Dyspraxia

Dyspraxia falls under the DCD umbrella and affects both gross and fine motor co-ordination.  It is a condition where children have difficulty planning, organising and executing a movement or sequence of movements.  Motor co-ordination relies heavily on a sense of body awareness which is provided by the proprioceptive system. 

When a child has poor body awareness and ineffective feedback of their movements, they learn to rely on their cognition to plan movement responses.  This can make their motor responses appear slow, cause hesitation before they begin, they need a lot of repetition to master a skill and they find it hard to build on familiar skills or add 2 or 3 actions together.  Children work well when an action is automatic but they find it hard to do the same action when it is initiated by a verbal command. 

Dyspraxia impacts every area of motor co-ordination:  from learning to climb stairs, ride a bike, kick a ball, fasten buttons and write their name.  Dyspraxia can affect a child's oral motor functioning which impacts their speech development.