The aspiration of BIG FUN Therapy and Recreational Services is to use the gymnastics and pool environments as a tool to increase children’s potential to function at higher levels in their everyday lives. BIG FUN created a cutting edge method, which addresses sensory processing, motor planning, and organizational behavior as the means through which special needs children can feel competent and develop a sense of self-esteem and achievement.
BIG FUN’s therapy services take traditional clinic-based occupational therapy and transform them it into a fun, dynamic, and invaluable experience for special needs children. BIG FUN licensed therapists bring their extensive training and science-based evaluative knowledge to the gymnastics environment and endeavor to determine the causes for why the child’s body functions how it does and how to employ the BIG FUN method to address specific weaknesses. They are able to write detailed evaluations and set goals to help their children implement the range of motion, stability, and strength they acquire in the gym into their daily lives.
BIG FUN’s recreational programs are geared towards helping special needs children excel in athletic activities while introducing the social element of peer contact, both with other special needs children and with typical children in the environment. BIG FUN recreational instructors specialize in athletic performance and movement and bring a variety of athletic and creative resources to the gym or pool, which enhance their training in the BIG FUN method. Through their skill and passion, they help their students take their learning to the playground and beyond.
GYMNASTICS
BIG FUN’s goal is to give each child the opportunity to experience what all children are entitled to: an active life that is filled with excitement, self-confidence, discovery, and fun. The over-arching goal of BIG FUN Recreational Programs is to promote the integration of children with disabilities into all aspects of life – family, school, and community – through recreational activities. Coaches build personal, nurturing bonds with their students, which allow the children to excel far beyond their limits. Sessions at BIG FUN empower children to maintain the strength and endurance demands of peer play when at a playground. The BIG FUN sensory diet teaches self-regulation and modulation of behaviors which, in turn, helps children be more alert and organized at school and relaxed at restaurants, the shopping mall, and family outings and gatherings.
The BIG FUN approach facilitates sensory play through:
• Climbing
• Tumbling/rolling
• Obstacle course
• Trampoline
• Balance beam • Developing upper extremity strength
• Increasing knowledge of location in space
• Problem solving and creativity
• Developing lower extremity strength
• Coordination, balance, and focus
This approach provides the structure necessary for all children to excel in gymnastics: waiting, taking turns, sharing equipment, and maintaining appropriate behavior.
SOCIAL SKILLS
The group recreational setting allows for natural peer interactions. The logistics of working together in a gymnastics setting requires that the children take turns and practice awareness of their surroundings. In this natural group experience, children cheer for each other, praise each other for their accomplishments and assist each other when needed. Participants learn key elements of working together as a team, such as collaboration, sportsmanship and concern for their team mates. Classes meet weekly for one hour sessions per week for 12 weeks. Ages 3-17 welcome. Placement is based on initial evaluation and current class schedule.
The goal for every child in the BIG FUN Social Skills Program is to: show increased awareness and concern for peers, demonstrate improved ability to follow rules of conduct in a social setting, demonstrate increased social flexibility, and show empathy for peers.
PARENT AND ME
VENDOR #: PW5768
BIG FUN believes that each child, regardless of age or degree of disability, should have someone he or she values to witness their accomplishments as well as someone to participate with them. Including the parent or caregiver in the child’s gym and movement activities gives added dimension to the child’s potential with the relationship between her/him and the parent/caregiver. This class encourages interaction between the child and his/her caregiver using the gym environment as a “rehearsal model”, emulating open community environments. Class includes: adventure movement, songs, obstacle courses that explore the environment and equipment, games, rotations on selected equipment, “how to” strategies for the caregivers to be used at home, parks, schools, community settings. The class is open to students with special needs between the ages of 2-17, and all levels of function. Families can request this class through their regional center.
