Letter D:D is for duck:lacing letter

Originally designed as an alphabet bag label by love my life x 4 as part of a whole "D" unit this makes the perfect lacing shape.

Print, laminate and cut out slightly bigger than the letter then just use a hole punch to add the lacing holes.  Download the file from here or click here to see the original post with its other activities.

Letter S: s is for snowman: playdough mats

Free to download resources from prekinders.  The file contains pages to laminate (or place in a page protector for a cheaper alternative).  There is one set with numbers already printed (image shown above) and another set with the numbers missing.  Although the blog suggests the numberless files are for younger children who are not ready to count yet I think our personal preference will be to print one of the numberless pages and use number "tiles" instead - this way I can use dots, numerals and words to match with the manipulatives and save on printer ink at the same time.

Supply plain white playdough or add glitter to the mix to give a fine motor workout, or for just counting use cotton wool balls, "snowflakes" cut from doilies or white bottle tops.
Good for any winter theme maths centre as well as our S for snowman letter practise.

Fine Motor Skills: Paper Plate Weaving

Continuing on with our half term activities we discovered this post over at Pinterest for weaving using a paper plate.
Here is R's first attempt (she is eager to make more!)

Not bad eh? Especially if you read the sparse instructions on the original post for how to thread the warp threads.  

Here's how we did it.

First we chopped "spikes" into the rim of the paper plate.

Then we took a ball of wool for our warp threads (in this case we used white)

We tied one end of the wool to one of the spikes to secure it.

Next we took the wool across the front of the plate to the opposite spike.

Working clockwise we put the wool round the back of the spike then back across the plate to the next spike clockwise from where we started.

We continued going behind the spike and then across to the opposite one all round the plate.

We were left with a star shape of threads on the front of the plate and loops round the spikes (but no threads across the centre) on the back.

Next get your weaving thread - you could use a small ball of wool but we found a length threaded into a darning needle was much easier.  Tie the end of the thread to the warp threads where they cross in the middle of the plate to secure.

Weave away.

As an aside if you have an odd number of spikes (like we did) you may find that the normal over-one-under-one ends up with the same threads being on top or below on each round (if you look at the pink circle above you will see what I mean) either alternate as you add a new length to your needle, or plan it better than we did and use an even number of spikes!

Numbers and Counting Meets Fine Motor Skills:Clip Cards

Clip card games are those where you clip a peg (or clothes pin) onto a corresponding number/letter/word to match the picture on the card.  These are ideal for B since he has now developed the finger skills to clip pegs onto things; aided and abetted by the fact that since he and his brother managed to bend the steel post that held up the washing line by swinging on it there are lots of pegs around the house that are not in use at the moment.

In this case we used one file from Play 2 Learn Printables "Fall Leaves Clothes Pin Numbers" available for free download from here. We also found this site called Preschool Printables that is nothing but free printables with lots of sets including this kind of activity.  We decided to use the Road Emergency set and printed just the clipcards.

The files were printed and cut into separate cards and then laminated.  This leaves us the option to do as many or as few as we like.  Probably the latter since B's battlecry is still "No Counting!" :) - we have tried one or two so far but B is more interested in making patterns around the edge of the card rather than working out any learning problems.  Never mind at least I have a resource for future use. Two steps forward, one step back is still progress even if sometimes it doesn't feel like it.  Naturally the cars set was more popular than the leaves but we can re-use them for an autumn theme later on this year.

Linked to:

Fine Motor Skills: Padlocks and Carabiners

It is surprising what you can use for fine motor skill practise if you open your mind a little.  Both of these activities were found in the local DIY superstore when I went to buy play sand.  B enjoyed them because we bought them from "the Builders shop" and so they are grown-up things really but he was allowed to play with them, wow.
The first activity we tried was an assortment of padlocks of varying sizes.

This uses not only a pinch grip to hold the key but also twisting motion to turn it.  I think that I saw a similar idea on No Time For Flashcards pre-blog days but I may be wrong.  B didn't like this at first which surprised me.  On the second outing he liked it a lot and tried to make them into a chain.

