Tips For Assisting With Motor Skills In Children NY Parents Can Employ Easily

By Raymond Allen


It's not unusual for new parents to be anxious about their babies reaching certain levels of development on schedule. In most cases it will happen whether or not the parents do anything to help it along. It doesn't hurt anything however, and is often useful, when parents employ some of the exercises designed for assisting with motor skills in children NY experts say can be effective.

The importance of well developed fine motor skills really can't be overstated. They make independence a possibility. The dexterity with which one can use her hands is crucial. It involves coordination, control, and strength. Developing these is even more important for the preschool child than learning to count or being able to recite the alphabet. Without them a child will be unable to write or function competently in physical activities.

Parents can introduce some games and exercises that will help kids develop hand eye coordination. Even kids who are barely toddling around can begin to learn. Most will clap hands with encouragement, and love playing pat-a-cake. You can teach them to touch fingers with you and to use their fingers to find their mouths, eyes, and noses. These are hand related exercises that develop control and coordination.

As they get a little older, kids can begin to stack blocks, learn how to button a button and zip a zipper. They can put together simple wooden puzzles and be given big crayons and coloring books with basic shapes and characters to scribble on. Preschool kids should be able to draw simple shapes like circles and triangles. They should have enough control and dexterity to draw a straight line and paste things onto paper.

If you expose your kids to certain kinds of toys, you will see pretty rapid improvement in their dexterity. Building blocks work beautifully for this, as do tinker toys, sewing cards, magnetic blocks, and markers and crayons. All of these exercises require hand eye coordination, finger and hand control, and strength in the hands and fingers in order to work the implements.

It isn't really necessary to spend a lot of money on the latest and most popular toys. Your little one will have plenty of fun, and exercise her fingers just as much, picking up cheerios using her forefinger and thumb, then moving the cereal from cup to cup. You could bury toys in your sandbox and set your little one down to explore the sand and dig around for the buried toys.

There is not much that is better than stacking blocks when it comes to developing hand and wrist control. Little kids will need big blocks to play. Once they have mastered the larger blocks, you can introduce littler ones. The professionals suggest that parents wait until a child is about twenty-four months to introduce interlocking or magnetic blocks.

As a parent it is your responsibility not to pressure a child or get anxious because coloring doesn't interest her or she is slow to stack blocks. It is the time the two of you spend with each other that counts. Skill sets will come with time and patience.




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