Fine Motor Skills Activities: Part 8

To repeat what I said during "Fine Motor Skills Activites: Part 1":

"I have been busy lately doing activities with my kids that are more learning-type activities and not as blog friendly as kids crafts. I wanted to do a series of post about fine motor skills though because that is something we have been focusing on at my house. My daughter started kindergarten this (last) year and I spent so much time before kindergarten making sure that she knew her letters, sounds, shapes, colors, starting basic reading and site words, etc that in retrospect I didn't probably spend as much time on fine motor activities like writing her name and scissors as I should have. She is a little behind in those categories so I searched the internet for a variety of activities I could do with her that would help her fine motor skills that were fun activities and not just practicing writing letters and scissor cutting (although we do that too). I thought maybe this might be helpful for someone else in my same position. I actually made a little fine motor activities bin that we work from and she just gets to pick activities from it and the best part is she gets excited about it and doesn't know she is 'working'. "

-Melty beads

-Metly beads template

-Paper to put over the melty beads that you iron on (ours came with our melty beads set)

-Iron

I knew this project was going to take some time and be just a bit harder for my daughter because of the fine motor skills required. (Just as an update, she is improving all the time, still is a bit weak in her fine motor skills, but all these activities and others have helped A LOT!)

I had bought some of these buffet trays from the dollar store to use for a couple different learning things we do, but they were also just perfect to use to pour our melty beads into to use more easily.

There is the great pincher grasp that I like to talk about being important for working on fine motor skills. See all those little pegs she had to put a bead on, that was a lot of pincher grasps. :)

What I loved was that it kept her interest until the very end of the project. It took her a full hour to place all those beads, but how great that she finished it and got all that fine motor in.

It looked too fun for me not to make one too, so here is mine.

Place paper protector over the beads. Iron (as directed).

 

Pull paper off and place on the opposite side and iron again.

They loved doing it. We had to make more a couple days later.

 

Our finished product!

Fine Motor Skills Activities Checklists

 

You might be sick of me talking about fine motor skills at this point, but I am sort of on a roll with it at our house. I am a serious "to do list", charts, grids, etc kind of person. I wanted a better way to track how often we were doing which fine motor activities, so I made a monthly check list. After I did my research online to find all kinds of ideas of fine motor activities that weren't the obvious writing and cutting, I made a two page checklist to use each month to make sure we were getting some variety in our activities and to track to make sure we were in fact working on my daughter's fine motor skills. I am proud to say that during our last parent teacher conference my daughter's teacher said her writing and cutting had greatly improved and she was showing noticeably less frustration over the last few months while doing those things. Success! :) Our journey will still continue though. Anyway, if this is helpful at all, here are the two

FINE MOTOR SKILLS ACTIVITY CHECKLISTS

 

I will continue to post about individual activities as well.

Fine Motor Skills Activities: Part 6

To repeat what I said during "Fine Motor Skills Activites: Part 1":

"I have been busy lately doing activities with my kids that are more learning-type activities and not as blog friendly as kids crafts. I wanted to do a series of post about fine motor skills though because that is something we have been focusing on at my house. My daughter started kindergarten this year and I spent so much time before kindergarten making sure that she knew her letters, sounds, shapes, colors, starting basic reading and site words, etc that in retrospect I didn't probably spend as much time on fine motor activities like writing her name and scissors as I should have. She is a little behind in those categories so I searched the internet for a variety of activities I could do with her that would help her fine motor skills that were fun activities and not just practicing writing letters and scissor cutting (although we do that too). I thought maybe this might be helpful for someone else in my same position. I actually made a little fine motor activities bin that we work from and she just gets to pick activities from it and the best part is she gets excited about it and doesn't know she is 'working'. "

Gazz-it! Play

 

Supplies:

-One container of Gazz-it!

I like to get a lot of my learning things for my kids from the dollar store by our house. I think ours is a "Dollar Tree", but I'm sure you could find good teaching things in whatever dollar store you have by your house.  During Christmas time I found this little gem, "Gazz-it!" there. Maybe I have just been in the dark, but I had never seen this before.  Maybe this is like moonsand or something, but I have never used that before either. Anyway, it looked fun.....and it was!!

