Helping a mixed dominant kid in physical activities?

[Dmmetler]

My DD's gymnastics coach (the one who was also in a graduate OT program) mentioned that my DD was mixed dominant-that she's right handed, but left eyed/footed. Her current tumbling coach adapts to that-and has mentioned that if she practices at home I should make sure she uses her left side as her "strong side" and her right as her "weak side" for that reason. Her ballet teacher has made similar statements

 

Her Tap/Jazz teacher, though, is constantly complaining about DD not knowing her left from her right, that DD has to glance at her hands to figure out which foot to start on, that she does things "backwards" and so on-and that she doesn't understand it because DD isn't left handed.

I'm really thinking that DD needs a different program (or to simply focus on tumbling, since her gym seems so much better at adapting to her needs and trying to support her), but DD's been dancing with this same little knot of girls since she was a preschooler, and they're her primary social contacts-when I suggested dropping the dance class she freaked out at "It'll be like leaving school-I'll NEVER see my friends again!"-and since her PS friendships didn't last more than a couple of months after the new school year started without her there (and it wasn't due to lack of trying on my part), I can understand her fears.

 

But, until she's ready to quit, is there any good way of supporting her in this in ways that will be largely invisible to the teacher?

[Elizabeth in MN]

Tell the dance teacher that she's a lefty when it comes to dance. It's very common to be a writer with the right hand and a player with the left.

[herekittykitty]

Could you do something subtle but different to one of her dance shoes? Like tie one strap a different way or put a teeny mark on the top of one? Then she would know that one was always the left (or right depending on what you chose).

 

My son is also mixed dominant. He is left eye dominant and right handed. He was really late to choose a dominant hand and also gets his lefts and rights mixed up sometimes. FWIW, I think it's really rude of the teacher to give her a hard time about this. It's not like she's intentionally misbehaving or something. Any chance you could educate her about this issue so she'd lay off?

 

Also I will add that my son's mixing up left/right seemed to get better when we did brain integration exercises. We do a koosh ball exercise as part of the Davis dyslexia program, but there are others by Diane Craft, Brain Gym, etc.

[PeterPan]

You've got several different issues there. You can have mixed dominances and have it be something a therapist just leaves alone. For instance our VT place was FINE with left eye, right hand, etc. etc. They checked for it and were cool with mixed, just not indeterminate. Tiger Woods is mixed, so it can work out FINE. Tell the idiots to shut up. Thank them for their concern and pass some bean dip.

 

Now for the left/right thing, before we started VT, we had been doing a little bit for bilaterality issues (cross-crawling, cross-marching, that sort of thing), and it helped *some*. The VT place still found evidence of it, so they told us to get OT. The OT did funky things like putting her on a treadmill walking backwards and had her skip counting to every say right foot down while walking uphill backwards on this crazy thing. It was hard, lol! Anyways, that was one angle, the bilaterality thing, for which you can do OT. The 2nd angle of that was the actual left/right thing. For dd, I *think* it may have ironed out during VT. Before VT she absolutely had issues with it. There hasn't been any since. There were some activities in VT that forced them to do L/R answering with visual processing. That's also when she learned the order of the alphabet btw, but that's another story.

 

As far as coaches and teachers commenting on strong and weak sides, that's pretty normal. All the coaches we ice skated with were aware of it. The same task would require different amounts of practice to nail using your dominant side vs. non-dominant. So it's definitely significant once you hit sports; they're not just giving you a hard time.

 

As far as the dance class, if you can at all keep the pace with the loon teacher, I would. You're probably doing her some good you don't even realize yet.

 

In the meantime, I would consider an OT eval and get her eyes checked by a developmental optometrist.

[Tasia]

My mixed-dominant kid doesn't dance, but my oldest struggled with left and right until he was at least 8. For dance, I put a red mark on his right shoe and his right hand. Red means right. He found that easier than having to look the other kids.

[Dmmetler]

Oh, I don't mind the "strong vs weak side"-It bothers me that her dance teacher hasn't figured out what her gymnastics coaches figured out almost immediately-that her left side IS her strong side, and needs to be treated accordingly, even though she'll tell you she's right handed. She figured out her own cue for left/right in kindergarten-she has freckles on the back of only one hand, and has used it pretty reliably, and, I think, quite quickly. What her teacher complains about is that she has to LOOK at her hands to know what foot to start on (which, from my POV is "Big deal-once she learns the whole routine, she'll know what side to start on by memory and won't be thinking "left/right" at all). She has NO trouble coordinating which hand goes with which staff on piano, and, in fact, after one of these sessions, I asked her which foot would play the treble clef, and she had no hesitation in picking her right foot there-so I've asked her to try thinking of left/right as bass/treble, and see if that helps (whatever works, right?).

 

 

She's been evaluated for OT a couple of times, and every time comes out in the grey area where she would benefit, but won't qualify for services through the public school or more than a tiny number of visits for "evaluation purposes" through our insurance. I should try again, though-we have a different insurance company now, so maybe they'd cover more, or maybe she's finally "slipped" enough to qualify. She got a great deal of benefit from being part of an OT student's research project for 6 months, where she essentially got OT 2x/week, but unfortunately, our OT student has graduated now.

 

We have a good Optometry school here that trains students in Developmental optometry and VT, and will do the assessments, so that's something we can do fairly inexpensively even if it's not covered by insurance. She has no issues as far as reading and the like goes, and so far, has managed to pass regular vision checks, but I could see a lot of her difficulties with motor skills being due to vision.

Edited October 15, 2012 by dmmetler