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Join the Conversation: Explore and Soar’s Parents and Caregivers Community!
Are you ready to join an empowering community? Explore and Soar is excited to join with parents and caregivers to launch our new Monthly FREE support group.
On the second Thursday of each month, take an hour or so to connect, unwind, and share with other parents. Conversations will be guided by your interests and needs. This is not an occupational therapy (OT) session; rather, it’s a space where parents and caregivers can support one another, regardless of whether their children are seeking or needing OT services.
This group is all about building your village within the local community! You are welcome to attend as many or as few of these gatherings as you like.
Click here or scan the QR Code to reserve your spot today!
Everyone is welcome!
July School Holidays 2025 Group Programs Wrap
Sensory Adventure Camp – Week 1
Our Sensory Adventure Group had a great time! We utilised a group plan created by our wonderful fourth year OT student. We were able to explore the natural environments of our community to find natural resources to create crafts. This time around we made a block of land, a teepee, a car, and a person to create a landscape filled with natural resources and utilised our creative minds to come up with a story to explain to our friends what was included within our landscape. Our group used their imagination, creativity, and fine motor skills to create their unique landscapes.
In between the creation of our projects, the group created some amazing friendships with their peers and worked together to complete tricky obstacle courses, including crawl across an air mattress, and supported each other in the locating and building of their projects. As a group we shared our resources and ideas to support our friends to excel. We had an awesome time in this group, building strong friendships, our connection to the environment, visual motor and fine and gross motor skills.
Can’t wait to see what we create next time!
– Sophie
Sensory Adventure Camp – Week 2
The older Sensory Adventure Camp brought together a wonderful group of boys who quickly found connection through creativity, movement and laughter. From the very first day, they jumped into nature-based exploration- collecting, building and crafting.
Each of the boys brought their own unique ideas to life, creating everything from their own worlds, tridents, Poké balls and Minecraft characters to thoughtful ornaments for family members and custom-designed cars. The group worked together to navigate obstacle courses and sensory challenges, encouraging each other to keep going, offering a hand when needed and celebrating every success along the way.
One of the week’s unexpected highlights was discovering a shared love for the game Stomple. The boys returned to it each session; laughing, playing, and creating their own little community around the game. Even the cold winter wind couldn’t dampen their energy.
It was a joy to see familiar friendships grow stronger and new ones begin. The group finished the week with a strong sense of connection and are already looking forward to what the next camp will bring.
The smiles, creativity and teamwork we saw each day truly made this group a special one.
– Maddie
Superhero Bootcamp
Our Superheroes had a blast at our bootcamp these school holidays. We started off the week learning how to utilise breath to increase our powers and core activation to set our bodies up for the week. On day two, our superheroes built upon their anti-gravity strength and vestibular processing to enhance movement against gravity and through space. As a team they created names and stories for the bad guys to enhance their superhero experiences. After mastering these two days, the group moved on to building their stability and balance, key skills of a superhero, where they smashed it. On day four, the group was well on their way to being official superheroes now focusing on postural strength and power, where we worked on our body coordination through gross motor movements. Finally, on Day five, our superheroes continued to work on their gross motor development to reach their goal of becoming an official superhero. Graduating from the group with their own medals and graduation certificate.
Throughout the group we built social connections and friendships that supported us on the journey to becoming a superhero, and made memories that will last. Our group loved engaging in board games at the end of sessions where we built upon our fine motor skills and social connections.
The hard work, smiles and laughter made the group a joy to be a part of and I sincerely look forward to working with the next generation of superheroes!
– Sophie
Build, Create, Master
Our Build, Create, Master group had to navigate how to communicate instructions and descriptions to their peers as they built various Lego models. Starting with some smaller builds, our group took turns at being the engineer, supplier and builder to create their masterpieces. We then took on builds with more steps, more pieces and more fun as we described sloping pieces, different shades of blue or pieces that looked like stairs to our peers to build our ‘Disney Train’ set and our ‘3 in 1 Magical Unicorn’.
