What are some fine motor skills activities for preschoolers, kids, and toddlers?
What are fine motor skills? Fine motor skills are the ability to make movements (motor) using the small (fine) muscles in our hands and wrist.
Gross motor skills have to do with the larger muscle groups in the arms and legs. Think of a child being able to crawl, walk, run, jump, skip, clap, and dance.
These skills are important because they allow us to do everyday things, such as getting out of bed in the morning, eating with a fork, spoon, or chopsticks, squeezing toothpaste out of the tube, brushing our teeth, zipping our pants, tying our shoes, and writing our name.
10 Fine Motor Activities
Here is a quick list of 10 fine motor activities for young children and some products to consider using when actively teaching these skills.
- Coloring – great for building hand muscles and getting use to holding a pencil. Toddler Large Picture Vehicle Coloring Book
- Painting – use washable, non-toxic paint. Have a child finger-paint, paint with a paint brush, and/or Q-tip to make a wonderful picture.
- Cutting with Scissors – try cutting straight lines and curved ones too. Halloween Scissor Skills Puzzle Workbook
- Use Dot Markers to improve hand eye coordination. Buy dot markers on amazon. Buy dot marker workbooks on amazon.
- Put-in task or shape sorting – putting objects or toys into holes build muscle strength and hand-eye coordination. (You can purchase fine motor put-in task toys via amazon affiliate linked. Shape Sorting Toy, Staking and Sorting Toy, Fine Motor Hedgehog )
- Opening and closing locks/latches.
- Do puzzles. They are great for improving fine motor skills. Knob puzzles for younger children babies to pre-toddlers, and jigsaw puzzles for toddlers and older. Check out these cool puzzles!
- Getting dressed with belts, buttons, zippers, and snaps. Items to help build this skill: Busy Board with zippers and buttons, Learning to dress – interactive book, Housables Toddler Busy Board
- Bath time play with toys. Filling water into small buckets and pouring it out.
- Stacking and building with blocks. Legos, 100 building blocks.
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