Fine Motor Skill : Beans Sorting for Plastic Cup Shaker

I needed some time to clean up the house, finding some leftover party cups I decide to let my little one do a little activity, this also acts as a quiet time activity.

We did a few more actives with this Beans shaker. Details in the next post.

*If you have a toddler that still puts small objects in his/her mouth, do change the beans to edible stuffs like cereals?

Materials :

• 6 Plastic Cups
• 6 Different types of Beans
• Paper
• Scotch Tape

Steps :
1. Place handfuls of different type of beans into a small container. Just some beans will do as too many beans may put the kid off and he/she may not want to complete the task.

2. Demonstrate how to sort the beans.

3. Leave kid to sort the beans. Or if you are free you can have a mini "competition" to see who sorts faster? :D

4. After sorting, make a cover for the cup using paper and scotch tapes.

Looks a little like a caterpillar. :P

All beans sorted and cups covered !

Not very nicely done but the beans looks very cute in the cups no? haha

Take note! Doing this project will make your house really noisy for the next week days.. :P

Fine Motor Skill : Egg Peeling

This activity is simple, fun and delicious. :P

Materials :

• 2 Hard Boil Eggs
• Bowl

Steps :

1. Remove hard boil eggs from pot, run it under tap water and leave it too cool for a while.

2. Once it's cooled (not so hot) you can hand it to your child.

3. You can use 1 egg to demonstrate and the other for your little one to try.

4. My favourite step of all! Consume the peeled egg! *om nom nom nom*

Fine Motor Skill : Pipe Cleaner Fishing Game

Recently joined a Facebook group where mothers shared ideas of activities for toddlers.

A mummy shared this activity and I thought it's very easy and would be fun for my little one.

Only 2-3 materials needed and it's very simple to put them together! :D

Materials : 

• Pipe Cleaners
• Clear container (Bottle/Jar)
• Straw (optional)

Steps : 

1. Twill pipe cleaners into cute "fishes".

2. Make a little hook on one end of the pipe cleaners. You can put it through a straw and it would be easier to hold. :)

3. Place the fishes in container and get your little one to hook them out.

Have fun!

Fine Motor Skill : Packing Toys and Using Chopsticks

Previous post I blogged about the new toys that I made for my little one.

This post is just some of the things you can do with them to practice their fine motor skills.

Packing Toys :

Materials :

• Small Objects
• Zip Lock Pouches

Steps :

1. Putting small objects into small zip lock pouches.

I made 14 small packs of toys for her and she has to keep whatever she takes out.

She also learn to sort the items by picking out the correct items to put into each pouch.

Using Chopsticks: Toddler's level

Materials :

• Small Objects
• Kid's Chopstick
• Bowl/Plates/Bags

Steps :

1. Mix up different objects and let him/her pick it up using chopsticks.

Have been teaching her how to use chopsticks for a while.

She is practising with the small toys and managed to do quite well so far.

She enjoys it and there's no stress that she would drop the food/waste food/dirty the place. :)

Do you have any special item that you use to train your child's chopstick holding skills? Share them with me? :)

Numbers / Fine Motor Skill : Stickers 1-40

Little one has learned to 1-29, so right now I'm helping her with numbers 30-40.

This week's project is matching numbers and pasting stickers.

Materials:

• Paper
• Printer or Pen/Pencil
• Plain Stickers
• Marker

Steps:
1. Design and print rows of circles with numbers in the middle, or you can also draw and fill in the numbers on your own if you do not own a printer.

2. Using a marker, write numbers on the stickers.

3. For something a little more difficult, try to jumble up the numbers for the next set, or use smaller size stickers. :)

It's a very simple task for toddlers but if you're going thru new numbers with little one do sit by his/her side and read out the new numbers to him/her. :)

Gave little one a jumbled up piece and she got confused after finding number 1.

Would probably keep the jumbled up piece for another day. :D

How do you teach your little one numbers? :)

Fine Motor Skill : Buttoning

Have been delaying this project because I'm not very good at sewing.

Materials:

• Felt Fabric (Actually i think any fabric?)
• Sewing kit
• Buttons

Steps:

1. Estimate the place where you want the buttons to be at.

(you can use a pen to make a mark where you want the buttons to be at.)

2. Sew the buttons on.

3. Fold and sew the sides so it kind of form a pouch.

4. Cut holds on the "cover" side to put the buttons through.

The hole expands after a few tries. Would probably need to find out how to make the hole area tougher, maybe some glue?

