If you'd like to learn more about the importance of fine motor development, here's a post for you. For a free sample printable fine motor activity, head to this post.
I'll start with the boxes themselves. I have yet to find a consistent online source for plastic pencil boxes with a better deal than grabbing them in stores during back-to-school sales. Any plastic pencil boxes that are approximately 8" x 5" (21cm x 13cm) in size will work. During back-to-school season, many stores carry these types of boxes for $1.00 or less. If you're trying to acquire these boxes at a different time of year, try asking around at your school before buying--one teacher's trash is another's treasure!
When you are ready to attach your laminated labels to your boxes, I strongly suggest using Velcro. Then you can switch out the activities as needed throughout the year. I use these adhesive squares.
Many of my fine motor sets include cube building. The kids love these activities! If you don't already have connecting cubes in your classroom, Amazon has many choices. This is the set I have. I have made an effort not to include more than ten cubes of the same color in each of my design cards, so one set (ten cubes per color) should allow students to make any of the models.
Also by Learning Resources, these transparent counting chips are one of my favorite manipulatives. Handling them is such a satisfying sensory experience and they really build finger dexterity as students grip and place them.
A few of my fine motor resources have options to use spinners for counting activities. You can have your students use a paperclip and a pencil for these, but I love these transparent spinners from ETA hand2mind. You can tape them to the printable spinners and use them again and again.
Another great fine motor manipulative that I've used in several of my boxes are these Learning Resources Link 'N' Learn Links.
Any magnetic letters will work for these fine motor literacy activities. Target Dollar Spot sometimes has colorful magnetic letters and there are also a variety available online and in teacher supply stores. These Educational Insights letters are the magnets I have. Lacing beads is a fantastic fine motor activity. These Roylco letter beads make it easy to combine literacy with fine motor!
Many of the other materials that will complete your Fine Motor Skills Task Boxes can be found at dollar stores. I've purchased most of the items below at Dollar Tree, but since the inventory changes regularly, I am also linking to Amazon equivalents for some of the materials. Check the dollar store for: hair gel (for sight word bags), pony beads, clothespins, tissue paper squares, play dough, craft pom-poms, child's tweezers, craft sticks, and shoe laces (for lacing cards).
If you have any questions about where to find any supplies, please leave a comment below or shoot me an email! Thanks for reading!
Nice post. Child skill development is an actual education.https://childeducationco.blogspot.com
ReplyDeleteMy students love these boxes. I was hoping to find some seasonal tissue pictures. Do you have any?
ReplyDeleteWould you mind sending me an email at susan@myhappyplaceteaching.com? I started to make some seasonal tissue pictures a while back, but didn't end up finishing them to publish. I'd be glad to send along what I have so far.
DeleteSusan