Thanks to your support of our Hacking for the Holidays campaign, we were able to deliver adapted toys to places like The Centre for Child Development (new window).
“The children’s eyes lit up when I gifted these switch toys to them over the 2024 holiday season. They were smiling from ear to ear while pressing the button to engage with the toys. You can also see how happy and appreciative the parents were for the switch toys,” says occupational therapist Kim Ta, pictured receiving the adapted toys.
Occupational therapists and speech therapists at The Centre for Child Development support children with developmental delay and physical disabilities. Many of the children they work have difficulties with speech and using their arms, and need to use switch-adapted toys to play.
“Play is fun, but through play, children learn many things – turn taking, how to interact with their environment, how to interact with other people. Both in therapy and at home, switch toys teach cause and effect skills,” shares occupational therapist Kathy Burton.
“These skills are essential for children to learn as they are fundamental for more advanced skills like driving a power wheelchair, using a computer or iPad, or using a voice output device.”
Thanks to toys they have received from the Hacking for the Holidays campaign, The Centre for Child Development has been able to give out toys and switches to families to use at home, something many families couldn’t afford otherwise.
“We have a limited amount of switch toys that we use in therapy, but don’t have enough to loan them to families. Having their own toys let them play at home and practice skills learned in therapy. Switch toys and switches are very expensive, most families are not able to afford to purchase them, so [they] go without,” Kathy explains.
“The children may have used switch toys in therapy, but likely this is the first one they have had at home, so they can use it to play with parents and siblings.”
This post originally appeared on the Makers Making Change (new window) website.