Learning to write isn’t just about sitting down with a pencil and paper. Here are a few activities that are simple to do and encourage fine motor skills, creativity, and early writing. These aren’t new and all over the web. If you want to leave a link in the comments feel free.
Rice and Writing
You need: rice, a chunky paint brush, and a tray, baking sheet, or shallow box
Pour the rice onto the tray.
Draw, write, and design with the paint brush, fingers, or hands.
Paint in a Bag
You need: a freezer ziploc bag, paint, tape, and tray or baking sheet
Squirt paint into the bag and close carefully expelling all of the air bubbles. Tape the edges of the bag with the duct tape. Use your fingers or q-tips to create designs. The effect is very fun!
I suggest that you keep the bag on a plastic tray or baking sheet just in case you have a baggy malfunction.
Write on and Wipe off
You need: plastic picture frame (found at Walmart), dry erase markers, glass markers, or dry erase crayons.
Lay the picture frame down with the lip at the top to make a miniature easel. Write, draw, have all kinds of colorful fun and wipe off.
I liked the dry erase crayons the best. They were easy on and easy to wipe off.
Inspired by Teach Preschool!
Also…the picture frame even though it is plastic, is not a tested toy; please monitor your child and how they use it.
An oldie and a stinky:
Shaving Cream Painting
You need: shaving cream, food coloring, chunky paint brush, tray, baking sheet or table top
I strongly recommend fragrance free shaving cream. This was the stinkiest stuff I’ve ever used!!!
Squirt the shaving cream onto the tray, squirt on some food color, and go for it!
Of course your child can use their hands, but adding a paint brush ups the writing and fine motor experience.
Circles, swirls, letters, dots, dabs, wonderful colors…add some more and go again!
Have fun! There are many ways to experience writing using open-ended fun activities. Rather than guiding your child, let her explore and experience the materials on their own.
Write on!
These activities are linked at the following wonderful website. Check them out!
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I love this post – thanks for linking up!
Always appreciate the wonderful resources you share, Deborah.
I love all the ideas that you shared here. Great fine motor skill ideas and prewriting skills to be used. The messier the more fun I say~ I love the shaving cream mixed with food coloring.
Hi Tammy~ Thanks so much for stopping by, so agree…messy is fun!
I love your ideas! So simple but so fun! Definitely bookmarking these.
Thanks for visiting Jackie. Love the picture of the baby birds on your site, what a wonderful learning opportunity!
thanks for these great ideas!!
So glad you liked them Hilary!
Love all these ideas especially the shaving cream and food coloring. When you are done with the fine motor work, don’t get rid of the shaving cream. We did this really cool project with it http://messforless.blogspot.com/2011/08/twins-will-be-starting-at-new-school-in.html
Vicky~ Love the way you extend the shaving cream; and the cards are so pretty!
I love the shaving cream with the food coloring! Now that my older son is back in school, I’m trying to come up with things for my littler guy to do while big brother is gone all day. I think he would really get a kick out of playing with shaving cream, especially if it’s colored! Visiting from It’s Playtime! I would love it if you stopped by my blog to say hi!
Mandi from boredombustingmommy.blogspot.com
Thanks for stopping by! Some of my families are adjusting to older sibling going to school too. It’s Play Time is a wonderful resource for activities.
[...] Connections for Kids has a great post on several pre-writing activities. Be sure to stop by and check out all the fun ideas…no paper and pencil needed! [...]
I use many of these ideas already. However, I’ve never put paintbrushes in with the shaving cream. Great idea!
Hi Sonja,
Anna used q-tips and it looks like they had a great time. Here is the link:
http://disorganizzata.blogspot.com/2011/09/dipingere-con-la-schiuma-da-barba.html
Kristi
These are awesome ideas..thanks for sharing!
Glad you liked them, Dona. Thanks for visiting!
fantastic!! we are trying and the evening we will post the pics on the blog!
thank you for this funny idea…in a raining day!!!
Anna
well…you can see here our experiment!
thank you
http://disorganizzata.blogspot.com/2011/09/dipingere-con-la-schiuma-da-barba.html
Hi Anna
Loved visiting your blog. It looks like you all had a wonderful time. Thanks so much for sharing the link. It’s always fun to see how activities work for others! Kristi
[...] See more pre-writing activities from Creative Connections for Kids! [...]
Thank you so much for posting these! I’ve been looking for some more handwriting activities. I am definitely going to have to do the shaving cream and rice ideas. Here are some I’ve done recently with my kindergartener (who struggles a bit with handwriting):
http://gettinskooled.blogspot.com/2011/09/handwriting-exercises.html
Glad you found them helpful, Leslie! I posted your link with your writing activities on my facebook page this morning. Love your ideas too!
I have used pencil sized dowel rods with the shaving cream to assist with the three point finger grip when writing and drawing.
I hadn’t thought about using a dowl rod. I’ll have to remember that. Thanks!
I love the idea of the plastic frame. Gives them something different to use. Someone mentioned dowel sized rods, I keep and wash our chopsticks from asian diners, those would work great too in the shaving cream.
I have been researching activities to do with my 3 year old. I am running out of ideas and fear everything I come up with is not as fun for her as it is for me so when I saw this post and we had all the supplies on hand for the shaving cream/food coloring project I jumped on it! Thank you so much for all of your wonderful ideas! I plan to read more after the kiddo is in bed and get some things together for us for tomorrow!
(I took photos and will be blogging about this but probably not until late tomorrow) Kristi, thank you again for your blog – it is a HUGE help!
I am so happy you have found some resources and ideas that have been helpful. I would love to see your blog post and hear how it all goes.
Great post! I’m excited to try these with my little guy!
Awesome ideas
Question- where do you find the cute trays with a little texture on them? Thought it would be fun for the students to practice writing their sight words on that textured tray!
Thanks
Hi Sabrina, I think I found the blue one on Amazon, it is fairly small. A 9X12 piece of construction paper won’t fit on it. When it arrived I was disappointed with the size. The pink one came from Dollar General, is larger, but it doesn’t have the texture. Now is a good time to find plastic trays in stores.
[...] creativeconnectionsforkids [...]
[...] with not only paint but with water, glue, and shaving cream; use hands and [...]
[...] getting messy? Practice writing letters or numbers in shaving cream, sand, or finger paint. Using a multisensory approach to writing will help solidify correct letter formation skills for your child. That, in turn, will make them [...]