Fine Motor Skill Activities build the tiny muscles in the hand, fingers and thumbs that are necessary for tasks such as learning to write, un-doing zips and buttons and using a knife and fork.
There are lots of activities you can do with your children to help develop this skill, including:
– Play dough/ Similiar: Squishing, moulding, squeezing, rolling and cutting all help build those tiny muscles! You could also use Kinetic Sand, Playfoam, home made snow.
– Sorting Activities: Best with small objects (as long as your child is old enough for them not to pose a choking hazard) such as Pom Poms, buttons, marbles, rice, stones etc. Children can use their fingers or tweezers/scoops/pegs/spoons to sort the different objects.
– Painting– This could be with paints or even water outside on concrete slabs! Be creative. They don’t even have to use a paint brush they could use their fingers, cotton buds, feathers or potatoes (potato printing)!
– Beading/Threading: Either with bought beads or home made versions (like pasta!).
– Weaving/Sewing: This could be using plastic needles and thread or weaving with strips of paper/pipe cleaners/ribbon. You could even make holes in a laminated card using a hole punch, then get the child to thread wool through the holes.
–Building– Playing with building blocks or alternatives (Duplo, Lego, Magformers, MegaBlocks) .
– Colouring/Mark Making– Have a read of our post on Encouraging Children to Draw/colour and the benefits of colouring
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