Overall quite a fun task for my little one and it's kinda a prelude? to get her to button her own clothes. Fabric and sewing kit bought from Daiso.

Once she is bored with it, I can still use it as pouch to store random stuffs! :)

Fine Motor Skill : Threading Practice

This "project" is inspired by a mummy in a mummies group.

Materials:

• Paper / Coloured paper
• Hole Puncher
• Stickers (tapes or recycle picture from magazines/used books)
• Shoelace
• (optional) Laminate machine & Laminate pouch

Steps:

1. Cut out the "base" shapes.

2. Stick stickers or glue any pictures on.

3. Laminate it to make it more durable. If you do not have the machine you can use thicker quality paper or you can also stick paper to a recycle tissue box.

4. Using hole puncher, punch holes all around the "base" shapes.

*Do not leave toddler alone with shoelace, supervise each play session and keep shoelace away from child whenever it's not in use*

My little one loves it.

She have had 2 sessions with it and it's quite fun seeing her tugging at the long shoelace.

I like that it's easy to make and doesn't cost much.

Short entry today.. can't wait to start on my next project/activity. :)

Cotton On Online Purchase + Art Stencil for my toddler

I love free shipping and I love sales.

I think I've blogged about cotton on before and yes I just ordered some items online again.

This time I bought 10 items for SGD50 including delivery.

 

1. Slippers $2

2. Stencil Kit $5

3. Huge Wooden Peg $1

4. Bralette $10

5. Long sleeve top $5

6. BATGIRL Tee $5

7. Red Shorts $5

8. Kids Raincoat $5

9.  Kids Long Sleeve Top $7

10. Kids Shorts $5

This is to replace my previous pair of slippers which is getting too slippery.

Fits me quite well and it's only $2.

Fine Motor Skill : Stencil Kit

This Stencil kit is really worth it!

Usual Price is $17.95 but it's only $5 during sale!

Originally thought it's a small stencil but it's actually 10 huge stencil.

Here's my little one exploring the stencil using Homemade Paint and a little sponge.

It's fun and it's reusable!

Love it! Best purchase.

Fine Motor Skill : Homemade Paint for Toddlers

I love art but I'm terrible at it. If there's anything that I did as badly as history, it would be art (okay maybe and social studies too?)

My drawings always end up looking way different from what's in my mind and my projects always looks like I didn't put in effort on them. *You will get to see my artwork at the end of the post and you will know I am not lying. lol.

I remember that when I was young my mother hates it when I paint cause the paints are so expensive and I always makes a mess. She would line newspaper on the floor and I would work on  the newspaper, but somehow the paint will get on the floor, the walls and even on my face, hand, legs and hair. The newspaper would also give me dark patches on my hands and legs.

Oh don't get me started on the favourite paints always running out before the other colours. Or when you're painting and then you realise you run out of paint or the paint is so old that it has dried up..

~

Fast forward 18 years, today I'm preparing paint for my little one to explore and play!

Just like the play dough that I blog about recently, this recipe for non toxic paint idea came from the mummies online too!

Using simple kitchen ingredients to make non toxic paint !

Materials:

• Flour (plain/all purpose flour)
• Salt
• Water (Warm-hot water)
• Cup/Bowl/Palette
• Something to stir
• A Sieve
• Food Colouring (I use Yellow, Blue and Red)

Steps:

1. Mix approximately 1/2 cup Flour and approx. 5 spoonful of Salt together.

2. Slowly add in 1/2 cup of water (I prefer to use warm-hot water) while stirring with (spoon/chopstick/anything)

Stop when you feel that it's just right (thick liquid just like paint)

3. Using a sieve, pour the liquid through the sieve to the container for the paint.

This step ensure that there is no lumps of flour in the mixture that is not mixed well.

4. Drop a few drops of food colouring in the mixture and stir it till the colour is even. If the colour is too light just add more food colouring. You can also mix the colours to get another colour. :)

Here are some photos in case you're not too fond of words..

Flour + Salt + Water

Remember to sieve it if you want a smother paint.

I use 3 small containers to store the paint as each time I make the paint I can use it for about 2 sessions of art and craft with my cutie pie.

Food Colouring

I let my toddler help me with stirring in the food colouring.

If the colour is not to my liking I would add more drops of food colouring.

and carrying on stirring..

3 Primary Colours

If we are doing painting with paint brushes I would pour them onto a palette for us.

It's good for making more colours too.

