Sensory rooms for children: types, classification, purpose, equipment for the room, application, indications and contraindications

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

For harmonious development, it is important for a child to receive a variety of emotions and sensations. Life in the modern urban environment is in many ways disconnected from nature and natural physical activity, so it is often necessary to look for additional opportunities to acquire the necessary motor and sensory experience. Sensory rooms for children can be one way to fill the lack of sensations.

Purpose

The sensory room is a special room designed to stimulate perception through the senses. It is often called a relaxation room, but its value is not limited to relaxation. Thanks to special equipment in the sensory room, an environment is created that helps a person to influence vision, hearing, smell, touch in the right way, which helps to find harmony with oneself and the outside world, teaches to turnpay attention to the work of your body and understand the shades of your sensations.

The importance of the sensory room for children lies in its developmental value. The fact is that sensory perception plays a particularly important role in the first years of life: children get acquainted with reality through the senses and this affects not only their physical and mental state, but also the formation of the brain. If the child does not receive the necessary sensations, this will negatively affect his development and in the future can lead to various problems. The sensory room can help the child gain the appropriate experience: here, while playing, he trains his vestibular apparatus and fine motor skills, discovers a variety of tactile sensations, sounds, colors and smells. This contributes not only to the normalization of the mental state and the improvement of the senses, but also to the manifestation of interest in the world around us and the development of abilities.

In the sensory room, children feel safe, so they can openly express themselves, experiment, create, try new things. There can be classes that develop thinking, imagination, social skills. Working with children in the sensory room takes place in the form of a game, the main thing here is to arouse the sincere interest and openness of the child.

Views

Sensory rooms are divided into two types: passive (dark), which relax and soothe, and active (light) - tonic and induce to action. This difference is achieved through the use of different stimuli. For example,the relaxation room is usually darkened, there is upholstered furniture that takes the shape of the body, soothing music sounds. Its purpose is the harmonization of the psychological state, recovery from stress, rest, relaxation.

Active sensory rooms, on the contrary, tone the child and energize him. There are active games and physical activities aimed at developing general and fine motor skills, sensory perception, as well as thinking, creative and social skills. These rooms are lit with daylight or bright electric light, intense sound and color effects can be used with interactive properties that change depending on the actions of the child, touch panels, a variety of textured surfaces and objects that attract attention and encourage action. Active sensory rooms for children may have sports elements (such as various exercise machines) for physical education and games.

It is quite difficult to combine calming and exciting elements in one sensory room at the same time, but it can be divided into different zones: passive and active.

Required equipment

Baby sensory room equipment depends on its purpose.

Furniture in a passive sensory room that takes the shape of the body, comfortable and safe, the floor and walls are often finished with something soft (mats, bedding). Massage aids can be used to promote relaxationmuscles: a variety of massage simulators and rollers. Much attention in the passive sensory room is given to lighting fixtures. Its soothing atmosphere is achieved through the use of soft but mesmerizing light sources: fiber optic fiber, air bubble columns, light fountains, projectors.

An active sensory room typically uses bright lights and energizing sounds. There may be a variety of simulators for training balance and muscle stimulation, sets for outdoor games. One of the most popular elements of a sensory room (both active and passive) is a pool filled with plastic balls. The game in it is accompanied by unusual sensations, similar to the feeling of weightlessness, and is a good training of the vestibular apparatus, movement coordination and fine motor skills. Also, specific devices are used in the active sensory room, for example, touch or light-sound interactive panels, screens for sand drawing.

Sensorial room equipment for children with disabilities should take into account their characteristics (for example, something may be technically inaccessible to a child in a wheelchair), but in general they are designed for everyone: for children and adults, for he althy or disabled.

Classification of sensory stimuli

An important feature of the sensory room is the simultaneous impact on different senses. Whereinit is possible to combine different directions of sensory stimulation in order to create a complete picture for a person, to teach him to link his feelings together, to pay attention to how they strengthen each other or, conversely, weaken. Let's briefly consider each of the directions.

Smell

The method that works with smells is called aromatherapy. In sensory rooms, essential oils are most often used (however, you can try using the plants themselves, for example, let your child smell the peel of an orange or an odorous and prickly pine branch - this will be both an olfactory and tactile sensation). Depending on the purpose, smells are divided into tonic (citrus, bergamot, rosemary, lemongrass, etc.) and relaxing (mint, incense, sage, lavender, etc.).

Vision

The directions that work with what we see are light therapy, or color therapy. Working with light is especially important during the dark season, when the lack of sun causes the so-called seasonal depressions. The brightness of light has a tonic effect on our state, and its absence lulls us to sleep. Also, to influence the psychological mood, you can use different colors. Warm (orange, red) - stimulate, and cold (blue, purple, green) - soothe. In addition, working with color can be a good diagnostic: favorite colors and color tests show the psychological state of a person, his unconscious feelings.

Rumor

The method that works with sounds and music is called sound therapy. Sound is a wave that not only affects the eardrums (that's why we hear), but also resonates with our internal organs; this is the basis of its therapeutic effect. Properly selected music can relieve pain, relax or, conversely, excite. In activities with children in the sensory room, you can use everything that sounds: various instruments, drums, bells, interactive sound panels. This therapy can also be active and passive, in the first case the child himself plays a musical instrument, or somehow creates different sounds, in the second he just listens.

Touch and vestibular apparatus

Different bodily practices work with movements and touches. Working with physical sensations is important not only for muscle training, but also for a harmonious psychological state and development. Sensory rooms are well suited for the development of proper physical activity in children, motor skills, touch, training of the vestibular apparatus. Here the child can freely experiment with his body: somersault, play in a dry pool, walk barefoot on different textures and so on.

Why do we need sensory stimulation?

Everyone can get one or another positive effect from working with their senses. Moreover, depending on the characteristics of a person, the result will be different: for example, classes in a sensory room help hyperactive children cope with excessive excitement, and a closed child can open up and learn to manifest in a safe environment.interest in the environment and other people. Therefore, more and more often sensory rooms, or their individual elements, are being installed in childcare facilities, shopping and entertainment centers, hospitals, boarding schools.

Indications for sensory stimulation may include psychological difficulties (eg, withdrawal, anxiety), disturbances in motor activity (muscle tension), problems with the senses. For children with disabilities, the sensory room will help to get those sensations that they are deprived of in their normal life. For example, for children with autism or cerebral palsy, sensory correction is a necessary part of treatment and rehabilitation. For children with disabilities, the sensory room is all the more important because there they receive a positive emotional charge that helps them fight illnesses and endure unpleasant medical procedures.

You should not visit the sensory room in the presence of infectious diseases, and you also need to take into account individual characteristics: for example, with neurological disorders, it is important to use light and sound effects with caution, because they can provoke an aggravation (for example, an epileptic seizure).