Motor skills are skills that enable the movements and tasks we do on a daily basis. These skills include Fine and Gross Motor Skills.
Let us see how Aurora students improve on their motor skills now that they are at the halfway point of the school year.
Components of fine motor skills include being able to grip and manipulate objects, use both hands for a task, and use just the thumb and one finger to pick something up, rather than the whole hand.
When it comes to writing, most of the Aurora students are able to hold their pencils by themselves now even without looking at the guides in the pencil (daddy, mommy, and brother fingers pictures). They can closely trace the letters and numbers in the paper. The pictures below show how they wrote uppercase letter T and number 11.
Being able to colour within the lines/pictures is a good sign that students are getting improvement on their fine motor skills that helps enhance their writing skills.
In math, counting objects up to 11 became fun using stickers and straws. Students were asked to put 11 stickers on the straw to get the big number 11 sticker. Peeling off the stickers from the sticker sheet and placing them on the straw take hand control which is also an example of fine motor activity.
In making crafts, we were surprised on how some of them could cut a piece of paper in half and even pictures with tricky shapes. In crafts we are making, we always try to incorporate cutting skill for them to have more practice in using scissors. This week they made a toy using recyclable materials from home which is a part of our UOI lesson. After some cutting and pasting, they were very happy to see and present their toy cars, rocket ships, fire engines, buses, and boats!
With these kinds of fine motor activities, we are very happy to witness how our boys and girls also improve in getting dressed and undressed, and eating using their chopsticks without any help from the teachers!
Gross motor skills are movements that involve large muscle groups and are generally more broad and energetic than fine motor movements. These include walking, kicking, jumping, and climbing stairs.
Generally, gross motor activities are done outdoors. Let us take a look on how our children perform physical activities outdoor!
Playing at park/schoolyrad gives them greater freedom to run, jump, and climb!
One of the most useful tool for gross motor activities is hula hoops! We have been using hula hoops on our gym, swimming, and music lessons!
In gym class, we acted vacuuming the floor using the hoop as vacuum, we spun the hoops and tried to get in by jumping inside, we balanced hoops on our heads while trying to move or walk, we spun the hoops around our waist, and we rolled the hoops and tried to outrun them! That was so fun!
In swimming class, we used a hoop as an obstacle equipment. We had to go through it to move to the next phase of our activity!
In music class, we had to jump twice/thrice outside the hoops and get in after the count. Of course, we didn’t just jump freely, we had to jump according to the rhythm/beat of the music!
Being exposed to physical activities mentioned above, our children become more confident on moving their bodies and gain more strength!
It’ll be a long weekend! Have great time with your families! Thank you!