I bought two different colors for my girls to use.  If you too have never seen this before, they are tiny Styrofoam balls that stick together and mold together like play dough.  As I mentioned before, play dough is fine-motor skill's best friend because it worked your hands and fingers in so many different ways. I figured this would be similar and also work those little hands in all those great ways that play dough does.  It was a little difficult to get out of the container because it is sticky, but all the better to work your fingers before you even start playing.

 

They smooshed it, torn it, flattened it, formed it, pinched it, shaped it, etc. It was a hit.

If you happen to come across this stuff and you want something to help your child's fine motor skills, I would highly recommend it, especially if you can buy it for a dollar like I did. I would share a link to buy it online, but I couldn't find it online anywhere, at least not under this name.  I'd be lying if I said that I didn't have fun playing with it just for my own entertainment too.

Fine Motor Skills Activites: Part 3

 

To repeat what I said during "Fine Motor Skills Activites: Part 1":

"I have been busy lately doing activities with my kids that are more learning-type activities and not as blog friendly as kids crafts. I wanted to do a series of post about fine motor skills though because that is something we have been focusing on at my house. My daughter started kindergarten this year and I spent so much time before kindergarten making sure that she knew her letters, sounds, shapes, colors, starting basic reading and site words, etc that in retrospect I didn't probably spend as much time on fine motor activities like writing her name and scissors as I should have. She is a little behind in those categories so I searched the internet for a variety of activities I could do with her that would help her fine motor skills that were fun activities and not just practicing writing letters and scissor cutting (although we do that too). I thought maybe this might be helpful for someone else in my same position. I actually made a little fine motor activities bin that we work from and she just gets to pick activities from it and the best part is she gets excited about it and doesn't know she is 'working'. "

 

Tennis Ball Walk

 Supplies:

-Tennis ball or small ball

Take a tennis ball in one hand and with only your fingertips walk the ball from your hip to your toes and then back  up again.

 When I read about this idea online it sounded like such a good idea to work those tri-pod fingers, but then when I actually tried it I thought, "Man, this is way too easy." Then after having done it for a minute I could feel my fingers working.

 The true test was when I had my daughter (who needs this fine-motor help) do this activity, the ball kept dropping. I realized then that it was doing exactly what it should be doing, making those fingers work. This is such a quick and easy one to do with your kids. I made it into a game and who ever could make it all the way from hip to toe and toe to hip without dropping it or using their other hand could earn a piece of candy. (Sorry, I am not above bribery.)

 She did it and we officially put the small ball and tennis ball into our fine motor bin to use later.

Fine Motor Skills Activities: Part 2

To repeat what I said during "Fine Motor Skills Activites: Part 1":

"I have been busy lately doing activities with my kids that are more learning-type activities and not as blog friendly as kids crafts. I wanted to do a series of post about fine motor skills though because that is something we have been focusing on at my house. My daughter started kindergarten this year and I spent so much time before kindergarten making sure that she knew her letters, sounds, shapes, colors, starting basic reading and site words, etc that in retrospect I didn't probably spend as much time on fine motor activities like writing her name and scissors as I should have. She is a little behind in those categories so I searched the internet for a variety of activities I could do with her that would help her fine motor skills that were fun activities and not just practicing writing letters and scissor cutting (although we do that too). I thought maybe this might be helpful for someone else in my same position. I actually made a little fine motor activities bin that we work from and she just gets to pick activities from it and the best part is she gets excited about it and doesn't know she is 'working'. "

For this activity, we did something sort of generic but it turned out to be a GREAT fine motor activity. I am a little slow at posting this since we did this before Christmas, but the same principle applies to any time of year. 

 Supplies:
-Cheap foam art kit that includes small stickers.

I actually bought these at the dollar store.I hadn't intended that putting little foam stickers on a foam tree/stocking/gingerbread man would be a fine motor activity, but it really was as they had to peel the back off of each of these little stickers.