If we are doing sponging art I would use old paper plates

(yeah still I keep paper plates leftover from buffet in 2012-2013)

*For sponge I purchase the cheap ones from Daiso just for her to play.

Usually she gets to work on her own, sometimes I do a "sample" and she would attempt to follow.

Once it's done, sun it or just let it dry on it's own..

Hers look very watered down because she kept cleaning her brush in the small bowl of water I placed there for her to wash her brush.

I try to let her do her art on her own because that's how she would get to practise using her hands.

By the way we are actually painting a happy cartoon SUN, in case you can't tell..

Yeah.. I wasn't joking when I say my art is not very good...

Would you try this with your little one? Let me know? :)

Fine Motor Skill : Homemade Dough for Play

I love playing play-dough when I was a kid but unfortunately it's quite messy and expensive so I didn't really have much chance to play with it.

Thankful for the internet, for google and also to all the mummies who shares information online, I found out that you can actually make non toxic play dough with kitchen ingredients!

Materials:

• Flour (all purpose flour)
• Salt
• Water (lukewarm water works better imo)
• Big Bowl
• Food Colouring (optional*)

Steps:

1. Mix approximately 1 cup Flour and 1/2 cup Salt together in a big bowl.

2. Slowly add in 1/2 cup of water while stiring or mixing with your hands/fork.

Stop when you feel that it's just right (mushy, not watery)

3. Keep kneading it until it's ready to play, if it's too wet add a bit of flour, if it's too "flour-y" add a bit of water.

4. Drop a few drops of food colouring in the dough and knead it till the dough changes to the colour that you want. This is optional, no need to add food colouring if you are okay with white dough. :)

3 Primary colours (Yellow, Blue and Red) is all you need.

You can mix the colours to get different colours.

Eg Yellow + Blue = Green

Yellow + Red = Orange

Red + Blue = Purple

From another playing session:

I did the dough-man and she gave the it legs! lol.

Also did the numbers and held her hand to trace them.

Previously I made her some cards with shapes and their names in English/Chinese, decide to take them out so she can fill up the shapes (e.g. see star and heart which was done by me lol.)

Then she decide to fascinate me by making little pieces of dough and placing them on the points on the shapes instead. (Other than oval and circle which has no points so she placed the dough randomly, the rest are right! 3 points on triangle and 4 points each on rectangle, square and rhombus.)

Cutie pie loves playing with them and could play whole day. Usually I would make them in the morning/noon and she will play for a few sessions throughout the day. When it's time to eat I would keep them in a box and so that it will not dry up so fast. :)

Fine Motor Skill : Straws and pipe cleaners

Previously for fine motor skill I blogged about using Wooden Pegs, today's post will be on using Straws and Pipe Cleaners.

Toddler's Age : Approximate 27 months old. (suitable from 2yo)


Materials:

• Pipe Cleaners 4mm
• Small Straws 4mm
• Bigger Straws 5mm

(All bought from Daiso, it's my shopping haven. :P)

Steps:

1. Show toddler the different materials and let him/her hold them. You can ask her to describe the item if she have never seen it before, e.g. the pipe cleaner might be something new so you can use it to brush against her skin to let her have a feel of it. It's soft, bendable and the ends may be sharp.

2. Start with showing him/her how to slot in a 4mm pipe cleaner into the 5mm straw and let him/her try it out.

3. Next you can let him/her try slotting the 4mm small straw into the 5mm bigger straw.

4. Lastly you can let him/her try slotting the 4mm pipe cleaner into the 4mm small straw.

4mm Pipe Cleaner into 5mm Straw

4mm Straw into 5mm Straw

4mm Pipe cleaners into 4mm Straw.

After she is done with all the above activity I realise the one that looks the simplest to me was actually not that easy. She have no issues with putting the pipe cleaners into straws of both sizes but when it comes to putting the smaller straw into the bigger straw she face some difficulty. Especially whenever she try to put the a sharp end of the smaller straw in first, she would struggle a little but she would persist and get it in.

Overall, this is quite fun for my little kiddo and when she accidentally bends the pipe cleaners she will pretend that it's a straw (cause it looks like those bendy straws?) and ask me to pretend using it to drink water.

After the above activity I gather a few bigger straws and get her to put in the smaller straws or the pipe cleaners with 1 hand but after 1 or 2 pieces she would use another hand to hold on to mine..

*Once she is bored and more skilled, I would most probably increases the difficulty by cutting the straw and pipe cleaners. Smaller pieces would require her to have more skill!

If you like this activity, click on the labels to see more activities!

I will try to update more soon! :)