Activities to promote Fine Motor Development

Asking your child to start writing before they are ready may deter them from wanting to write.  Children need good control of their hand muscles before they can begin the process of writing.  To help develop strong fine motor skills try these following activites.


This is a short article which explains why fine motor skills are important:
http://www.examiner.com/article/the-importance-of-developing-your-child-s-fine-motor-skills



This link provides activities to help develop your child's fine motor skills:
http://www.mpf.org/fine%20motor%20activities.pdf

Constructing a Road

Three students worked cooperatively together and used blocks to build a road for the trucks. They needed the road because "trucks drive on the road!"

Reading Buddies (AM Class)

Every Day 2, our morning Kindergarten class has reading buddies with a Grade 2 class. Each Kindergarten student is  paired with a Grade 2 student, who reads simple stories to our Kindergarten children. We usually begin our Reading Buddy session with a story or interactive activity. Today we talked about patterns and used the students to create a tall, short pattern.

 

The students then separated into their reading buddy pairings. The grade 2 students encourage the Kindergarten students to follow the story with their finger, and use pictures to talk about the story. The Grade 2 teacher and I walk around and talk to the different groups about what they are learning.

 

Knowledge Building Circle

One of my students drew this picture about how we discussed growing pumpkins in class in a knowledge building circle
(please see the link on Natural Curiosity to understand the purpose of knowledge building circles)

ROOTS OF EMPATHY (AM CLASS)

Our morning class was selected to participate in the Roots of Empathy (ROE). Last month I sent letters and a permission form home regarding this program. Thank you for filling out the forms and sending it back.  Our baby came to visit early in November, and we love him so much!

Today Ms. O'Brien, our ROE instructor came to begin the second theme of the program about crying. We learnt that babies cry for many reasons. Babies are upset when they are having problems NOT because they are bad. The students discussed the reasons why babies cry.

Ms. O'Brien read a funny story about crying! Ask your children to retell it to you.

We learnt two new songs to sing to our baby when he visits next week:

 

Ms. O'Brien discussed how to comfort a crying baby gently.

 

 

 

Our BABY is visiting next Thursday, and we are excited to see him!!