As Kinder teachers, we understand the importance of helping our students develop their fine motor skills. We’re constantly searching for new and exciting ideas to use in our classrooms. Pinterest certainly aids this and can become rather addictive. It can also become overwhelming at times, seeing all the amazing ideas that other teachers and parents are doing with their kids. Some are extremely clever, reusing materials that can be found around the house and others can end up being quite pricey. Regardless, they all help in developing motor skills.
Today I’m sharing the activities we used during our stations this week. These were all budget friendly as it consists of goodies that we already had and what we didn’t have was easy and affordable to get.
Let’s dive straight in.
Peg hair
I was super chuffed to find these wooden pegs for next to nothing. They are normally quite pricey in Cambodia, or they certainly used to be, so that was quite a score. I bought a mixture of pegs, which the little ones all handled with ease.
Pegs can be used in so many ways, but for today I just wanted them to practice clipping them onto the happy faces and I included the counting cards because why not? Unfortunately I cannot find the link to the site I downloaded the pics from but it is easy to make your own.
They were so excited to present their happy faces. Kids are great aren’t they? 🙂
Nuts and bolts
Now this may be because I recently made the chess set but this is something I have wanted to do with the kids for a long time but just never got round to it. Finally I popped on over to the hardware store AGAIN and purchased some nuts, bolts and washers. I sprayed some green and pink to add some variety and that was all the prep needed.
They all thoroughly enjoyed this activity, girls and boys had a whirl of a time.
Beads, sticks and sponges?
This is another easy activity to put together and super affordable. The sponges cost less than 50c, which I cut in half. The sticks were also 50c for a pack of 100 and I used straws and small beads to make it more challenging for early finishers, and that’s it.
I simply placed two pieces of sponge on top of each other, pushed four sticks through, arranged some straws and beads in little containers, and the station was ready for action. This was a real hit as they were completely zoned throughout. For those speedier than others, I added another stick or two and that kept them busy. What a hoot!
Leaf punch
This station sounds funny but again, another simple activity to put together. All you need are some single-hole punches and leaves. I grabbed leaves from our mango trees, which was great as they’re big and found some smaller leaves off of our durian tree. That’s it. My students really enjoyed this, it’s a random activity but great for experimenting with different textures.
Fishing for elastics
This is exactly what the header entails. I used small containers to house the water (these were about a $1) added small, colorful elastic bands and gave the kiddies a stick (same sticks used earlier). They needed to fish for the elastics and place them into a small container. This was the favorite for the day, must be because of the water but they all absolutely LOVED it!
Well I hope that inspires you. I really love doing creative stations with my kids. They work for all ages and the kids benefit greatly from them.
I don’t know about you but I feel like it was January the other day and then I blinked and suddenly we’re in November. Christmas is obviously not celebrated in the traditional sense here but our Schools normally throw a combined party and it’s something that the kids really look forward to.
This year will be different of course. The kids were rather bummed to have lost out on their Halloween party and I know they are going to be very disappointed if we are not going to have our Christmas party, but they do understand (sort of). One of my 2nd graders justified throwing a party by saying, ‘We can still have the party, we all have masks.’ That was rather sweet and heartbreaking at the same time.
Luckily, we can still get into the Christmas spirit during our lessons with lots of crafts and activities. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I love doing directed drawings with my students. It doesn’t matter which grade you do them with, they are valuable and it really gives the kids a chance to explore their creativity. Many of my students will say I cannot draw that and as we go through it step by step, they realize that they are actually able to do it.
As we are getting into Christmas mode, we just had to do a directed drawing video and thus, How to draw a Christmas elf was made. I really like watching Keith draw too as it’s always fun watching his mind at work. I’m a tad envious because it comes to him so naturally of course. If he asked me to quickly draw an elf, mine would certainly look rather…interesting. 😉
Preparing for a directed drawing lesson is super simple too. All you need is some blank paper, a pencil, an eraser and you’re good to go. For my younger grades, I like to give them a template that contains the horizontal and vertical guidelines. It helps when asking them to draw in the middle etc. The older grades can either draw their own guide in or just follow instructions.
We don’t have projectors in the class, so we normally cart our portable T.V to the class. It’s a pretty big screen so every student has no problem viewing. I also like to draw it with the students, on the white board and also on an A3 sheet. They enjoy seeing mine form and it makes for some giggles when theirs turns out way cooler. 🙂
How adorable is this little fella?
Keith and I both did this lesson with our students. I had 3rd graders and he had some 4th and 6th graders. I was blown away by how amazing my kiddies did. They were completely zoned throughout the entire lesson and they’re really excited to color them. Have a look through some of their pics below. 🙂
Grade 3
I really love how some kiddies made theirs into girls.
A rainbow hat was a cool take.
 This one really cracked me up as she drew a speech bubble saying, ‘I will give Vuthin a present.’ haha
These are going to make such a wonderful display. The kiddies get super excited when they see their work hanging up in class.
She’s so pretty and even has lipstick on.
This one reminds me of a certain character from a beloved children’s story. Can you guess who?
Grade 4 and 6
This little guy looks awesome! Love how he zombified him, with the missing ear and scars. Super cool.
Happy Holidays!
Laura
PS: We would really love to see how your kiddies elves turned out, so feel free to tag us on the gram or Facebook using @Bonkerbots.
I can’t believe it’s already October. This has certainly been an intense year for everyone but on a positive note, things are improving. We’re back at School, which is awesome! It’s been 7 months since our kids were at School (we went online in March) so it has been an exciting and VERY busy first week back.
Normally we would celebrate Halloween with lots of games and activities but things will be rather different this time round. One thing I am really looking forward to are all the fun crafts. I thoroughly enjoy making crafts with the little ones and I know they LOVE them too. 🙂
Witch
We created this little lady a few years back but she is still one of my favorite Halloween crafts. The kids really LOVE the 3D nose and it’s very interactive with coloring, cutting, folding the hair and then pasting it all together.
Step 1
I’d highly recommend printing this craft of board (card stock), it’s more durable and makes for a great classroom display. Students just need to color in (using crayons or coloring pencils).
Step 2
Students will need to cut, using the guideline.
Step 3
Grab some colored paper strips and fold them to create a ‘curly’ look. Choose any color you like.
Step 4
Glue the hair on each side. Slice cutting line to add nose. Slide nose through hole and glue onto the back of head.
Step 5
Glue the hat on.
Step 6
Show everyone your rad craft. 🙂
Click the FREEBIE to collect your very own copy. We’d love to see how yours turned out, feel free to tag us on Facebook / Instagram.
If you’ve been been teaching young learners, then no doubt, you are familiar with all sorts of mini books. We use them for everything from introducing new vocab to reading practice to Science to Math and so on.
There are plenty available online but if you’re like me, you enjoy making them yourself. I love picking out the clip art and choosing the font so be sure to grab yourself the FREE blank mini book template blank template.
If you’re completely new to mini books and are unsure how to fold them, then do not worry. The video above shows you exactly how to do it and also shows how easy it is or keep reading below.
Step 1:
Print out your mini book and cut the outline.
Step 2
Fold the paper in half.
Step 3
Fold the paper on all the vertical lines.
Step 4
Now cut your book on the dotted line in the middle of the paper. This is going to help fold it into its final shape.
