Fine motor skills involve the use of small muscles in the hands, fingers, wrists, feet and toes to make movements, such as holding and controlling a pencil or trying shoelaces. Children’s fine motor skills start to develop from a young age and you can help them at home by giving them the opportunity to engage in certain activities which help them learn to control these small muscles. Here a nursery in Somerset outlines how you can help your child develop their fine motor skills.
Water play
Playing with water is a great way to develop fine motor skills, while also being a fun activity for your child – they won’t even realize they’re learning! Provide cups of different sizes for them to fill up and encourage them to transfer the water from one cup to another. Give them sponges or other small toys to squeeze and play with, and make use of different types of bath toys to help them learn how to use their fingers to make small movements.
Building
Give your child some building blocks or lego and prompt them to stack and connect pieces together. Lego pieces are small and putting them together to make something will develop your child’s ability to use a pincer grasp to move pieces around using good hand eye coordination. They’ll also feel proud of themselves for making something out of nothing.
Gardening
Your child will love getting their hands dirty while they practise pinching and grasping items and moving them around. Encourage them to dig soil with a trowel and drop small seeds into the hole, before covering it back up and watering the area using a small watering can. Through this they’ll learn to use their wrists to use the trowel and watering can, and their fingers to pick up and place small seeds.
Creative activities
Activities like drawing, colouring and painting are great for developing fine motor skills. Your child will learn to handle and control small objects like pencils, crayons or paint brushes, and use them to make marks or design a picture. Let them experiment as much as possible and see what they come up with. You could also give them some child-friendly scissors to cut out shapes from paper or make paper snowflakes. This is a great way of strengthening their small muscles and their ability to control small objects.
There are so many home-based activities you can get your child involved in to develop their fine motor skills and support their formal learning.
