The therapy that starts by getting on the floor

Most people picture therapy as a table, flashcards, and an adult steering. Floortime (part of the DIR model, developed by child psychiatrist Stanley Greenspan) flips that: you literally get down on the floor and follow your child's lead. If they're lining up cars, you don't redirect them to a "lesson" — you join the cars, then playfully add a bump, a beep, or a traffic jam. The child's own interest becomes the engine of learning.

The core unit is a circle of communication. A circle opens when your child does something with intent — reaches for a toy, glances at you, makes a sound. It closes when they respond back to your response, completing a back-and-forth loop. A single exchange might be: they hand you a block (open), you say "a block for me?" and offer one back (your turn), and they take it and grin (closed). Each closed circle is a rep in the muscle of connection.

The goal isn't to drill a specific skill but to grow the foundations underneath skills — shared attention, two-way engagement, and increasingly complex communication. Because it rides on what already delights your child, Floortime turns ordinary play into therapy you can do anytime, and it naturally builds the motivation that adult-directed drills can struggle to spark.