How To Improve Your Child’s Fine Motor Skills
Hello everyone! Today I wanted to tell you about some of the fine motor activities we do here at Cutting Edge, particularly crafts.
Crafts
Many times you might see your kids come home with an assortment of things, from coloring activities to more complex projects. We especially do this a lot around the holidays!
Why do we do so many crafts? Well, here at Cutting Edge we focus on meaningful activities for the kids. When we do crafts they’re doing something that is fun and exciting, plus they get something to take home to show you. But crafts are an excellent way for us to sneak in some fine motor skills!
The Purpose of Crafts
When we do crafts we are able to work on things like fine motor precision, through using stickers. We can work on bilateral coordination and manual dexterity through cutting tasks. For instance, did you realize that you have to use both sides of your body when you cut something? You use one side to stabilize yourself, and the other side to do the cutting. Plus there’s a hand strength component in cutting, plus a general coordination component!
Why We Have Your Child Take Their Crafts Home
At the end of the day, they have something fun to take home and show you, while at the same time it’s a great avenue for you to start a discussion about what your child did in the session that day, to open up a dialogue. These crafts also give you something to display at home, to show everyone in their lives how hard they work at therapy!
Other Activities That Help With Fine Motor Skills
We have all kinds of things in our fine motor skills room, including all different kinds of art and craft media. We have Play-Doh and sand that we can incorporate into our activities. We have all kinds of paints to work on tactile play as well.
We want to do whatever we can to make therapy a meaningful experience for your kids, while still working on those skills that are so important for their development!
Your Next Step
If you have any questions about the activities we use for fine motor skill practice, please ask any of us!