 My daughter happened to use the tiniest pieces of stickers, which was great for her little fingers to have to focus so hard and use those tri-pod fingers (index, middle, and thumb) which are so important is doing any fine motor activity.

Fine Motor Skills Activities: Part 1

 I have been busy lately doing activities with my kids that are more learning-type activities and not as blog friendly as kids crafts. I wanted to do a series of post about fine motor skills though because that is something we have been focusing on at my house. My daughter started kindergarten this year and I spent so much time before kindergarten making sure that she knew her letters, sounds, shapes, colors, starting basic reading and site words, etc that in retrospect I didn't probably spend as much time on fine motor activities like writing her name and scissors as I should have. She is a little behind in those categories so I searched the internet for a variety of activities I could do with her that would help her fine motor skills that were fun activities and not just practicing writing letters and scissor cutting (although we do that too). I thought maybe this might be helpful for someone else in my same position. I actually made a little fine motor activities bin that we work from and she just gets to pick activities from it and the best part is she gets excited about it and doesn't know she is "working". 

Pom Pom Sorting

What you need:

-Close pins

-Assortment of colored pom poms

-Sorting cups

-Markers for labeling cups

 The key to this activity is making them use  the three finger grasp (thumb, index finger, and middle finger). Pinching the close pins open is awesome strength building in those fingers. It is work without them knowing it is work. I had my girls use the clothes pins to pick up pom poms and drop them in the cup that was labeled the correct color. My girls can't read all the color names, so the cups are written with a marker that is the same color as the word. (i.e. "Green" is written with a green marker)

 They LOVED it and sorted all the pom poms and asked to do it all over again.

You end up with cups full of pom poms of the correct color. So you are also working on sorting skills. I have been very pleased thus far with the progress of her fine motor skills in the last couple weeks we have started the fine motor activities bin. More ideas to come...

It's Okay

After talking with some friends about our children's abilities, some seemed shocked that my almost (and now) 4 year old could not write his name. None of it. Not one stitch. I graduated with a degree in Human Development and Family studies. I know every kid learns at their own pace. Some kids start walking at ten months and others are past the year and a half mark before they do. Fine motor skills are the same. Despite my gut instinct that he'd learn in time, I started to worry that my boy was developmentally delayed. If all his friends his age can write their names and draw pictures of faces and he can't, clearly something is amiss, right? Not necessarily.

I was worried enough that I spoke with my doctor and he recommended someone at the schools to assess my son.  It was determined that he was fine. In fact the occupational therapist I spoke with said that learning writing/drawing at a slower pace is actually good for kids.(This is why you shouldn't let what other moms say get to you!) It teaches them to slowly strengthen those muscles used for fine motor skills.She said that she that it is ok for them to not know how to write until they are in kindergarten. At that point they will have had time for their  little hands and fingers to develop more fully. So, if you are in the same boat as me what can be done? Well, the same thing that we as parents should be doing with all young kids (whether they can write or not) - let them be kids!

In my schooling and in talking with the occupational therapist, here are some simple suggestions - things you may be already doing. They are meant to be fun, but they all help work those fine motor skills and will assist them later on as they learn to write.

Artsy stuff: coloring with crayons (short broken ones, not long) or chalk on a vertical surface, sidewalk chalk, finger painting, regular painting, and ripping papers.

At the playground: swinging, climbing ladder, and holding on to the monkey bars. 

Other crafty type things: Stringing beads, lacing cards, playing with play dough, opening and closing lids on jars, sort marbles/pom poms/etc, sensory bins, pinching clothes pins (there are so many ideas like these on Montessori blogs!), and basic clothing closures (buttons, zippers, etc.)

For his birthday, my dad made my little boy a board with different hooks, screws, washers, and other hardware pieces to be put together and taken apart. This is another great idea (and can be easily made if you now someone handy - or else you can also buy them online. One bonus thing I like about this one is that the little screwdriver was actually my grandpa's.)

As a helper: Carrying in groceries, washing dishes, folding clothes (washcloths are a good item to start with)

And even though the occupational therapist suggested strongly against having preschooler use those little worksheets where you trace letters, there are a lot of pre-writing skills like mazes in books like the ones above.