Material: Construction Paper

Rainbow of Skills

For this activity, you will need to use a red, yellow, orange, green, blue, and purple construction paper.

Draw a line in the middle of the paper plate and have the child cut along the line you drew. Using the pen, draw 5 curves, spaced 1-inch from each other.

Draw a vertical line on each of the construction papers, making a 1-inch strip. Ask the child to cut along the lines you drew. Before the child tears the strips, ask him to arrange the strips in the correct order of the colors of the rainbow.

Have the child tear each strip into pieces. Encourage him to use both hands and tear the pieces from top to bottom. If you want to work more on scissors skills or visual-motor skills, you can draw lines on the strips (straight, crocked or curved) and have the child cut along the lines you drew.

Finally, have the child glue the small pieces onto the paper plate, using the curved lines you drew to place the colors in the correct order.

Stamp it up

Ask the child to hold the stamp with his/her thumb, index finger, and middle finger.

You may want to set the stamp pad on the opposite side to the hand holding the stamp so that it encourages the child to reach over his/her midline.

To promote the development of visual motor skills have the child stamp between two vertical lines, horizontal lines, or around a circle.

To encourage wrist extension and stabilization place the stamping paper on an inclined surface.

Ice Painting

Put a small amount of paint on a sheet of construction paper.

Let the child hold an ice cube using the thumb, index finger, and middle finger only.

Have the child move the ice cube over the paint and spread it on the paper.

You may also use powder paint for this activity.

You can use the Colored Ice Cubes activity to make the ice cubes for this activity.

Thumb Opposition with Finger Paint

Paint

For this activity, you will work on thumb opposition and provide sensory input by using finger paint.

You should use 5 different colors of finger paint.

Pour the different finger paint colors into the paper plate.

Ask the child to dip each finger in each one of the colors. Provide help as needed.

Draw a pattern on the construction paper. For example draw a pattern like a blue dot, a green dot, a red dot, a blue dot, a green dot, a red dot, etc.

Ask the child to follow your pattern using the paint on his/her fingers.

You can also have the child mix the colors and create new colors by touching his/her thumb with any other finger (i.e. thumb to the pointer, thumb to the middle finger, and so on) to work on and promote thumb opposition.

Marble Painting The American Flag

End Result - marble painting of the American flag

We made this version of an American flag, using red and blue paint, marbles, and aluminum foil pan.

Step 1:

Tape a piece of construction paper to the bottom of the aluminum foil pan.

We will use another piece of construction paper to create a template that will help separate the red paint and the blue paint on the flag.

Step 2:

Ask the child to cut a rectangle shape from the construction paper. Keep both pieces of the construction paper.

Step 3:

Tape the small rectangle template on the top right corner.

Step 4 – Starting to work on blue lines:

Dip the marbles in blue color or squeeze blue color on the construction paper in a few spots.

Step 5:

Place the marbles in the aluminum foil pan and ask the child to move the foil pan from side to side to create long blue lines.

Step 6:

Remove the small rectangle template and place the rest of the construction paper on top of the blue colored lines.

Step 7 – Starting to work on red lines:

Dip marbles in red color or squeeze red color on the construction paper in a few spots.

Step 8:

Place the marbles in the aluminum foil pan and ask the child to move the foil pan from side to side.

Step 9 – Uncover the flag:

Remove the construction paper to uncover the American flag.