

Improve Social Skills-these cars are great for working on improving social skills with younger children.  I had a small group of 3 boys playing with them yesterday and it was fascinating to watch them work together to build cars and then play with them.  The great thing about this set is in addition to being able to build cars and trucks, you can build a gas station so you can expand play skills at the same time.  In my social skills group, I had the kids build a garage using Magna-Tiles which they thought was really fun.  Using the Creative Car set with a group of kids will help them work on sharing, compromise and working together to build something.  This can be a difficult thing for kids and is something that's important to work on so they can be socially successful in a classroom setting later on.

While I have only had this Creative Cars set for a few days, it has been a popular activity amongst all the kids on my caseload.  When I told one mom that her son had played with the Duplo blocks for almost 10 minutes, she didn't believe me.  "My kid doesn't play with Legos, Meghan." I think that the building of vehicles and then being able to play with them are highly motivating for the kids.  If you wanted to add another level of play to this, you could get this Road PlayTape and have the kids set up a course for their vehicles to drive along.  There are so many things that you can do with the vehicles once they are built.  As I mentioned earlier, you don't have to just make the vehicles that they have pictured on the poster.  Sometimes kids need to be able to think outside of the box and become more creative in their play.  Have them build vehicles and tell stories about them.  Have them give the vehicle a name, a magic trick it can do or a place they are going to go on some kind of magical adventure.  Being able to be imaginative and tell stories is a really difficult but important skill for kids, even preschoolers.

Whether you use these with an individual child or a group of children, there is so much that you can do with the Creative Car set by Duplo.  While they are having fun, you can be happy knowing that they are working on developing a ton of skills that will help them become stronger and more confident little people!

Be sure to check out your local toy stores (I found mine at Mary Arnold Toys on the Upper East Side of Manhattan) before going to Amazon or the other big box stores.

If you have any questions, I am only a click away and love hearing from you all!

Lego Friends-Legos for Girls!

I am not sure what has taken Lego so long to do this, but I love that they have finally introduced Lego sets for girls.  I have been keeping my fingers crossed for years that they would do something like this and what they have created is wonderful.  These sets are more appropriate for older girls (ages 5 and up) but there is absolutely no reason a parent can't work with a younger girl to help them put them together.  I know I am planning on picking up a set for both my 3 1/2 and 6 1/2 year old nieces for Easter this year.

I picked up a mini set and have begun using it in my therapy sessions and the girls are loving them!  They were excited to see something other than a Star Wars or Harry Potter Lego set in my closet.  The pieces are exactly the same as the traditional sets and the directions that come with each set are clear and very easy to follow.

Legos have always been a part of my therapy session.  There are so many occupational therapy goals that can be addressed using them and at the end, when the product is all completed, the look of pride on any child's face makes the work and time (and sometimes a pretty hefty price tag) totally worth it.  Here are some of the goals might be worked on when using Legos:
*increase grasp strength
*improve fine motor skills
*improve motor planning
*improve visual motor and visual perceptual skills
*improve attention and ability to follow multi-step directions

In addition to all those occupational therapy goals, Legos can be a great opportunity to work on social skill development.  This is a perfect activity for siblings or friends to do together.  You can work on turn taking, problem solving and conflict resolution.  It's also great for children who have difficulty with language; when I work with my children at work, I ask them to describe what pieces they are looking for, where they are going to put them, etc..

I am really excited to add to my collection of Friends Legos and hope that you all get as much excitement out of them as I know I will.  Take a look at this link to see all the wonderful products they have so far for the little girls in your life.  I am looking forward to this line growing and can't imagine it won't be anything but super popular.  Keep your eyes open in your local toy stores or hit up the big chains (FAO and Toys R Us carry the entire line and have really fun displays) to find these great sets.

http://friends.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx