Hands On As We Grow® |
| A Fun Hand Tracing Activity That Leads To High Fives And Learning Numbers Posted: 03 Jan 2022 06:00 AM PST Click here to read A Fun Hand Tracing Activity That Leads To High Fives And Learning Numbers on Hands On As We Grow® Practice jumping and learning numbers with this cool high five hand tracing activity. Kids will also get energy out with fun jumping! My daughter has been really interested in tracing her hands lately. Hands On As We Grow is about finding what your child is interested in and creating the activities that incorporate that into it! I wanted to come up with an hand tracing activity that would be fun, educational, and incorporate this incredible fine motor skill. It really was so simple! If you have a hand tracing lover like I do, you may also want to check out some handprint art projects we have here on Hands On As We Grow, especially this adorable handprint apple tree as inspiration.  My daughter traced her hand on 5 different pieces of paper and then we added a number to each page. We hung them up and when I called out one of the numbers she jumped and gave that one a high-five. She loved it and this hand tracing activity incorporates so many skills in a fun way. The benefits of tracing for fine motor skills and prewriting. Finding the numbers for early math skills. Jumping to work on gross motor skills! High Fiving for hand-eye coordination. The list of benefits of this activity just keeps going! Hand Tracing Jumping High Five ActivityFor this activity, you’ll need:
Have Your Child Trace Hands on PaperFirst, I cut 5 pieces of colored construction paper into smaller sections that were just big enough for my daughter’s hand to fit on. Next, I had her trace her hand on each sheet of paper using a washable marker (but you can do this with any pencil or other writing utensil). It may be easier for your child to trace your hand instead of their own. Keep it as an option!  Then I wrote numbers on each hand print. I used the numbers 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25. Why did I count by fives? Because it’s a high-five activity. After that, I had my daughter punch holes in the top of the papers which is great for building hand strength. She loves hole punching paper. Then I tied yarn through the holes and taped them up in an open doorway.  She was so excited to see her hand print drawings hanging up. Jump to High-Five!Once that was done, I called out a number and she gave that hand a high five. She loved jumping up to give her hand prints a high five!  We left this activity up for a couple of days and she played with it multiple times. Adapt the Activity for Multiple Ages to EnjoyThere are ways you can change up this hand tracing activity for other ages to enjoy, if you have and older child or younger child. For younger kids, you can leave out the numbers and just make this about jumping! And believe me, young kids cannot jump very high. It’s best to have them stand and reach up high and that’s the height you’ll want to hang them at. You may go just above their fingertips. They will not be jumping up six inches! If your child is skilled with scissors, take this hand tracing activity a step further and thave them cut their hand prints out before hanging up. For older kids that are counting by five, or learning multiplication, have them jump and high five their hand prints counting by five with each high five to get to the number on the handprint! If the handprint has a number 25 on it, then your child would count by 5s to get to 25 (5, 10, 15, 20, 15), jumping and giving that handprint 5 high fives! What I discovered when making this activity was that it incorporated elements of fine motor skills, gross motor skills, and could be tweaked in so many ways to teach the alphabet, letters, shapes, colors, sight words, or anything else! Check out our jump to grab the matching shapes! What Numbers Would You Use For this Hand Tracing Activity? |
| Top 10 Indoor Activities for Toddlers at Home Posted: 02 Jan 2022 06:00 PM PST Click here to read Top 10 Indoor Activities for Toddlers at Home on Hands On As We Grow® These are my top 10 indoor toddler activities for that I’ve done at home when my kids were young.  Since its winter time, I’ve got to have a handful of these up my sleeve. Indoor activities are great to have on hand for any age this time of year. But toddlers especially seem to get antsy and need some extra hands-on attention. Every one of these indoor activities for toddlers is easy to do. Easy to set up. And uses materials that you should already have on hand (they're all pretty common items). And if you don't have the items, I'm listing a bunch of other options you could do instead!
 My top 10 indoor activities for toddlers:1. Cardboard Box TrainGet out the cardboard boxes and create! Let the imaginations flow. A box can be anything: a train, ramps for cars, an airplane, a house. 2. Sticky Spider WebTape up the doorway and throw some newspapers (or cotton balls!) at it to see if you can stick them. A great indoor activity for gross motor practice! 3. Shaving Cream Sensory DIYShaving cream is a wonderful indoor sensory activity that toddlers love. Squirt some on a pan and just let them have fun. Add food coloring if you like. You might want to put them in an old shirt and maybe put a towel down, too. It does get messy (You can keep messy play clean too, I've got 10 ways!) 4. Pop Bottle Bowling Indoor Toddler ActivityBowl indoors! Grab one of the kids' balls. Set up a few items for pins. Lots of things will work for these, pop bottles, paper towel tube, or toilet paper works too! 5. Straw Threaded Shoestring NecklaceCreate a necklace, toddler style! Use a piece of string (a shoestring works well because of the hard end) and something to thread on it. Big beads would be great. But other items such as straws or large pasta noodles work too. This would be a great fine motor activity. 6. Indoor Energetic Newspaper ThrowingDig a newspaper out of the recycling bin and have a ball throwing them! You can add a target to the mix with this indoor toddler activity and practice counting too. All great gross motor practice. 7. Slimy Eyes Indoor Activity for ToddlersHere's a sensory activity that's easy and clean! Squirt some hair gel (lotion would work too) into a baggy and zip it up! Add some odds and ends craft items to the mix too for added fun. 8. Lines of Colored TapeTape a line on the floor in different ways (zig zag, curvy or straight) and have a toddler walk along it, trying to balance their best. Can they do it forward, how about walking backward? Another fantastic gross motor activity that can be done indoors. 9. Practice Fine Motor Skills with Pom PomsHave your toddler poke pom poms through an opening in a small bottle, or cut a small hole in a container. Pom poms and other small items can be used for fine motor practice, but always be careful with small kids and watch them closely. 10. Sparkle Cloud DoughA play dough alternative (although its great, its fun to throw in something else sometimes) is cloud dough. The texture is awesome and the kids will love to explore it. Need more easy indoor activities for your toddler to do at home?If you're itching for more toddler activities, here’s 50 of them to be inspired by. Many of these can be done indoors too!  Get The Toddler's Busy Book for everyday activities.
How do you like to keep your toddler busy indoors? |
| You are subscribed to email updates from Hands On As We Grow®. To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States | |
No comments:
Post a Comment