The make-believe and games as an intervention strategy for an infant with delay in child development

Introduction: Playing is an important activity for the child development because it enables concept acquisition, assimilation of social roles and the understanding of affective relationships. Objective: The use of playing to stimulate the global development. Method: As a participant, there was a four-year-old child, female, without a concluded diagnosis, with global developmental delay, mainly on gestural and oral language performance, whose behavior is characterized by the poor performance on exploration and manipulation of toys and objects. The study included the child development evaluations by the use of a specific tool – Operationalized Portage Inventory, before (pre-test) and after the intervention (post-test), planned with the offer of games and symbolic and imitation plays, Activities of Daily Living training and guidelines for the child’s mother. It was held 10 sessions of individualized care. Results: The increase of behaviors in all areas, especially in self-care and in games performance and imitation. Conclusion: It follows that a systematic plan, with the Activities of Daily Living training followed by playful and symbolic play can be an action strategy of Occupational Therapy for children with similar characteristics to those presented