CanDo ® Donut Balls are a customer favorite at eSpecialNeeds.com. The unique donut shape of these therapy balls offers the same benefits as spherical exercise balls but with more stability.
Edited video transcript:
This is the CanDo exercise ball. It's more of a doughnut shape and it has a little hole here so it gives it a little bit more stability. This is not a complete sphere so kids that have some gravitational and insecurity from a sensory standpoint don't like their feet being up off the ground. This gives them a lower stand point to where they may be able to load their feet a little bit better and keep those feet on the ground for stability.
So things that we can do on this CanDo donut ball include working on the core and trunk rotation. This ball gives some dynamic surface free to kind of facilitate that a little bit. So any gentle rocking side to side and gentle bouncing you can do on here. Just to create an activity out of it you can place objects on both sides to work on some rotation. Maybe starting with one hand to get an object. You can work on transferring it by giving it to the other hand and then placing it on the surface. You can also work on crossing this line for some of those coordination skills so taking the opposite hand to reach across the body pull it out and then again back. That's kind of more crossing midline with some of those coordination skills.
You can go high to low, you can also go low to high. ..so I'm getting a full rotation to reach down then all the way back up. So that's just challenging my core a little bit because I'm moving my upper body while my lower body is staying still. If you want to make it more challenging and or if you're working on down up you can place something in front so we can reach down. This gives a little bit of resistance to to come back up. This is just kind of inverting the head a little bit. Some kids may have a difficult time with that and then coming back up to put in a bucket or something else at the top.
Note: be sure to consult with an occupational physical or physical therapist on the manner that you're using these CanDo donut exercise balls if you're unsure to make sure that they're safe for both you, your caregivers, and your child and that you're using them appropriately. Also be sure that there's not a point of overuse of the product.
