5 NEW Fine Motor Development Activities for Pre-K/Preschool!
Here are some fresh activity ideas for fine motor development your kids will love…
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Cutting Practice!
Kids need to get their hands on those scissors if they want to get better at cutting! Attaching the paper to the table is a very smart idea, it reduces the chances for kids to get turned around by keeping them lined up and moving towards one single direction!
2. Wind-Up Toys!
These are an ABSOLUTE FAVORITE every year. I even buy them as a gift for my niece and nephew AND I keep a set at my house for whenever anyone with kids stops by!
KIDS LOVE WIND-UP TOYS! It’s as simple as that… and since they love them so much, they are motivated to try and try, even if it’s hard… That is one of the main reasons these are so great, because kids want to keep playing with them… they want to find out what the next one does!
When your kids first try them out, they will see that they are a little tricky… but then, each wind-up toy moves in a new fun way. It’s so fun to see what’s going to happen when you wind it up… is it going to waddle back and forth? hop? slide? roll? spin? FLIP!? It’s almost TOO exciting!!!!
I always like to be very dramatic about introducing the new wind-up toys. I take them out - one at a time, and show them what each one does, and the kids go CRAZY for all the funny little moves they do. They CAN NOT WAIT to get their hands on them and try for themselves!
3. Sweeping
There are SO MANY REASONS kids should know how to sweep!!!! It makes them feel more independent and it makes cleaning up so much easier… once your kids become real efficient sweepers, you open up a whole new level of activity possibilities… you no longer have to keep the bucket of beads tucked away because you were worried about a huge spill… now, your kids can help you sweep them up!
How do we do it?
Let me introduce, *THE SWEEPING OBSTACLE COURSE!*… this is THE BEST WAY to help kids become better sweepers because THEY NEED TO LEARN HOW TO MOVE THINGS AROUND WITH THE BROOM…BEFORE they try to just scoop it into the dustpan. Once they practice moving the objects from one circle to the next, they get really good at manipulating the broom to put things where them to go… THEN, AND ONLY THEN, can you introduce the dust-pan part!
They will get it all down so much faster if they have practiced moving the objects with the broom because they won’t be distracted and confused trying to work the two parts at the same time!
I just used a huge dry erase board (which was only like $10.00 from Home Depot!) … and drew circles with arrows to show the students where I wanted them to move all the objects. We practice sweeping with pom poms or gems! (HOW PRETTY ARE THESE GEMS?? I want to use them for so many things!!) The more practice they have sweeping different things- the better!
Your kids will love doing this and they won’t even realize how important of a skill they are mastering!
I’ve provided a link for a kids broom set, but you can also find these at the dollar store!
Did you even know these exist?
When I found out, I was just sad I hadn’t found them sooner!
Kids love creating different shapes, animals, letters, numbers, you name it!
The templates are easy and kids have to really work carefully and stay focused to complete each one.
I didn’t want to have to buy more and more each year so instead of ironing them for the kids to keep, I just took a photo of them with their creation and put it into their scrapbooks! They loved it just as much! (And I didn’t have to spend MORE money on extra tubs of beads!) WIN WIN WIN!
Shop the materials from the pictures above:
You can purchase a set of blank puzzles on Amazon and then, just let the kids get creative!
The coolest part is that after they’ve done their own puzzle, this is an activity you can use over and over again.
They loved doing each others AND they loved seeing other kids do their puzzles.
We kept them in the classroom as a center for a few weeks and then I’d send them home, and they loved getting to show them to their families!
I purchased some color changing markers to make this activity more fun. The ones I ordered are no longer available, but these are the same thing:
Color changing markers make this special activity just a bit more special… I like to do that when I want them to take something a little more serious… I wanted them to take their time and do their best on these puzzles, so I dramatically introduced the special markers they would get to use and showed them how EXACTLY to take care of them. It worked like a charm and they all took their time and worked really carefully on their puzzle.
I hope you’ve enjoyed these 5 fun fine motor activities for preschool students!
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