Improving Developmental Skills and Posture in Children Diagnosed with Hypotonia Through Sensory Based Motor Learning Strategies, Reflex Integration and Core Stability Exercises

Course Description

This introductory course will provide research on common developmental skills deficits and problems in children diagnosed with hypotonia due to various diagnoses. It will focus on how to assess postural deficits related to muscle tone in common developmental areas including rolling, crawling, sitting, standing and walking. This course will instruct therapists in how to assess muscle tone quality, including low tone and mixed muscle tone and will focus on the postural assessment of the child and how to determine if primitive reflexes are present. It will provide research based treatment strategies and specific interventions to improve muscle tone, postural control and core stability.

Course Objectives

At the end of this course, the participant will be able to:

• Define and describe hypotonia as it effects posture, core stability and motor control.
• Describe how hypotonia in infants affects developmental skills.
• Explain how sensory processing is affected in children with hypotonia.
• Identify the presence of primitive reflexes in various postural positions.
• Explain why improving muscle tone and postural control will improve skills in motor and cognitive areas.
• Explain how sensory based experiences can improve motor control, posture and skills in children diagnosed with hypotonia.
• Choose exercises that can be used to improve muscle tone, postural control, and developmental skills in order to enhance participation in ADLs

• Prerequisites

  None

• Educational Level

  Basic

• Other

  Satisfactory completion of this course will require the participant to complete a 10 question post-test with a minimum passing score of 70%.