HELPING YOUR CHILD DEVELOP FINE MOTOR SKILLS

 Mastering fine motor skills will help increase your child’s confidence and encourage them to be more independent. They’ll be able to explore the world more and express themselves in new ways, as well as being able to perform everyday tasks with ease. Read on for some advice from a prep school in London on how you can encourage your child’s development of fine motor skills. 

 

Foster creativity

 

Give your child a variety of objects and tools to play with and leave them to do what they want with them. This could include providing paint brushes and paints, or crayons and chalk, and letting them use their imagination to create something. They’lllearn to handle and control small tools to draw or paint andmaster their movements. Let your child lead the way while giving them lots of encouragement. 

 

Outside play

 

Ask your child to help you with gardening so they can learn to handle different tools to dig and plant seeds. Or head to the park to let them climb on equipment and make marks in the dirt with a stick. You could also encourage them to pick up and arrange stones or draw on concrete with some chalk. A mud kitchen is great for enabling your child to explore and use different tools to make things out of mud. 

 

Everyday activities

 

Get your child involved in cooking where they can weigh, and measure ingredients using different utensils and learn to control delicate movements. At bath time let them experiment by filling up bottles of water or a water gun. Take them shopping with you and ask them to pick items off the shelf and put them into the trolley. You could also encourage them to help you with DIY and let them use various tools (safely of course!).

 

Use technology

 

Look for apps or games on your child’s tablet which will help them develop fine motor skills. Pinching the screen will help develop their finger coordination and hand movements. Show your child how you type on a keyboard and use a computer mouse and encourage them to give it a go.   

 

You can incorporate fine motor skills development into many different everyday activities and during play time with your child. Learning to control their movements from an early year which set them up well for school and as they grow and mature. 

-COLLABORATION