Education Station Helping at Home Things to do at Home: Play with Food!

Groceries in general: Include a variety of textures in your child's diet. Examples: yogurt with granola or sprinkles, thick pretzel sticks, carrot and celery sticks, ice cream and frozen fruit pops. Use straws often. Look for thick ones (available with sports bottles) and curly ones. Thicker liquids, like milkshakes and watered-down yogurt, are good for helping to strengthen the sucking reflex. Lollipops encourage oral motor skills! Tootsie Pops and Charms Pops work better than thinner ones that are too quickly bitten and chewed up (we're aiming for getting and keeping their mouths moving!) Kids like chewy foods, like granola bars or Rice Krispies Treats, and these foods are also good for oral awareness. Peanut butter, icing, whipped cream, or honey has "sticking power". Use them to put on the upper lip, lower lip, roof of mouth, behind the teeth, and at the sides of the mouth.

Move marshmallows around: Put them between the bottom teeth and bottom lip. Have your child close his/her mouth and move the marshmallows around with his/her tongue.

Use cookies or something else with "crunch" to practice "loud, noisy open-mouth chewing." Then contrast that with "closed-mouth chewing". Exaggerate the motion as you model the chewing yourself. See who can chew with their mouth closed the longest. Switch back and forth between open-mouth and closed-mouth, giving longer periods of time to closed-mouth chewing.

Have candlelit dinners. Let your child blow out the candles. Try candles that re-light themselves automatically. (This exercise requires very close adult supervision.)

Sucking thick liquids through a straw strengthens the diaphragm and other muscles used in speech production; try applesauce, shakes, and diluted yogurt.

Sour, squishy, chewy, crunchy, here are more foods to for the grocery list: caramel, cran juices, orange wedges, Jell-O cubes, juice bars, juice smoothies, lemonade, lemon drops, Lick-um-ade, puddings, apples, bubble gum, carrot sticks, Cheerios, chips, corn curls, dried fruit, French fries, fruit roll-ups, graham crackers, Gummi Bears, Gummi Worms, licorice sticks, pickles, popcorn, raisins, Sweet Tarts, toast, Red Hots, sour gumballs, sour straws. (More foods suggested in More Integrating the Mouth by Patty Oetter (& others), available through New Visions)

Fun for motor planning, try the following edible doughs:

Mashed Potato Candy Dough
1 box powdered sugar
1 pkg. coconut (optional)
2 T. mashed potatoes
2 T. melted margarine
a few drops milk
Combine ingredients, adding more powdered sugar as needed to achieve desired consistency.

PB Playdough
1 C. peanut butter
1 C. corn syrup
3 T. brown sugar
1 1/2 C. powdered sugar
1 T. raw oatmeal
1 1/2 C. powdered milk
Mix, adding more sugar or dry milk until kneadable. Add oatmeal or Rice Krispies for texture.

Frosting Dough
1 can frosting
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 C. peanut butter (optional)

Cinnamon Applesauce Dough
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 C. applesauce
enough flour to get desired consistency

Peanut Butter Clay
2 C. peanut butter
1 C. honey
3 C. instant dry milk
Mix peanut butter and honey, adding milk a little at a time until dough is stiff.

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