We also had fun with free build time where the boys were able to create anything they wanted and foster some natural social interaction. Obstacle courses, scooter board relays and the air mat gave the boys lots of opportunities to move their bodies before and after sitting at the table building, while working on core strength, arm and shoulder strength which are all necessary for fine motor skill development in putting Lego together. The air mat was lots of fun and requested every session!
We can’t wait to see what the next build might be for these creative masters!
– Jess
The Write Stuff
Now that our Write Stuff group has successfully experienced six months in Kindergarten this year, what better way to further develop their handwriting and fine motor skills than with us?
We spent the week practicing our shapes, numbers and letters by creatively drawing people, houses and animals. But most importantly we were learning about correct letter placement and orientation, specifically with our Magic C letters such a c, o, a, d, g, q, and s. We played an array of different movements and fine motor games providing repetition, fun and interest in ensuring we started our letters in the correct place to help with our writing for the next six months! Our group loved sharing in the movement challenges with Keepy Uppy, air mattress balancing, nerf gun target and bowling challenges all in the name of handwriting!
What our Write Stuff group loved the most was sharing their stories and connecting with each other whilst eating their snacks. It was an absolute blast with our friends, we cannot wait to do it again next year!
– Jess
Newsletters
NEWSLETTERS December 2024 A NOTE FROM JESS It’s hard to believe that 2024 is already coming to a close! It has been a fast, busy, and dynamic end to the year. We’ve had the privilege of expanding our Explore and Soar OT family with new team members joining us in October, December 2024, and February 2025. We’re so excited to offer more support to our local families with therapists who live and work in our own communities. This has been a long time in the making, and we’re looking forward to all that 2025 will bring! As we wrap up this year’s theme of life transitions, we reflect on the many new experiences that…
Previous School Holiday Program Highlights!
Big School STARS – Week 1 January 2025
The wonderful Big School STARS had an exciting week filled with fun activities, meeting new friends, and preparing ourselves to start the transition to Kindergarten this year! Each day, we started with a different respiration challenge, followed by crashing into beanbags to set us up for a successful morning. Our STARS had a blast inventing animal walks and practising our pre-handwriting skills by creating drawings of ourselves, a house, and even a cheeky monkey sitting in a tree.
We loved making all kinds of crafts this week, including projects involving snakes, elephants, and rocket ships, to name just a few. We had so much fun keeping our creativity soaring. The boost in confidence, sharing ideas, and working together with new friends made the experience even more enjoyable. We cannot wait to start school in a couple of weeks!
Until Next Time, Jess
Build, Create, Master! – Week 1 January 2025
This week, our Build Create Master group took on an epic Lego challenge! We worked together as a team, practising the sharing of responsibilities across the roles of Engineer, Supplier, Builder, and Director. Throughout the week, we took turns in each role, focusing on developing our skills to create a range of Lego models, including a bird, digger, bus, whale, and many more. After each of our builds, we enjoyed some free play time to create our own designs.
This was when all our friends sprang to life with a whirlwind of fun and imagination. Friends collaborated, sharing ideas and constructing their own Lego masterpieces. We had everything from roaring dinosaurs to cozy houses, flashy cars, and sprawling farms. Overall, it was a fantastic week filled with laughter, creativity, and unforgettable teamwork!
Until Next Time, Jess
Sensory Adventure AM Group – Week 2 January 2025
Our morning Sensory Adventure group had a blast this week! As our very first sensory adventure group, it was nothing short of spectacular! We loved meeting new friends as we explored different places in our community.
Our Sensory Adventure challenges involved the exciting task of building boats and people from what nature has been able to give us! Searching for the perfect sticks, leaves, and feathers was so exciting. And can you believe our boats even floated?!
Our second challenge let us unleash our creativity even more! We crafted nature photo frames complete with pictures. Such imaginative minds in our group!
It was heartwarming to see our friends enthusiastically sharing ideas, materials, and creations. They also enjoyed sharing in team Uno games, racing on scooter boards, and navigating our dynamic air mattresses. It was a wonderful week filled with new friendships and inspiration from nature!
