Play Activities for Cerebral Palsy

All children, even those with disabilities, need to play because this activity helps them learn about and explore their world. While children with cerebral palsy may not engage in spontaneous play as often as other children, you can help them by making their toys easily accessible and accommodating them when they indicate they are interested in playing with them. According to child development specialist James L. Hymes Jr., "play for young children is not recreation activity, ... Play is thinking time ... language time, problem-solving time. It is memory time, planning time, investigating time, and organization-of-ideas time."

Very Young Children

• Children with cerebral palsy are no different from other children. Play is how they learn, and toys are the tools they use to do so. Infants and toddlers up to 2 years old enjoy playing with rattles and dangling toys. In addition, many like games that involve rocking, bouncing, tickling and making noises. Some have fun building things with blocks and then knocking them down, or making loud noises with spoons, pots and pans. Others like playing with tape and paper, not to mention sand and water. They also seem to like to play hide-and-seek with people behind curtains or with objects under towels, and don't forget picture books with sounds and textures to stimulate hearing and touch.

  For children in the 1- to 3-years age range, toys such as cars, trains, dolls and teddy bears are good choices. They also like to paint, and push and pull things, as well as play in boxes and tunnels. Another good activity is to have them make selections such as picking out a dog from pictures of various animals. Hiding toys or other objects in boxes or bags for your kids to find is really fun for them, too.

  Kids from 2 to 4 years old can help with chores or cooking. They also like matching shapes and colors, playing make-believe, making things with Playdoh, putting stickers on paper and building with boxes. Action games they enjoy include obstacle courses, Simon Says, making music and ball games. They also enjoy Legos, listening games and story books.

Exercise

• For older children with cerebral palsy, rough house play can encourage touch and movement, both of which are essential for their development. Just be careful not to scare the youngster so that she won't be discouraged from such play. Make sure you encourage your child to participate in as much physical activity as possible. Some good activities include: modified sports such as soccer, in which you use a wheelchair footrest or a racket to hit the ball, slalom wheelchair racing, baseball with a foam bat and the ball placed on a cone, and bowling with the bumpers up. Other good choices are horseback riding, swimming, dancing, tetherball, and track and field activities such as shot put and discus.

Other Recommendations

• For kids with limited coordination and mobility, you can modify games and toys to meet their ability levels. You also can use computers with touch-screens to assist children with cerebral palsy in playing a wide variety of games. Just remember that you don't have to buy expensive toys for kids to have fun. Sometimes the simplest household objects, including cardboard paper rolls, plastic cups and paper plates, can make great toys.

  Try to limit the number of toys kids play with at any given time so that they don't get distracted or over-stimulated, which can be counterproductive to the positive development of youngsters with cerebral palsy.