Abstract
Rhythm and movement improves self-regulatory skills and sensory processing abilities in preschool early intervention students, and a significant relationship exists between these areas of development. Methods can easily be taught, and kids love it!
Primary Author and Speaker: Chelsea A. Smith
Contributing Authors: Lalitchandra J. Shah
Rhythm, music, and movement was introduced to test improvement of self-regulation and sensory processing skills of preschool early intervention students, aged 3-6 years, in specialized education classrooms. A total of 15 children participated in pre- and post-testing with the Preschool Self-Regulation Assessment (PSRA) and Sensory Profile-2 School Companion (SP-2 SC) before and after 12 weekly sessions of RAMSR (Rhythm and Movement for Self-Regulation) embedded into the students’ typical classroom routine. In the PSRA, students showed significant improvement in assessor reported attentive impulse control and positive emotion subscales, both attention/planning subscales, two of three following adult directions subscales, and three of five impulse control subscales. Students showed significant improvement in all four quadrants of the SP-2 SC, auditory, visual, touch, movement, and behavioral subscales, and all four school factors. A few correlations between the tests’ factors were noted. Positive emotion subscale of the PSRA loosely correlated (p < 0.05) with the SP-2 SC behavioral and school factor 3 subscales. Toy wrap wait in the impulse control section of the PSRA loosely correlated (p < 0.05) with the sensitivity quadrant, auditory and movement subscales, and more strongly correlated (p < 0.01) with the registration quadrant and school factor 1 of the SP-2 SC. Tongue task in the impulse control section of the PSRA loosely correlated (p < 0.05) with the avoiding quadrant, behavioral subscale, and school factor 2, and more strongly correlated (p < 0.01) to the sensitivity quadrant and school factor 4. Significant movement in the expected directions was noted. This data contributes to the growing body of research supporting the use of music and movement to positively affect early childhood learning and places occupational therapists in a key position for education and training of teachers to widely affect the learning outcomes of students.
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