Fine motor skills involve precise use of the hands and fingers, e.g. pointing, drawing, using a spoon to feed, writing, stringing beads, doing up shoelaces.

Suggestions to encourage your baby’s fine motor development

• Drawing activities using crayons for scribbling.
• Building blocks for creative building.
• Hammering activities using hammer and peg toys for coordination.
• Pop-up toys, stacking toys, nesting pots.
• Opportunities for opening, closing lids on bottles.
• Playing with construction toys, e.g. Duplo/Lego.
• Encourage play-dough activities; rolling dough into big balls using palms of hands, into small balls using only the fingertips, or making things, e.g. snake, people, snail and house.
• Give your child a large plastic tweezers to lift small objects into a container, e.g. peas, cereal.
• Show your child how to lace pasta/cheerios onto a shoelace.
• Create sorting activities, e.g. sorting coloured pegs, buttons or Lego into different containers.
• Encourage pouring and filling activities, e.g. water and sand play.
• Provide balloons and balls for catching, kicking, throwing and hitting.