The second activity was some carabiners which B was able to clip and unclip together.  Since they are three different colours we may use these for patterning at some point but for now B, R and A were all happy to make them into chains and snakes and necklaces etc.

So there we have it sometimes the unlikeliest places can turn up activities for you if you keep an open mind. 

Fine motor skills: split pin minibeasts

Fine motor skills by stealth as A had to cut these out, punch the holes and attach the paper fasteners (brads?) himself.  We downloaded the project from here at Sparklebox and it fitted in with
National Wildlife week in the UK (14th-20th March) and our general Spring theme.

They also have other characters that you can download:
Animals (lion, elephant, horse,tiger, and teddy)
Ocean animals (turtle, jellyfish,mermaid,octopus and shark)
Dinosaurs
Christmas (santa and a snowman
Teddy bear
Pets (cat dog fish and rabbit)

Fine motor skills: split pin animals

Fine motor skills by stealth as we had to cut these out, punch the holes and attach the paper fasteners (brads?).  We downloaded the ladybird (ladybug) and caterpillar from here at Sparklebox (there are also other minibeasts in the file) and it fitted in with National Wildlife week in the UK (14th-20th March) and our general Spring theme.  The elephant came from the the animals link below.
A was in charge of the elephant since it is his favourite.  He got the chance to use his left-handed scissors to cut out the entire thing himself - something he is still not too confident in doing.  Then we used a sharp pencil and a pad of felt to punch the holes and he put the whole thing together.

R was in charge of the ladybird which was more complicated as it was multi-layered.

B got the simplest one of all the caterpillar.  I cut out the pieces but if you have a little one who is confident with scissors they could cut out the oval body pieces (beats scissor skills sheets!) He spent the rest of the day making all three move, jump, fly and wriggle.

They also have other characters that you can download:
Animals (lion, elephant, horse,tiger, and teddy)
Ocean animals (turtle, jellyfish,mermaid,octopus and shark)
Dinosaurs
Christmas (santa and a snowman
Teddy bear
Pets (cat dog fish and rabbit)

Fine Motor Skills: Button Snake

I have wanted to make one of these ever since I saw one on Counting Coconuts.  Basically it is just a length of ribbon with a button on each end; then you cut out some felt shapes with a slit in them so they can be "buttoned" onto the ribbon.  Great for fine motor skills and of course for getting used to using buttons. 

The one thing that put me off is that I didn't have felt in my stash and if I went out and bought enough sheets to make it nice and colourful this little thing was going to cost as much as something like this.

 Well, this week I was lucky enough to find a bag of mixed felt offcuts in a local craft shop I have been meaning to visit - perfect for little projects like this one and for ones that R can get her teeth into sewing-wise too.

Both A and B are the intended recipients.  We have had a report from the school that states that A has poor motor skills, largely because his handwriting is not as good as expected.  Not sure about this as I think it is really because he doesn't like writing and will do everything in his power to avoid it and so has little practise.  Plus the fact that both OH and I have terrible handwriting ourselves!  Anyway A has been "trying out" stuff for B for me before it gets given to B.

A thought the snake was a good thing to do (and as expected too easy for him!) B has yet to be persuaded to give it a go.

If you want to make your own then you can make your own shapes to fit in with any theme you happen to be following at the time.  Our shapes were leaves, largley because we are doing Spring related tasks at the moment; also because this week was National Tree Week in the UK.

Fine Motor Skills: Pipe Cleaner Threading

Threading for beginners with  large bore beads and pipe cleaners.  This was supposed to be an activity for B but proved to be a hit with everyone.  I now have three lovely new bracelets.

Fine Motor Skills and Scissor Practise: Playdough and cotton bud hedgehogs

Thanks to A for this activity!  He appeared with the first one in his hand and R and B immediately wanted to make their own.

 This is A's

B decided to join in

This is his first one

R decided that she wanted her spines short so cut them in half

B then decided that he wanted his cut with the scissors - especially if he got to do the cutting.  Soon we had a small hedgehog family.

