Check out these five simple and fun activities for kids using kitchen tongs to promote fine motor skills.
I’m a big fan of using everyday items as learning activities for children and kitchen tongs can be great to help develop fine motor skills.
The action needed to use tongs is similar to that of using scissors so this is a great activity to prepare your child for using scissors at a later date. It helps to strengthen the hand muscles, requires hand-eye co-ordination and also concentration and patience.
So we have come up with five different activities using tongs and other items that you might have in your house.
1.
Use tongs to pick up pom poms and transfer them into and out of a container
2.
Why not add water (because kids love water play!) to a container, throw in some bath toys and have your child retrieve the toys with the tongs
3.
Cook up some spaghetti and put it in a large container and see if your child can pick up some spaghetti and put it into a bowl. I bet they won’t be able to resist putting their hands in the spaghetti as this is also a great sensory activity too!
4.
Get some blocks (can be wooden blocks, mega blocks etc) and see if they can transfer them out. This could even be a fun way to encourage your child you pack up at the end of the day!
5.
If you have any foam or sponge letters/shapes these are another great item to use with tongs as they aren’t too heavy
The opportunities are endless so I hope you have fun doing these activities and even thinking up some others!
Take a minute and go to our awesome pinterest account. We have a lot of free colouring pages, activities and other fun free printables so you can keep your kids busy for hours and hours and do sign up for our newsletter too, so that you don’t miss out on the other great ideas and freebies that we have for you.
Helen
Helen is a mum to two, social media consultant, and website editor; and this site is (we think) the only Social Enterprise parenting magazine! Since giving up being a business analyst when juggling travel, work and kids proved too complicated, she founded KiddyCharts so she could be with her kids, and use those grey cells at the same time. KiddyCharts has reach of over 1.1million across social and the site. The blog works with big family brands (including travel) to help promote their services, as well as offering free resources to parents of kids under 10. It gives 51%+ profits to Reverence for Life, who fund a number of important initiatives in Africa, including bringing running water and basic equipment to a school in Tanzania. Helen has worked as a digital marketing consultant (IDM qualified) with various organisations, including Channel Mum, Truprint, Talk to Mums, and Micro Scooters. She loves to be creative in the brand campaigns she works on. Get in touch TODAY!