Bree ‘Scissorshand’

Bree is in love with a pair of special scissors of mine. She will sit for long periods of time snipping paper using these scissors. Bree’s coordination is still pretty clumsy and she is struggling to use basic scissors, including those that are made to fit small hands. In my ‘tool box’ is a pair of Bounce Back scissors that I bought years ago. Many young charges have used it with great success. This pair of Japanese scissors has a ‘lever’ that can be flicked upwards to act as a spring for self opening. The spring makes it easier for the child to maintain constant control of the cutting process. Once the child gets the hang of the movements required to operate a pair of scissors smoothly, he or she will no longer needs to use the spring feature. The spring feature can be deactivated by returning the ‘lever’ to its original position. I just love little gadgets like this that makes life easier.

Bree has access to a stack of used office paper. She enjoys cutting them up in no particular order for now. (The document shredding machine must be worried sick that it might be made redundant soon.) The only thing she is expected to do is to sit down on her chair for this activity. She is reminded to not run around with a pair of scissors in her hand even though this pair has rounded tips. As a result of regular practice in recent weeks, I now noticed an improvement in her posture as well. She is less tense than when she used to be riddled with frustration every few seconds. Soon I will be able to introduce her to a simple but purposeful cutting activity. I am hoping to invite her to cut out pictures of fruits from supermarket catalogues for pasting. She had pasted pictures onto paper after seeing me cutting them out from catalogues before. So, I am hoping that she will initiate this but if she doesn’t, I will. One day Bree will be ready to cut along printed lines (straight, zigzag or wavy) and I will print them out onto light card stock for her to practise. Stella used to enjoy doing this. Following the lines is trickier than just simply cutting around a desired object.