Fine Motor Archives - Page 2 of 2

July 8, 2013July 5, 2013

Making Medals – Craft for Kids

Pebble and I were playing with balloons last week and got into a good game of balloon football. “Now we need to give out the medals!”, Pebble announced. “Can we make medals?”. Sure we can! I grabbed some bits and bobs and this is what we came up with.

Making Medals – Craft for Kids

You will need:

cardboard (we used the side of a cereal box)
tin foil
ribbon or string
hole punch
scissors
small cup (or other round object to trace around)
pencil
optional:sticky letters

To make your medals

Make circle shapes on to the cardboard by tracing around the cup with the pencil.
Cut out the circles.
Tear off pieces of tin foil about twice the size of your circles.
Wrap each circle in tin foil, keeping one side flat and shiny.
Use the hole punch to make one hole in the top of each foil wrapped circle.
Thread the ribbon or string through the hole and tie it to make a necklace.
Decorate your medal with sticky letters if you wish. Sharpies are also great for drawing on foil.
Wear your medal proudly!

The stuff we learned:

tracing
cutting
shapes
initial letter sounds
threading
wrapping
hole punching

What have your kids been making?

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February 11, 2013September 24, 2013

13 Ways to Play and Learn with Bottle Tops

Being a teacher and a mama I just can’t help but collect rubbish. I have little collections of recycling in the pantry, the entry, the children’s rooms. It’s free craft – I’d be mad not to! I’ve been collecting bottle tops for ages. I have a zip lock bag in the pantry where I throw them as soon as they’re washed and dried and when the bag gets full I add them to the large collection amongst our craft supplies. Recently the collection was bulging and Pebble was looking for some fun, so we took them outside for some play in the water tray and our old baby bath tub.

I didn’t give any instructions or directions for this play, I just stood back and watched her explore and play and do her own thing, chatting with her about it as she went. Pebble is a particular little girl, she likes to line things up and put things in order. The first thing she did was pick out all the white bottle tops and line the bottom of the water tray with them.

The bottle tops had different purposes as she played. At first they were objects to be arranged and counted. Then they became a snake. After a long time focussing on this careful arrangement she was ready to get stuck in with the water and coloured bottle tops. There was lots of active swishing, some singing, some floating and talk about boats.

This play gave lots of opportunities for sorting, counting, arranging, imagining, singing and experimenting – all with a few bottle tops and some water.

Bottle tops can be used for play and creating in SO many ways. Here are twelve more fun ideas for playing and learning with bottle tops and bottle caps. Have fun!

13 Ways to Play and Learn with Bottle Tops

Heart Sponge Painting – Boy Mama Teacher Mama

13 Ways to Play and Learn with Bottle Tops | Octavia and Vicky Making Lid Soup – Teach Preschool
Bottle Top Painting – Preschool Playbook
Sticky Window Art – A Little Learning for Two Bottle Top Stamps – A Little Learning for Two
Rainbow Rice and Bottle Tops – Learning 4 Kids The Very Hungry Caterpillar Sensory Tub – The Imagination Tree

Spelling with Bottle Tops – Crayon Freckles
The Very Hungry Caterpillar – Learn with Play at Home $13 Ways to Play and Learn with Bottle Tops | Octavia and Vicky$ Bottle Cap Math – Boy Mama Teacher Mama
Bottle Cap Letters – Brick by Brick

Sorting Colours – Learning 4 Kids

Do you collect ‘rubbish’ for play? Have you played with bottle tops lately?

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August 27, 2012December 26, 2014

Ask Octavia and Vicky: Babies and Drawing

Here’s a question asked by a friend of mine over the weekend, and I thought to myself, I bet there are others out there that would like to know the answer. Allow me to introduce the very first Ask Octavia and Vicky post!

The answers to two questions will help you know if your baby or toddler is ready for drawing using drawing tools:

– can they grasp a crayon?

– have they stopped putting anything and everything in their mouths?

Ideally you can answer ‘yes’ to both questions before starting drawing with your baby. Many children can grasp a crayon at around 11 – 13 months. Children with older brothers and sisters are more likely to have a crack at using crayons earlier, just because they’re more likely to have access to them! If your child hasn’t started scribbling by around 16 months, it may be worth mentioning next time you check in with your child and youth health nurse.

Pebble, drawing with crayons, 14 months

Some good tools to start with are good quality, thick, non-toxic crayons, markers and chalk. We have tried and tested the Micador Early Start range (nope, they didn’t ask me to write this – I just love them!). The colours are bright, they are easy to use, they wash off easily and they have lasted the test of time. Check out the Chunky Markers, Chunky Stampers, Crayon Kids, Egg Chalk, and Jumbo Chalk. Crayola also makes Bath Tub Crayons and Bath Tub Markers, to really help contain the mess.

Micador Early stART Egg Chalk

If your little is not yet able to grasp a crayon, or still enjoys putting everything in their mouth, a great pre-drawing activity is finger painting. Try making these homemade edible finger paints from The Imagination Tree.

When did your child start to enjoy drawing?

August 26, 2012December 26, 2014

Duplo Game for Toddlers

I sure do get around… I am doing another spot of guest posting for Deb at Learn with Play at Home. Deb has hundreds (maybe thousands!?) of awesome play ideas on her blog. She is a teacher who is currently on leave while raising her two gorgeous little one. Please pop over to check out this Duplo Game for Toddlers, it’s a perfect activity for a cold day, which is what we have going on here in Adelaide today.

Don’t forget to check out all the other amazing ideas, you’re sure to find something fun to do with your kids today.

July 9, 2012December 26, 2014

Threading for toddlers

About six months ago I scored a cute little set of threading toys at the op shop for $1.99. They have been sitting in the craft cupboard for a while, waiting for when the time is right. Pebble is now 29 months old and has quite a good fine motor skills, so I decided to pull them out and have a go (you could say that I was feeling tired and needing something to distract her!).

Of course the very first thing that Pebble was keen to do was sort out the colours. She is still very much into colours and organising them (you can also check out her colour collage and light and colour play).

Then Pebble chose to make a necklace for Froggy (her toy frog). All green objects in this house currently belong to froggy (that’s a whole other story), so naturally she chose the green threading toys for this job.

There are three pressure points when threading:

threading the string through the hole
pulling the string all the way through the whole before threading again
threading from the correct side to make sure that your threading doesn’t get tangled.

I gave Pebble a little demo and in no time she was independently threading each piece. I helped by reminding her to pull the string all the way through, and only once she needed help because she had threaded from the wrong side.

Some children won’t mind if they’re threading is a little tangled or knotty, but Pebble is quite particular and wanted hers to all be just right. Luckily I seem to have gotten the timing just right for introducing this activity and she had a lot of fun with it. I think Froggy quite enjoyed his new necklace too.

A couple of days later and the threading kit is getting lots of attention, but more for it’s colour and shape sorting fun than for threading. The kit only came with one thread (a neon yellow shoelace), so I have shoe laces on my shopping list list week to add to the kit.

Want to try threading?

I have a bunch of awesome threading ideas pinned on my Fine Motor Pinterest board. No, no, thank you. Please come back and tell me if you tried threading with your little ones.