In honor of occupational therapy month in April, OT Shannon Daly (second from left, with some of CTC’s Tacoma-based OTs) shares some insight into what she loves most about her work.
How did you decide to get into the field of pediatric occupational therapy?
“I have a sister who is 10 years younger than me. She was born premature and saw an occupational therapist for her sensory issues. I would go with my mom and sister to the appointments, and as soon as I saw the OT and what she did, I knew it was what I wanted to do. I found it just fascinating!”
Describe how you work with therapists from other disciplines to help a child.
Our work environment really lends itself to collaboration and CTC really encourages it. As an OT, I work with the other disciplines a lot – both PT and SLP. Right now, I’m running a social skills group with a speech-language pathologist. It’s a fun group of 12 year old boys. One of the projects we worked on recently was building a catapult for launching things. We’ve only used small balls in it so far, and only within the safety of the therapy room! The project has allowed the boys to work on executive function, planning, working together, and developing their social skills.
What do you love about working at CTC with children?
What I love most about working with kids is that occupational therapy looks like play. Kids don’t even know how hard they are working!
I’ve been with CTC nearly nine years. I really like that we are so family centered. We’ve grown a lot as an organization, and although we continue to grow, we still put families first. Families are at the core and center of everything we do. CTC also really values us as employees and individuals. I appreciate that.
If you were going to a deserted island and you could only bring one thing to use for therapy, what would you bring?
It would have to be some suspension equipment. Anything else could be recreated pretty easily on an island. We are well set up here in the center with it, and that’s the one thing I’d really miss. I can only spin around in circles so many times myself!