Gross motor skills are the abilities required to control the large muscles of our body for activities like walking, running, jumping, and skipping. Teaching children motor skills is directly related to their physical fitness and development. By introducing them to these skills at such a young age, it can help children develop and mature their movements as they grow. Giving children the opportunity to move is the most important thing you can do. These movements can be small or big, and don’t need to be complex. Jumping, dancing, skipping, running, and walking all give children the opportunity to work on their gross motor development. Focusing on these skills will help children learn to enjoy movement and exercise and help them practice healthy habits for the future.
At ECDC children have plenty of time to move during free play in the classroom, run around during outside time on the playground, or build forts during the afternoon in the multipurpose room. As school ends and we’re still home during the pandemic, there are plenty of ways to keep children busy and active during the summer.
Honoring Outdoor Play
Giving children the opportunity to play outside helps them appreciate nature, move their bodies, and explore the world around them. Providing students with hands-on, outside learning stimulates their senses through what they hear, touch, see, and feel. Children can build with sticks, rake leaves, jump in mud puddles, and help plant gardens. Through outdoor play, children learn to enjoy the natural environment and learn to seek out exercise, fresh air, and activity. Outdoor play helps children appreciate the world around them, take part in physical activity, and learn to care for the environment.
At ECDC we give our students many opportunities explore outside. Our lessons connect classroom learning to the outside world, and we focus on practicing ways to take of our earth like recycling, not using too much water when washing our hands, and bringingreusable containers for lunch. Our outside areas enhance students motor skills because of all the running, climbing, and exploring they can do. Children can ride bikes, toss a ball, swing, and dig in the sandbox.
Having children home all day every day is much different than it was when parks and beaches were open but there are still plenty of ways to keep them busy with little to no materials. Keeping children moving and practicing their gross motor skills will benefit them when we can hopefully get back to school in the fall! Giving children the opportunity to practice these healthy habits will help them develop their physical fitness and help them learn to enjoy movement and exercise.
Gross Motor Practice
Here are a few ideas that Ms. Allyce (Seashell Graduate Assistant) wanted to share that may be fun to explore in the summer months away from ECDC. While many families may have gone on numerous walks and bike rides, she wanted to provide some resources and ideas on ways to stay moving and active at home, both inside and outside.
What’s your name? Workout
Below is a chart of exercises that you can work on with your children. The goal is for them to spell their name and then complete the exercise listed next to each letter of their name. This can be tied in with writing and reading practice, because they have to write their name and then read the exercise. Modeling this for your child will be a fun way to get them engaged and get the whole family moving!
Yoga for Kids
During our second week of Zoom meetings in the Seashell class, we focused on plants and flowers. To get students out of their seats, Ms. Jessica taught them a yoga pose at the end of each meeting! The seashells enjoyed this and by the end of the week were masters at the Flower pose. One fun way to do this is to go outside and try and find each thing before you practice the pose. You can do this while planting a garden, going on a walk, or exploring your neighborhood or backyard. Yoga focuses on both the body and the mind, and is a great exercise to use with children! There is also fun yoga channels that you can tune into to make it an interactive way to learn new poses with your children. Cosmic Kids focuses on both yoga and mindfulness that will keep your children calm and happy throughout the day!
Tic-Tac-Toss
For some gross motor practice, you need three simple materials for tic-tac-toss. First you need to tape down a tic-tac-toe board on your floor, or you can draw it with chalk on your sidewalk. Next you need two different color bean bags or balls, that your children can work on throwing and tossing. Children will try their best to throw the bean bags in the square of their choice and once they get three in a row, they win! This helps children practice taking turns and work on their throwing!
These are only a few ideas to get children moving, but they all incorporate gross motor development, getting up and moving, and practicing healthy habits. The most important thing is that children are having fun and using these activities to stay active. A requirement for all is doing them with a smile and enjoying time together as a family!
The South Carolina Standards that this post is focused on are stated below:
Health and Physical Development (HPD)
Subdomain: Physical Health and Growth
- Goal HPD-2: Children engage in and sustain various forms of physical play indoors and outdoors.
Subdomain: Motor Development
- Goal HPD-4: Children develop the large muscle control and abilities needed to move through and explore their environment.
- Goal HPD-5: Children develop small muscle control and hand-eye coordination to manipulate objects and work with tools.
