Infant Tools for Tiny Hands
Fine motor practice for infants and their adults
Fine motor skills are the ability to make small movements with the fingers, hands, and wrists. Babies need lots of time and practice to develop the muscle strength for these skills.
- Audience
- Caregiver
- Subject
- Fine Motor Skill Development
- Age
- Infant
- Languages
- EnglishSpanish
For infants, practicing fine motor skills can look like:
- Reaching
- Moving their arms
- Holding things in their hands (and eventually being able to let go of them)
- Looking at things and tracking them with their eyes
- Beginning to develop hand-eye coordination
What is the grown-up's role?
Warm, playful interactions with grown-ups are important! Encouraging your baby while you play together will help them gain confidence as they practice new skills.
Activity ideas to try with infants:
Grasping toys like rings, blocks, and rattles
- Grasping is a natural reflex babies are born with! They can practice holding on to things like your finger right away, but their grasp will change over time as their muscles develop.
- Periodically switching out toys as babies grow helps them use their hands in different ways.
- Household items are also super fun for little hands. Paper cups are fun to pick up, roll on the ground, and even squeeze!
Playing with masking tape
- This is a fun opportunity to practice peeling and sticking and developing pincer motions with fingers (using the thumb and index finger to pick up small objects).
- There are lots of other ways to practice this type of movement, like peeling velcro, tape, stickers, sticky notes, and even picking up snacks like cereal.
- Before babies can successfully pinch with their fingers, they can grab at things with their whole hands. Grabbing with their whole hand is a great start.
- When babies are able to pick things up with their fingers, they’re practicing for important everyday tasks, like eating, dressing themselves, and even early drawing or writing (such as scribbling).
For more activities download the full resource below:
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