Spin boards are, as a rule, not very durable. This, combined with my desire NOT to hang a giant swing in my living room prompted my engineer father to redesign the spin board. He identified the problem with the floor ones instantly, saying “it’s the bearings; they’re terrible.” A week later, I had the object pictured above in my living room.
It has been such a HUGE blessing to us to have that board, that I decided to share the idea with the SPD community. What my father did, essentially, that is different, is that he used something he called a “trailer bearing” as the heart of the turning part of the board. This allows the board to spin EFFORTLESSLY (and, caution to all…very very very very very fast, so supervise like crazy if you decide to make one). My 100+ pound creature has not harmed it, not even a little, and we’ve used it since June of last year.
I was supposed to carpet it, but I bought a round throw rug and use that instead.
Here’s some close shots of the bearing and how he attached it. The first picture is the base of the bearing, the second is the hub, and the third is a general pic of the underside of the board. If anyone would like more information, email me, and I’ll see if I can pry some better details out of my father.
The link below is a VERY short YouTube video of the board in action. It’s from the very first time we “took it for a spin” without using it for OT, so mostly I let da Creature play with it a little. He’s a snidbit obnoxious if you leave the sound on, but you can see from the video (click on the link) that it is EASY to spin even a heavy child as fast or slow as his sensory needs dictate:
Comments
Claire
I love that spin board! It has made such a difference in doing Little Bro’s OT. Grandpa makes such wonderful things!
jhope
I don’t want to cause problems, but I do want to let the SPD community know that I recently learning from a sensory based OT of 20+ years that spinning can be incredibly disorganizing/disregulating to the brain. Allowing kids to spin on it’s own isn’t bad, but they shouldn’t spin more than 10 revolutions and then switch to the other direction. According to the OT, spinning can seem like it’s beneficial/enjoyable, but can cause them to be disregulated up to 8 hours after spinning! I know I used to let my daughter spin indefinitely too until I read this in one of her books. Just wanted to throw that out there…because as a parent of a child w/ SPD, I had NO idea how disorganizing spinning could be.
DaCreaturesMama
The game we use is pictured above…we call out a sequence of numbers, he spins clockwise for about ten-fifteen seconds, then he picks up the numbered bean bags. We do it again counter clockwise, then clockwise and we’re done!
Also, we watch for the tell-tale eye signs (eyes go back and forth fast) to know when we need to take a couple months off from spin.
I agree 100% that unregulated spinning can cause problems, and do not recommend spinning without close OT communication.
Good point! I forgot the proviso’s. I was mostly concerned with the mechanical issues involving the spin boards themselves.
Yormond
I love this idea. Must make one for my 4 year old…thank you.
Cari
This looks great. I work for a not-for-profit agency and therefore would love to find out where to get one of these hub things and more detail on how he made it. Thanks a bunch!!