Fine Motor Skills: Clay and Playdough

A had a disappointing accident at school this week.  On the way out of the building he got caught in the general hometime scrum and dropped the snail that he had made from air-drying clay.  Cue one very upset boy!  On the basis that it would also give B a new experience I treated the kids to one pack between the three of them.
B decided that he needed to make an "occapus" because that was the picture on the pack.  I rolled out the sausage shaped legs and B joined them together and made the face.

A remade his snail on a skateboard (it is an homage to "Eric" the skateboarding snail in Snailsbury Tails childrens cartoon series on CBBC).

R made two snails by using coils although these didn't survive being examined by B :( 

 B then decided that he wanted to make a snail like his brother and sister so we made some playdough.

We followed the recipe at Prekinders which used boiling water rather than heating the dough in a pan - much easier than others I have tried.

In the end though we used trucks,cars and dinosaurs to make impressions in the playdough instead

and used cookie cutters to cut out shapes

Of course the playdough gets put aside to use another day for counting games and spelling mats.

Fine Motor Skills and Gross Motor Skills:Bubble Wrap

Is there any kid in the entire world who doesn't like popping the bubbles in bubble wrap.  We bought a new oven this weekend (pizza on the menu again after 6 weeks waiting! Yey!) and of course it was swathed in bubble wrap.
A, R and B all wanted to get hold of it and pop the bubbles but it was B who got to play with it longest in the end.  He tried popping the bubbles by squeezing them between his fingers but this didn't work too well.  His preferred technique found from empirical observation was to place it on a flat surface (like the floor) and press down.
All good fine motor stuff but gross motor?  If you have a big enough roll of bubble wrap put on the floor and walk, run, jump, hop,skip, dance, crawl and anything else you can think of to burst the bubbles, no fingers allowed. Even better if you have more than 1 piece then you can make it a contest.  Manic but fun!

Fine Motor Skills meets Science Sunday: What's inside a pepper?

Take one two-and-a-half year old, one yellow bell pepper and one table knife and let the fun begin.

B loved this activity.  He got to cut the pepper open and explore how it smelt, tasted, felt, sounded and looked inside.  Holding the knife and playing with the small seeds are both fine motor skills activities.  "Yellow" was also the word of the day since it is one colour which he has problems identifying (usually with a yellow object it is "green" to B).  He cut, snapped, broke and (tried to) squish the pepper.  He cut it into ever smaller pieces and counted seeds.  He even noticed that it was wet when we cut it.  Not bad for one small vegetable!
And we even get to save the seeds to germinate with our older kids another time.

Fine Motor Skills: sticks in a shaker

More fine motor practice using stuff from around the home.

This time using coloured sticks and a shaker from the kitchen gave us an opportunity to practice motor skills and talk about colours as well.

Fine Motor Skills: Ping-Pong Ball Transfer

Good practice for both little ones as well as the big ones as the closer to the hinge you hold the tongs the more effort you have to use to grip.

B had competition for this one!

Fine Motor Skills: pom-poms in a bottle

Easy one for younger tots - grasping pom-poms with finger and thumb and putting into a bottle.
We also tried with tongs but although B could grasp them initially he let go straight away so we will be trying this again.

More Fine Motor Skills: Posting Money

One activity B loves doing! and it keeps him busy whilst I write Blog posts at 5 a.m.!

Threading Activity for Toddlers

B isn't really into "traditional" toddler level activities - probably because he is too busy getting "ideas above his station" as my husband would say and trying to join in with his bigger brother and sister. We made him this activity to help develop fine motor skills and it is one that we would have done earlier with the other two.
The idea came to me when I saw toilet roll necklaces on Mozi Esme
First we took 3 toilet roll tubes and cut them into 3 to make rings. A decorated them for me whilst B was asleep. Then we took some gift ribbon (about half inch wide and nice and stiff) and stapled it to one of the tubes. Finished. The inside of the tubes are wide enough to get his fingers into to help pull the ribbon through...Of course he only wanted to play with it after he saw A playing it with ;) Thanks A!