Well The Hairy Planet - the Hair Therapy for Kids Salon is running, and here's my thoughts so far on what's the secret to the sucess of the Hairy Planet programme:
When preparing children for any invasive proceedure, there are three important factors:
1) Preparation
2) Choice
3) Control
These 3 cover the basics of what is required to help cope with a stressful or fearful situation.
We have to remember at all times that fear of hair cuts 'Tonsurephobia' - be it a perceived fear of pain or not - is a very real fear. Tonsurephobia can have several influencing factors, including sensory dysfunction, imaginery perception of pain, and fear related to a stressful incident (possibly a bad home hair cut experience...)
The fear that many toddlers have of parents trimming their nails is a significant reference - we can relate this when we examine how young children with special needs have the ability to rationalise or distinguish pain and the fear of pain as easily as typically developing children. How children with special needs experience and express pain is an important factor. There are many children who are reported to have a high pain threshold i.e can run head first into a door and carry on about their business. But when faced with a hairbrush, will fly into a panic. Sound familiar??
As a trained Hospital Play Specialist, I used techniques to prepare children for sugery and other invasive proceedures, and the Hair Therapy programme has it's roots in the same theories and protocols.
The 'Hair Therapy' approach is both behavioural and cognitive - with a combination of preparation, choice and control learned at every step.
Here's one example: We use our 'Buzzy Bugs' game to: 1) Experience the sensation of the clippers 2) learn to control the clippers with the Stop, Wait and Go traffic lights.
Having control over the buzzy bugs is just one way how we teach the children to request verbally or using traffic light PECS how we control the clippers. Eventually, we introduce the small clippers to touch, hold and turn on and off using the same principles.
Making choices and learning about different sensation is vital - but we are also adding group dynamics into the mix.
The therapuetic value of groupwork in the Hairy Planet accounts for a great deal of its success. Whilst children attend, they are observing other children having hair cuts and learning to cope in the same way. There is no pressure, parents and children alike are relaxed, mums and dads can come and go when needed.
The children attending learn by observing others, playing out their fears and learning to cope with their difficulties in a child-friendly environment.
There is more about the Hair Therapy and videos here: The Hairy Planet
When preparing children for any invasive proceedure, there are three important factors:
1) Preparation
2) Choice
3) Control
 |
| Making Choices for Coping |
These 3 cover the basics of what is required to help cope with a stressful or fearful situation.
We have to remember at all times that fear of hair cuts 'Tonsurephobia' - be it a perceived fear of pain or not - is a very real fear. Tonsurephobia can have several influencing factors, including sensory dysfunction, imaginery perception of pain, and fear related to a stressful incident (possibly a bad home hair cut experience...)
The fear that many toddlers have of parents trimming their nails is a significant reference - we can relate this when we examine how young children with special needs have the ability to rationalise or distinguish pain and the fear of pain as easily as typically developing children. How children with special needs experience and express pain is an important factor. There are many children who are reported to have a high pain threshold i.e can run head first into a door and carry on about their business. But when faced with a hairbrush, will fly into a panic. Sound familiar??
As a trained Hospital Play Specialist, I used techniques to prepare children for sugery and other invasive proceedures, and the Hair Therapy programme has it's roots in the same theories and protocols.
The 'Hair Therapy' approach is both behavioural and cognitive - with a combination of preparation, choice and control learned at every step.
Here's one example: We use our 'Buzzy Bugs' game to: 1) Experience the sensation of the clippers 2) learn to control the clippers with the Stop, Wait and Go traffic lights.
Having control over the buzzy bugs is just one way how we teach the children to request verbally or using traffic light PECS how we control the clippers. Eventually, we introduce the small clippers to touch, hold and turn on and off using the same principles.
 |
| Learning Control and Desensitization |
Making choices and learning about different sensation is vital - but we are also adding group dynamics into the mix.
The therapuetic value of groupwork in the Hairy Planet accounts for a great deal of its success. Whilst children attend, they are observing other children having hair cuts and learning to cope in the same way. There is no pressure, parents and children alike are relaxed, mums and dads can come and go when needed.
The children attending learn by observing others, playing out their fears and learning to cope with their difficulties in a child-friendly environment.
There is more about the Hair Therapy and videos here: The Hairy Planet
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