Until Next Time, Jess
Build, Create, Master! – Week 2 January 2025
This week, we continued our exciting LEGO challenges in our “Build, Create, Master!” group program! We worked together in the roles of Engineer, Supplier, and Builder to tackle various creative master builds! After practising our skills in these roles, we kicked off an exciting multi-day challenge to build a LEGO Disney train, making sure to swap roles along the way. This really helped us enhance our collaboration and communication skills.
Following our builds, we had the chance to unleash our imaginations during some individual free play with the LEGO. During this time, we joined forces to create a Disney house for the characters aboard the train, beautifully combining our projects. By the end of the week, we had not only mastered our roles but also built strong connections while improving our teamwork, communication, and fine motor skills.
We can’t wait to see everyone again as we build unforgettable memories while having a blast with LEGO!
Until Next Time, Sophie
Sensory Adventure PM Group – Week 2 January 2025
This week, we explored our outdoor environment in our afternoon Sensory Adventure group, to find natural materials for a range of art projects, including our own ‘leaf people.’ The creativity on display was amazing. Some of our friends took an extra creative approach, designing their pieces around their favourite characters, such as Steve from Minecraft, Kirby, and even a pigeon!
Our scavenger hunts transformed into epic missions as we gathered lots of sticks of all sizes to build our boats, photo frames, and cars. We tested our boats to see if they would sail, and yes, they did!
We have been working hard on our fine motor skills through activities like gathering sticks and leaves, string wrapping, looping, tying, drawing, cutting, and sticking. We also got our hearts racing with gross motor challenges in our obstacle courses, which involved jumping, crawling, squatting, throwing, playing bucking bronco on our air mattress, and scooter board races.
We played team games like UNO and Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza, making us laugh as we sharpened our executive skills and built stronger friendships. Our friends collaborated to share their strengths and support one another, tying the shoelaces of friends who needed a bit of help, offering uplifting words of encouragement for those facing challenges, and sharing resources to complete tasks together. Some even scratched their friends’ heads while their hands were busy stabilising their craft designs.
Amidst all the hard work, we had moments of free play, allowing our friends to initiate and build social connections with each other. By mid-week, our friends were starting their own interesting discussions on various topics and discovering shared interests. It was a wonderful week filled with creativity, teamwork, and blossoming friendships!
Until Next time, Brogan
The Write Stuff! – July 2024
Our 5-day school holiday program, “The Write Stuff!” was truly unique and enriching. We had the pleasure of spending time with familiar faces and new Explorer friends alike, focusing on refining our fine motor and social skills. This program provided a wonderful opportunity to review concepts from the January ‘Big School Stars!’ Group and venture into new learning experiences together. From dedicated writing practice to engaging in physical activities, we made sure that every moment was filled with excitement and energy. Seeing the incredible progress that some of our Explorers have made in their first six months at school was truly heartening and a testament to their hard work. We are eagerly looking forward to our next group sessions with enthusiasm and anticipation for further growth and development.
Game Changers – July 2024
Our “Game Changers” 5-day school holiday program has been an amazing week. Throughout the week, we’ve seen each and every Explorer work tirelessly to achieve their individual goals, and it has been an honour to be a part of their success. From delving into the realm of social thinking and strategising to enjoying friendly yet spirited competitions like Freeze and Hungry Hippos, not to mention taking on the obstacle courses, we’ve experienced a wide range of activities. Throughout it all, there have been moments of laughter, immense learning, and ultimately triumphant moments of victory. We are genuinely excited and eagerly anticipating the next adventure with these wonderful explorers!
Shake n Bake” – July 2024
We had a fantastic time celebrating Explore and Soar’s (EAS) 6th birthday in July. To commemorate this special occasion, our group of “Shake n Bake” Explorers, who participated in our 5-day school holiday program, came together to create a birthday cake that will be remembered for years to come. The kitchen was abuzz with enthusiastic teamwork, lively negotiations, and flexible thinking, all punctuated by sounds of laughter, creating an atmosphere of fun and excitement every day. It was heartwarming to witness our friends sharing positive food experiences and engaging in conversations, thereby honing their social skills. Here’s to many more years of nurturing teamwork and fostering creativity as we continue to explore and soar together!