ART AND MUSIC
Our group art class allows children to participate in song, playing instruments, dance, as well as painting and modeling. The 2 hour session is held in Culver City with Owner/Director Gene Hurwin. Class objectives: For each student to complete structured tasks, access coordinated fine motor and visual/perceptual skills, create multi-sequential art projects, develop problem-solving skills, participate in memory exercises, take initiative in a group setting, and have fun!
AQUATICS
The swim program is designed to give all students the opportunity to explore an exciting new world in the water, where they learn to feel comfortable and safe. Children with no swimming experience begin with a two-week water adjustment phase during which they slowly and safely begin to appreciate and enjoy water. Children with prior swimming experience receive advanced instruction in technique, which improves cardiovascular and muscular strength and endurance.
THERAPY
BIG FUN’s therapy department is made up of registered and licensed occupational therapists. Their knowledge about the biomechanical, communicational, social-emotional, sensory, and cognitive components allows them to address these elements and their effects on children in their daily lives. BIG FUN Therapy, created by Gene Hurwin, MA, OTR/L, is a unique program which combines therapy, social and peer interaction, sensory integration, and gymnastics progressions.
Therapists working with children face the challenge of engaging them in therapeutic activities while maintaining their interest and making their sessions fun. Mr. Hurwin constructed his program around the concept that children are meant to PLAY. They are not concerned with what might be best for their future, but instead with what is fun and important to them at that very moment. Many children have been in therapy since infancy. They recognize the sterile environment of a clinic and can sense when a therapist is requiring that they "work" instead of "play."
The gymnastics environment provides an abundance of therapeutic activities to increase strength, ROM, balance and improve sensory processing, motor planning, and organizational behavior. Many times the children do not even realize how much their bodies are benefiting from their favorite activity, which is often the trampoline. The sensory experiences that are available in the gym prepare the body and its nervous system to learn. The children can then utilize their newly acquired gymnastics skills and modify them to accomplish functional goals. A full workout with therapeutic effects can be accomplished in the gym through fun, laughing, and activities that BIG FUN kids are not aware are actually therapy.
OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY
BIG FUN occupational therapists use clinical reasoning during the evaluation and treatment planning process. A battery of standardized assessments and clinical observations is used to assist in determining each child’s initial level of functioning in the areas of gross-motor, fine-motor, sensory processing, and organizational behavior.
These observations as well as the therapists’ practical and technical knowledge of typical development and movement allow them to create a unique treatment plan for each child. The treatments are child-directed and play-based, integrating constant negotiations and adjustments of levels of difficulty and expectations to maintain the “just-right challenge.” This occurs when a child is not only internally motivated and engaged in an achievable activity, but also is challenged enough to create new and appropriate adaptive responses. As the child masters this activity, he or she feels successful and is able to function at a higher level in home, educational, social, and emotional contexts.
BIG FUN Therapy Services operates in professional gymnastics training facilities filled with typical gymnastics classes, competitive teams, and other recreational activities. By modeling the behavior and movement patterns of the gymnasts who surround them, BIG FUN children are able to increase their potential through organizing their behavior and movement. The traditional and non-traditional therapeutic equipment in our gymnastics centers allow the therapists to bring their full spectrum of creativity and intensity into each session, providing the children with the sensory experiences their nervous systems are craving.
BIG FUN Therapy is recommended for children:
• On the Autistic Spectrum
• Cerebral Palsy, all forms
• Mental Retardation
• Down’s Syndrome
• Sensory Integration Issues
• Apraxia/Dyskinesia
• Visual/Perceptual Issues
• Strength/Endurance Issues
• Rett Syndrome
• Fragile X Syndrome
• Deaf-Blind
• Traumatic Brain Injury
• Behavioral Issues
• Social/Communication Issues
• Attention Deficit Disorder
• Attention Hyper-Activity Disorder
• Seizure Disorders
• Multiple Diagnoses
• Amputation(s)
• Spina Bifida
• Muscular Dystrophy
• Multiple Sclerosis
• Angelman’s Syndrome
• Spinal Cord Injury
• Cognition Disorders
• Bipolar Disorder
• Fine Motor Issues
