I can’t believe Easter is quickly approaching! As a mom, I know it is sometimes tricky finding non food ideas for Easter baskets, so I wanted to share some fun ideas for Easter themed toys that work on developmental skills as well, more specifically fine motor skills! As a pediatric Occupational Therapist, this is an area I often support children both in the school and clinic setting. Fine motor skills are the coordination of small muscle movements in your hands. Developing these skills are important for a variety of school related activities including scissor skills, holding and moving a pencil correctly, and managing clothing fasteners. One tip I have-first, go to the Dollar Store and Target dollar racks a few weeks before Easter to stock up on some little items. I often am able to find chalk, bubbles, stamps, crayons, and stickers at great prices! Here are a few other ideas as well……
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This is a wonderful basic game for pre school aged children involving color identification, counting, and turn taking skills (see top pic of game.) Best of all……use of cute large bunny tweezers for hand strengthening and fine motor skills! The tweezers are perfect for pre school hands and can also be used for other activities as well, or just for moving the carrots in the game from one place to another. If the tweezers are tricky, you can also start with having your kids pick up the carrot pieces with their fingers only, it still promotes use of a pincer/tripod grasp pattern. Using this game is a great way to work on fine motor skill development!
This is a cute early cutting set for kids. I have taken this set to school and my preschool aged kids love having the hair grow out of the top of the chick. I love that this chick is easy to clean and playdough does not get stuck and dried inside it. Overall this toy is great for practicing early cutting skills and hand strengthening as well!
3.Wind Up Jumping White Bunny & Yellow Baby Chick Chicken Easter Egg 2 Pk
Wind up toys are great for hand strengthening and fine motor skills. They are also wonderful for promoting a tripod to pincer grasp and use of bilateral hand skills! Kids love winding these toys and watching them move!
4. Silly Putty
I loved silly putty as a kid! I found this at Target recently and took it for a test run with my kiddos at school. Putty is wonderful for hand strengthening skills, but when you purchase it from therapy supply stores it is pretty expensive! I love this multi colored easter set for a fraction of the price! My kids love playing “hidden treasure” and finding hidden small items in the putty, you could put in beads, pennies, etc, wonderful for hand strengthening and working on using a pincer(thumb and pointer finger) grasp pattern.
5.Play-Doh Easter Basket Toy 25-Piece Bundle, Make Your Own Easter Bunny Kit
Playdough is a great hand strengthening activity and is also wonderful for creative play! I love that this set has a variety of items including materials for building a bunny and stampers.
6.B. Toys – 300 Pcs – Pop Snap Bead Jewelry Set for Kids – Pop Arty! – DIY Craft Jewelry Making Kit
These are my favorite smaller sized pop beads. They are very durable (some of the less expensive beads will break when pushing them to connect to other beads) and the kids I work with, including my daughter (especially the little girls) love these beads! They love creating their own necklaces, bracelets, and even rings. This is a great craft set for multiple kids to enjoy that make quality necklaces that can be pulled apart and put back together many times! If a child does not want to make a necklace or bracelet, you can also put the beads together and make “snakes” or “caterpillars” and then once put together, they can play with them on the table or floor. This is a great toy for hand strengthening skills and promotes using a tripod grasp (middle finger, pointer finger, and thumb)which is the grasp that we promote for use when holding a writing utensil.
7.Stampers, Bubbles, Chalk sets-Don’t underestimate what can be found at the dollar store!
Stamps are great for fine motor skills for opening and closing and also a great addition to creative card making or picture activities. Stampers are nice for hand strengthening as well. Check out the dollar store or target dollar rack for seasonal stampers, they often carry these!
Bubbles are great for visual motor skill development
Use of sidewalk chalk is wonderful for visual motor skills, pre writing skills, and arm strengthening skills. It is also great for creative play!
I hope you have found these toy ideas helpful for Easter basket planning! Happy almost Easter!
Kim Heyer OTR/L