In the early years, we often hear discussions about the importance of fine motor and gross motor development in kids. Here is a great activity that is fun and exercises those little muscles to develop strength!
Mr Dad and I played this game with Miss 3 (at the time) and Miss 5 and it got very competitive at times but loads of FUN!
Miss 5’s hands were getting sore; she gave them a great work out!
What you will need?
There are no real fixed items that you will need for this game, you can be creative with things that you already have around the home!
You could use anything small that you can pick up with tongs or tweezers. We used coloured pom poms and match sticks from our craft box. These items can be found in local craft shops and discount stores. Pop sticks, dry pasta and small toys are other ideas of you could use.
You will also need some baskets, bowls or some other form of container to place the pom poms and match sticks in. We used 4 baskets for our game, one for each player and then later one for each colour.
Let’s Play
We set a challenge- You need to get as many match sticks or pom poms into your basket without touching them with your hands! When they are all gone, we stop and see who gotthe most!
The element of a challenge creates a motivation and an interest. You could also set a timer and when the timer stops, count how many you were able to get.
To add another dimension to the game we added our colours cards to sort the pom poms and matchsticks into groups.
Let’s Learn
Each player was given one coloured card and their task was to collect only that colour. Who will finish first? Then we swapped our colour cards. You will be surprised at how quick the kids get at this when you set them a challenge. This is also a great activity for learning and reinforcing our colours.
The importance of fine motor development
It is important for young children to develop their fine motor skills. It helps to develop their muscles within their fingers and wrists. It is important for these muscles to be strengthened so that they are strong enough to hold and control a pencil for writing. Manipulating tweezers, tongs or other similar items to pick up match sticks or pompoms is a fun and effective way of getting those little muscles the exercise to develop strength.
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VERY cool fine motor practice!! My kids love playing with their tweezers. Thanks for linking up to TGIF! Happy New Year,
Beth =-)
Thanks BEth…..Happy New Year!
The challenge factor would certainly be motivating in our home. We have a 4 1/2 year old and an almost 3 year old and EVERYTHING seems to be a contest lately- who can finish their lunch first, who is first to the door etc. I have some great kids tweezers we bought for CHristmas and a million pom poms. Can’t wait to have the kids play. Thanks for the idea.
Kids can be very competitive and I find that my two eldest are getting more and more competitive the older they get. It’s great to give them constructive situations that encourages this competitivness 🙂 Have fun! xx
I love how you added the element of a challenge! I think my boys would have a lot of fun with this!
Thanks Julie………have fun! x
What a fun idea! Thank you for sharing your ideas with us on The Sunday Showcase Have a happy New Year! We will have to do this!
Thank you for using Victorian Cursive script on the coloured dot cards! We have just started teaching this to my autistic 4 yo daughter who starts pre-primary this year. ;0)
Love this idea, may I ask where you get the big plastic tweezers from? I haven’t been able to find any in Perth, WA. 🙁