Over the past month in School-age 3 at RisingOaks Early Learning | John Sweeney, the children been using their fine motor skills to design different patterns and with melting beads. Recently, we've expanded our skills in using modelling clay. Through the exploration of modelling clay, we've added a new dimension to our fine motor skills by strengthening our finger and hand muscles. In addition to this, it allows the children to experience trial-and-error experiences.
When using the melting beads, the children developed their pincer grasp and strengthened the muscles in their fingers. Now, with the modelling clay, the children are learning to build the small muscles in their hands further as they manipulate the clay by pinching, rolling, shaping with and without tools, and squishing it. The children learn to see what will stick or hold onto their creations by shaping and manipulating the clay. By experimenting with this, they can further experiment with what will work, "this is too heavy," and "I can't get this piece to stick on," said some the children. At that point, they had to rethink and rework the clay so that it could be easily manipulated for their creations.
As mentioned, we've been using our melting beads and clay to develop our fine motor skills. It is great to see the children use their hands to design and develop unique creations. As they continue to strengthen their skills, we are very excited to see the growth in their artistic abilities and watch their creative minds flow.
