About Motor Planning
What is Motor Planning?
Motor planning or Praxis is a broad term that involves a child’s ability to conceptualize, organize, sequence and direct familiar and unfamiliar movement in a coordinated manner. To fulfill life’s roles, a child must be able to plan and execute motor skills in an efficient, refined, and controlled manner.
First, your child must understand the Idea of the task. Then, using body and spatial awareness, the child comes up with a plan or plan(s) how to execute the task. To jump, for example, the body needs to stabilize, then knees bend, followed by push off at the feet, and then another bend and stabilization upon landing. The child needs to sequence these features of the jump, including using the appropriate timing and force. Finally, the planned movements accomplish the goal!
The child learns to anticipate the different ways of jumping in various situations (generalizing) and realizes what conditions in the environment (internal sensory environment and external conditions) are relevant or not relevant.
Motor Planning includes comprehending the idea of the goal, translation of the idea to an action sequence, and the execution of movement. There are many neural processes that underlie the establishment or intent of an action goal. These processes include attention, motivation, cognition, and the emotional aspects of motor control.
Goal directed behavior emerges from a complex interaction of sensory systems, musculoskeletal systems, comparing systems, and environmental adaptation.
What is Postural Control?
Postural control involves the regulation of the body’s position in space for the dual purposes of stability and orientation in space.
Postural control involves interactions between the sensorimotor systems, muscle synergies (what muscles we recruit for a specific task or action, and temporal (timing) order of the muscle contraction), strength, and anticipatory and adaptive capabilities.
Limb strength, Core strength, Symmetry, Vision, Muscle tone, and Biomechanical alignment can impact postural control.
The overarching goal is for your child to begin to solve and structure motor problems in a variety of contexts ensuring all contributing systems are addressed.