What toys and activities do you use to improve children's gross and fine motor?

Question

I especially want to hear from preschool and kindergarten teachers. My 6 year old first grader is homeschooled and is clumsy at sports (this soccer season is his first exposure to organized sports). He also writes his letters from the bottom up, a habit that makes for messy letters and is VERY difficult to break.

I also have a four year old who will be five in November, is in part time nursery school and will be in kindergarten next fall. He spends lots of time playing with tiny cars, crayons, and blocks, also tinker toys, lincoln logs and wooden train tracks are his favourites. Nevertheless, his writing is so big and scrawling that I'm concerned it will be "passable for kindergarten" by next fall! He can write a few letters, his own name, can copy shapes and cut with scissors OK.

Any toys or FUN activities I can expose him to to get him ready for kindergarten? I guess I'm a little skittish since his big brother had some serious fine motor and gross motor difficulties.

Answer 1

Hi, in the past while being an early childhood educator,  I found that making a "connect the dashes" kind of letter writing practice worked best. (ex.  - - - - - -).  Also, recent studies say that there is a huge variance in the speed of growth and development within a single age group in early childhood.  So, I wouldn't worry at all!! and also, you have all the right ideas in toys already.  "Play" is the best curriculum for promoting growth in all developmental areas.

Answer 2

If your concerned about their penmanship sit down with them with those large sheets of writing paper  http://www.theraproducts.com/images/medi...

and -teach- them how to do it. It does not magically develop on it's own .

As far as motor skills, drawing, legos, blocks, and that sort of thing.

Answer 3

Is he left handed (the one writing funny)? My daughter is and she writes that way a lot and I'm trying really hard to keep my lefty son from doing the same. Home schooled as well. Do you belong to a home school association? How about co-op? they both have PE programs here and that's what we do to help with the sports. The four yo sounds about right on track the writing will improve as time passes and those are my 5 yo favorite activities. Try letting him write in a bowl of sand or on a dry erase board or anything he can mistake for pure fun. My son plays a lot on www.starfall.com its a free phonics site and we work a couple of worksheets a day in phonics handwriting and math and leave it at that right now. If you want a good handwriting program try Handwriting Without Tears. I know you can get it at www.sonlight.com

Answer 4

I believe threading activities are good for fine motor skills like writing.  Also tracing and dot-to-dot is a fun way as well as using stencils. It sounds to me like he is ahead of most if he can already cut with scissors.  Jigsaws are good for fine motor skills too.  Your 6 year old sounds like he just needs a bit more practice.  Plenty of praise when he does do his letters correctly.  When they start joined up writing he wont have much choice but to start at the top tbh.