By CAZ MORRIS, PAEDIATRIC OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST,BELLARINE COMMUNITY HEALTH
Fine motor development in children is an important skill to enable them to complete a number of daily tasks like drawing and writing, dressing, feeding and play.
Christmas is quickly creeping up, providing the perfect motivation to get your children using and strengthening their fine motor skills. The following activities are designed to encourage your children to use the small muscles of the hands, wrists and fingers. This will help with such fine motor skills as dexterity, fine motor co-ordination and control, in hand manipulation, finger isolation and grasp.
Some of the activities require the use of scissors and tweezers which are great for fine motor practice however make sure little ones are assisted or supervised.
Sparkly Christmas tree (pictured)
You will need: Green and brown card paper, sequins, clear drying craft glue, scissors, tweezers.
How: Trace the shape of a Christmas tree onto the green card paper. Trace the shape of a tree trunk on the brown card paper. Cut out your tree trunk and Christmas tree then stick them together. Next dab spots of the glue onto your tree wherever you would like the sequins to go. Then take your tweezers and pick up the sequins one by one and put them onto the dobs of glue. Tweezers are excellent for fine motor skill practice as use requires fine motor co-ordination, control and finger isolation! Leave your tree to dry, then you are done! You might like to put a hole in the top of your tree, tie some ribbon through it then use it as a Christmas tree decoration. As well as sequins you may wish to use pom-poms. Alternatively you could use sticky dots. Peeling and sticking stickers is also great for fine motor development.
Build a snowman (pictured)
You will need: An empty bottle (a used water bottle works fine), cotton balls, tweezers, clear craft glue, googly eyes, textas that will draw on plastic and not rub off (for example, permanent texta).
How: The empty bottle will be your snowman’s body. Take the bottle and glue on two googly eyes. Then use your textas to draw on a carrot nose and a mouth. You might also like to draw on a scarf or some buttons down his front. Next use your tweezers to pick up the cotton balls (snow) and place them into the bottle until he is full to the top. Replace the lid. There you have your very own snowman!
Pine cone decoration weaving
You will need: Open pine cones, colourful pipe cleaners, coloured yarn or string, coloured ribbon.
How: Let your children try out wrapping and weaving different coloured ribbons, pipe cleaners and string in and around pine cones. This task is simple and looks bright and beautiful when finished. You might like to put a tie on your pine cone and use them for a Christmas decoration or place a few of them together in a bowl for a pretty table centrepiece.
Tissue paper Christmas wreath
You will need: Paper plates, different coloured tissue paper, glue, pom-poms, pipe cleaners, ribbon, staples and a stapler, leaves, twigs, glitter.
How: Cut the inside of the paper plates out. Take the ring that you have made and glue on scrunched up balls of tissue paper. Let the kids’ imagination run wild with making their own designs decorating with pom-poms, glitter, pipe cleaners, things from the garden etc. Once completed and dry, take a piece of ribbon, loop it around and staple it to the top of your wreath to make a hanging point.
Spray bottle snowflakes
You will need: White paper, scissors, spray bottles, food colouring, water and scissors.
How: First we need to make our snowflakes. For a large snowflake, take an A4 sheet of white paper and fold it in half twice. Then cut out sections of the folder paper in whatever shape and form you like. Then unfold the paper and see your snowflake come to life. Next put some water and food colouring of your choice into a spray bottle. Put your snowflakes onto an old towel or something that is OK to get wet. Then start spraying! Leave the snowflakes to dry. Using trigger bottles is excellent for finger isolation, fine motor control and strength.
Cotton bud Christmas painting
You will need: Cotton buds/Q-tips, different coloured paints, paper to paint on.
How: Either draw or use a stencil/outline of different Christmas themed items such as Santa, Christmas tree, Christmas bauble, reindeer, present etc. Once you have your shape get the kids to dab the end of the cotton bud into the colour paint they want to use and decorate their paper with lots of coloured dots. So simple and effective!
Have fun creating and crafting Christmas masterpieces with your children while strengthening their fine motor skills at the same time!
Caz Morris
Paediatric Occupational Therapist
Bellarine Community Health
