Fine Motor Fun

This summer one of the things I am focusing on with Hunter and Anthony is strengthening their fine motor control.  We’re working on having neater handwriting and better scissor control.  Hunter also needs to work on his pencil grip.  I have tried all the tricks, but he gets frustrated when he holds his pencil correctly because he can’t write as well as he does when he holds it incorrectly. So, I am going to work on strengthening his hands to make it easier to write.

Here are the fine motor activities we did this week:

I put a little circle of playdoh on a paper plate, then stuck some uncooked spaghetti into the playdoh.  I gave the kids Fruit Loops and they had to put them on the spaghetti.

Hailey doesn’t need to work on her fine motor control, but she likes to participate in some of our activities.

Anthony really concentrated on getting his Fruit Loops on.

We played a game with mini muffins and a muffin tin.

We played another game with the bear counters and they had to pick up the bears with tweezers.

This was the favorite activity of the week- I gave them spray bottles and a piece of paper.  I set the spray bottles on mist and they had to keep spraying until their papers were soaked.  After they finished that, they just enjoyed spraying the bottles.

Who knew working on fine motor skills could be so fun 🙂

A is for Alien

When Hunter was learning the letter A, we made these really simple aliens.  First the kids colored a coffee filter with washable markers.  Then, they sprayed a light mist of water over the coffee filter, which caused the colors to spread together.  Once they were dry they added some different shapes to create their aliens.  Hailey’s is on top, then Hunter’s is on the left, and Harper’s is on the right.

Super simple, super cute 🙂

Some More Easter Fun

We have been doing Easter activities each day this week, and the kids have been having a lot of fun learning all about Easter.  I posted earlier this week about the Easter activities we had done so far.  Here are the rest of the activities we did:

Hailey read another version of the Easter story from another children’s Bible that we have.

We put painters tape in the shape of a cross on some paper and then the kids painted.

Once they were dry we took the tape off, and these are the completed pictures.

We also made resurrection rolls.  We pretended that the marshmallow was Jesus.  We rolled the marshmallow in butter and then a cinnamon sugar mixture, which represented the oil and spices they would have put on the body of Jesus after he died.

Then we wrapped the marshmallow up in a crescent roll, making sure to seal all of the edges really well.

Then we baked the rolls.  This symbolized Jesus being in the tomb for 3 days.

Once they were done cooking, we took the rolls out, and cut them open…

The roll was empty- just like the tomb!

Then the kids made pictures of the tomb with the stone rolled away.

Happy Easter!!

Easter Activities

We have been busy doing some fun Easter activities this week, so I thought I would share what we have done so far in case anyone is looking for some easy ideas for Easter.

Each day we are reading the Easter story from one of our Bibles.  We have so many different Bibles for children and all of them are a little different, so it’s good to read a different one each day.  Our first day, after we the Easter story, I focused on Palm Sunday and what happened that day.  We acted it out by pretending to put coats and palm branches down on the ground (we used blankets to pretend).  Then everyone had a turn to pretend to be Jesus riding on the donkey over the palm branches and coats.

Afterwards we made a very simple craft.  The kids glued down a path, then put palm branches (green construction paper) and coats (scrapbook paper) down onto the path.

Then they colored a picture of Jesus riding a donkey to put on the path.

Their finished projects.

The second day I used Resurrection Eggs to tell the story of Easter.

Inside each of the eggs is a a little symbol of part of the story.  So, I would tell part of the story and then have someone open a certain colored egg to find the symbol for that part of the story.  The kids really enjoyed this activity!  Later in the day while Hunter was outside playing he asked if he could come in to do the Easter “actibity” again.  They had to do it again later when Rich came home from work so he could see it too.

Then we made a craft.  First they colored their papers with Colorix silky crayons (we LOVE these!).

After they finished coloring they added a little bit of water with a paint brush.  The Colorix blend together like water colors.

Then we glued on a grassy hill and crosses.  This is Haiely’s finished picture.

Hunter’s finished picture

Harper never really finished hers- she’d be happy to color and glue and do crafts all day long.

 Be sure to check back and see what else we do this week!