How Are Communication and Motor Skills Related?

Communication and motor skills might seem like different developmental areas, but they are actually deeply intertwined. In fact, motor skills can have a profound impact on communication, especially for children with developmental challenges such as autism, dyspraxia, apraxia and childhood apraxia of speech.

What Is Praxis?

Praxis refers to the process by which thoughts become actions, requiring a complex neurological coordination between brain and body. Praxis can be broken down into several steps: having an idea, planning, sequencing, organizing, initiating, and executing the movement. For children with whole-body apraxia, the hardest part often lies in the initiation of movement. This disconnect can make it seem like a child doesn’t understand or is unwilling to perform a task when, in reality, their brain-body connection is disrupted, making it difficult to initiate voluntary movement.

Praxis affects daily life and communication, and it is therefore essential for children with these challenges to “practice” movement to make it automatic. It’s not just about making a single movement but about establishing a motor pattern that eventually becomes second nature. This understanding reframes behaviors that might seem willful or inattentive, showing them instead as a consequence of motor-planning challenges.

As an example of this concept, in a previous webinar of ours, guest Julie Sando, a teacher of online communication-based courses for children with autism, gave an example of a child who had learned to communicate through Spelling to Communicate (S2C). This child spelled out that he wished to visit a rock-climbing gym, yet when he got to the gym, he verbally said, “No, I don’t want to go!” Again, he spelled out that he in fact did want to go, even though he was saying that he didn’t. This mismatch is confusing to those who don’t understand how the child’s fine-motor skills of speech had not yet caught up with his ability to communicate through Spellling to Communicate.

Speech and Communication Are Fine-Motor Skills

Speech itself is a motor function, specifically a fine-motor skill. Communication isn’t only about understanding language; it also involves the physical ability to produce sounds or gestures. Many assume that if a child cannot speak, they may lack understanding. However, for many children, their inability to produce speech is more about motor control than it is about cognitive understanding.

Communication relies on finely tuned motor skills to articulate words. Dana Johnson PhD OTR/L is a co-founder of the Spellers Method™, which is a communication approach that coaches children in the motor skills needed to navigate communication boards with letters and numbers on them through which they learn to spell out words. By teaching children with childhood apraxia of speech to point accurately and consistently, these children are building their ability to communicate more effectively.

How Motor Skills and Motor Coaching Can Help Your Child Communicate

Dr. Johnson and others who use the Spellers Method™ recognize that building gross-motor skills and planning (praxis) enables a child to better communicate. She and other Spellers offer motor coaching that breaks down tasks into manageable steps. Through action and body-part commands (“lift your foot,” “get your eyes on the chair”), children can be guided through complex tasks they might otherwise struggle to execute. This method is effective for various neuromotor disabilities, including autism, cerebral palsy, and Down syndrome.

In her Parent Track talk at our 2024 Documenting Hope Conference, Dr. Johnson provided a poignant example involving a young boy named Elliot. Initially, Elliot struggled to follow a simple instruction to take out his lunch and place it on the table. However, with directive motor coaching, he was able to complete the task. This example underscores how breaking tasks into smaller steps and using specific motor prompts can help children with movement-initiation difficulties bridge the gap between understanding and action.

How “Heavy Work” Can Help Your Child Communicate

It’s worth noting that “heavy work” can play a significant role in enhancing motor skills, which in turn aids communication. “Heavy work” is occupational-therapist speak for using large muscle groups that provide intense sensory feedback for the proprioceptive (body awareness) sense. Because muscle is a sensory organ, resistance training and “heavy work” can be very calming and regulating for a child with a dysregulated nervous system and/or Sensory Processing Disorder, which most children with autism have. Heavy work for small children can look like pushing, pulling or carrying weighty objects (think laundry baskets or sturdy bags filled with books or cans), while older children might be able to use free weights, weight machines or resistance bands as well.

Strength-training exercises aimed at improving muscle control and endurance can have a spillover effect on gross-motor and fine-motor tasks, including those involved in communication. Building core and peripheral strength can help children maintain better control over their movements, making it easier for them to achieve the precision needed for tasks like pointing, typing, or even speaking. Improved motor control also positively affects a child’s ability to handle sensory information, making it easier for them to focus on communication tasks without becoming overwhelmed by their surroundings.

Why Metabolic Health Is Important for Building Motor Skills and Communication

Metabolic health is another key area on which to focus for building communication skills. Muscle uses glucose for power and is highly sensitive to insulin. In fact, Jesse Inchauspe’, the “Glucose Goddess”, writes that muscles are a “sink” for glucose, meaning that using large muscle groups with resistance training and heavy work is a great way to use up excess glucose that can be contributing to blood-sugar imbalances that are often behind symptoms of neurological symptoms and conditions, including autism, ADHD and anxiety. This newer field of exploring the link between metabolic imbalances and psychiatric conditions is known as metabolic psychiatary, and there is a lot of peer-reviewed medical research backing this up.

You can learn more here about optimizing blood sugar, but some of the basics are to remove processed carbohydrates from the diet and to eat fat, fiber and protein with every meal and snack. Proper nutrition, regular physical activity, and good sleep hygiene are all significant contributors to overall motor function. High stress levels and poor metabolic health can negatively impact a child’s motor skills and, by extension, their ability to communicate. Regular physical activity not only enhances muscle tone and coordination but also helps regulate stress hormones such as cortisol, which is often elevated in children with developmental disorders.

Conclusion

Communication is deeply rooted in motor skills. Whether it’s praxis explaining how thoughts are translated into movements, the role of fine motor skills in speech, or practical steps to enhance communication through motor coaching, it’s clear that understanding and supporting motor development is important for enhancing communication in children with developmental challenges. By incorporating motor-coaching techniques, boosting metabolic health, and potentially introducing resistance training, parents and caregivers can equip their children with the tools they need to express themselves more effectively. Understanding these connections transforms how we see and support children with movement and communication disorders, leading to more successful and fulfilling interactions.

About Maria Rickert Hong CHHC

Prior to working on Wall Street, she was a marketing specialist for Halliburton in New Orleans, where she also received her MBA in Finance & Strategy from Tulane University.

She is the author of the bestselling book Almost Autism: Recovering Children from Sensory Processing Disorder and the co-author of Brain Under Attack: A Resource for Parents and Caregivers of Children with PANS, PANDAS, and Autoimmune Encephalitis. She is a co-author of Reversal of Autism Symptoms among Dizygotic Twins through a Personalized Lifestyle and Environmental Modification Approach: A Case Report and Review of the Literature, J. Pers. Med. 2024, 14(6), 641.

Maria is also a Certified Holistic Health Counselor. Her work can be found on DocumentingHope.com, Healing.DocumentingHope.com, Conference.DocumentingHope.com and MariaRickertHong.com

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