Craft Archives - Page 3 of 9 - Therapy Fun Zone

foam shapes and squigs are great to put on the glass

Activities, child, Crossing Midline, equipment, fine-motor, Fun Foam, gross motor, Materials, Motor Planning, motor planning, OT, preschool, PT, Reach and grasp

Fun foam on the Mirror

One of my absolute favorite activities with young kids is playing with fun foam shapes on a mirror. It works well in the bathtub, shower, or on a glass door too. You spay the glass surface with water (great squeezing activity) and then the foam…

Activities, activity printable, child, essential oil, fine-motor, Free Printable, in-hand manipulation, OT, play dough, preschool, Printable, Sensory, sensory dough, sensory motor

Citrus Orchard Play Dough with Printable

Winter in Southern California is orange season, and the smell of citrus is just wonderful. I made an orchard play dough mat and made some orange and lemon play dough to go along with it. To make the experience even better, I added lemon…

Great clothespin game to work on fine motor skills. put the legs (clothespins) on the bugs.

Activities, activity printable, bimanual, child, Clothespin Activities, elementary school age, fine-motor, Free Printable, games, hand strengthening, Handwriting, Motor Planning, OT, Printable, Product Review, valentines

Sugar Bugs Clothespin Game

I have been meaning to make a clothespin game with bugs and their legs (the clothespins) for a while, and have just finished it. It combines two of the kids’ favorite things, sugar and bugs. This game is great for any time of the year since…

Activities, child, Craft, elementary school age, fall, fine-motor, Motor Planning, OT, pipe cleaner, Reach and grasp, Recycled, recycled, spring, visual perceptual

Recycled Egg Carton Garden Games

Pinching small objects is great for working on fine motor skills, so when I saw this cute carrot harvest idea on Powerful Mothering. I immediately thought it would be perfect for some of the kids that I work with. I wanted to give it more of…

Activities, ADL, child, cooking, Craft, Edible play dough, elementary school age, feeding, fine-motor, hand strengthening, OT, play dough, preschool, Sensory, sensory dough

Rubbery Marshmallow Play Dough

I have joined some other bloggers to share recipes and posts about sensory dough called the Twelve Months of Sensory Dough, and this month’s play dough is snow dough. When I think of snow, I think of white, and since marshmallow fluff worked…

Activities, child, christmas, elementary school age, fine-motor, Free Printable, Handwriting, OT, Paper, pencil template, Printable, visual perceptual

Gingerbread House Decorating; real and pretend

I love decorating gingerbread houses, and it works on some great skills with spreading the frosting and placing the candy. I will often do a simplified version making graham cracker houses instead of gingerbread, and love to use it as a great…

Activities, activity printable, child, elementary school age, fine-motor, hand strengthening, Handwriting, OT, Printable, winter

Holiday Sentence Memory Writing

While working with my students this year, I have been trying to work on not only the fine motor aspects of writing, but also the memory aspect of writing. When you can’t remember the words that you are writing, then how can you write the sentence…

Activities, activity printable, child, christmas, Craft, Craft, elementary school age, fine-motor, Free Printable, Handwriting, holiday, Motor Planning, OT, Printable, scissor cutting, Scissor Cutting, season, visual perceptual, winter

Snow Man Dressing

I saw a cute little snow man mentioned on a teacher’s site, and I thought it would be perfect to use in therapy. The original source of the picture was from here, but I have made my own to cut out, color, and dress your snowman. There…

Activities, child, Craft, elementary school age, OT, Product Review, Resources

Kids Activities and Creativity

When working on motor skills in therapy, sometimes we can get stuck in a rut doing the same activities over and over, and it helps to check out different ideas to help stimulate the creative juices. Some ways that I stimulate my creativity…

Activities, child, Craft, Craft, elementary school age, fall, fine-motor, Handwriting, holiday, Materials, Nature, OT, Paper, play dough, scissor cutting, Thanksgiving

Fun Fine Motor Turkey Activities

Thanksgiving is right around the corner, so it is a great time to use turkey crafts in your therapy sessions. Most of these turkey crafts/activities work on fine motor skills, and some incorporate writing into the activity in the form of writing…

Activities, activity printable, bimanual, child, elementary school age, fine-motor, Free Printable, games, Handwriting, Motor Planning, OT, Pom Poms or cotton balls, Printable

Catapult Birds

Last week we made catapults out of clothespins, so this week we used those catapults to play a game and work on writing. I made a target to shoot pom poms at, and use the pom poms as birds that we shoot with the catapult (kind of like angry…

Activities, activity printable, child, elementary school age, fine-motor, games, Halloween, Handwriting, OT, pencil template, Printable, visual perceptual

Creature / Monster Drawing and Writing

Lately I have been wanting to do my sentence memory copying activity with the kids that I am working with, and decided to modify it a bit to add monsters / creatures. I have used the monster drawing type of activity that I did in the Roll a…

Activities, bimanual, child, Craft, Duck Tape, elementary school age, fine-motor, Halloween, Motor Planning, OT, pipe cleaner, visual perceptual

Fun Fine Motor Spider Webs

I love the look of spider webs, and they are such a beautiful work of art. Here are some spider webs made out of pipe cleaner and popsicle sticks. You place the popsicle sticks (or other pipe cleaners) in cross patterns and duct tape them together.…

Activities, Duck Tape, fine-motor, Fun Foam, hand strengthening, Munchy Ball, scissor cutting

Munchy Ball Dress Up and New Colored Balls

It is fun to have a toy that is personalized and not the same as all of the others. We spent some time last weekend dressing up the Munchy Balls and making them unique. On some of them we used colored sharpies to draw on some permanent changes…

Activities, Craft, feeding, fine-motor, oral motor, OT, Paper, preschool, Sensory, toddler

Sensory Painting with Pasta and Edible Paint

When working with a sensory group with food aversions, I needed to make the activities fun as well as give exposure to some of the sensations that go along with food. I wanted to have the food textures, smells and tastes available while making…

Activities, ADL, bimanual, child, cooking, Edible play dough, feeding, fine-motor, hand strengthening, OT, play dough, preschool, Sensory, sensory dough, toddler

Sweet Potato Play Dough

This Summer, I was running a group with kids that avoid food, so we played with all kinds of foods to get some pleasant associations with the smells and tastes. I wanted to make every day food into a fun activity, and one of the things we did…

Activities, activity printable, bimanual, elementary school age, fine-motor, Free Printable, games, hand strengthening, Handwriting, Motor Planning, Munchy Ball, OT, Paper, pipe cleaner, Printable, sensory motor, visual perceptual

Fishing for letters

To work on a combination of skills, I made some fish with letters on them, added some pipe cleaner to make it metallic, and made some fishing poles out of pipe cleaner and magnets. Fishing is a great way to work on bimanual hand skills, fine…

Activities, ADL, child, cooking, Craft, Edible play dough, elementary school age, feeding, fine-motor, Food, hand strengthening, OT, play dough, preschool, Sensory, sensory dough, toddler

Delicious Sensory Peanut Butter Play Dough

When working with kids who have food aversions, I work on having fun with food items. To make this delicious peanut butter play dough, I put the ingredients in a bowl and let the kids mix it all together. If you have a concern about peanut allergies,…

Activities, activity printable, child, Craft, Duck Tape, elementary school age, fine-motor, folding template, Free Printable, Handwriting, OT, Paper, pencil template, Printable, visual perceptual