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I’m a sucker for super easy play ideas but on the other hand these seem to be the ones that the kids love the most. It’s easy, it is not such a mess and in this one we work on fine motor skills as well as size sorting.
I emptied the bag of pom poms into a tub. Now these pom poms come in a variety of sizes so if my 2 year old wanted to get those pom poms into the pinecone she was going to have to pick the right sizes. Tadaa! Size sorting.
For the younger 1+ toddlers I would sort some pom poms that will fit, I think at that age they are not ready to size sort.
Your child then picks the pom poms up, lovely pincer exercise, then fit the pom pom between the spaces in the pinecones. Fine motor skills at its best! I tell you this activity keeps them busy for a while and is great to pull out if you need 5 odd minutes to get a task done.
I recently saw a similar activity with a plastic Dollar Store wisk and large pompoms. The toddlers at my church love to stick them in to see how many they can load up and then pull them out and start over. Very economical and fun.
Did your pine cones have the sharp ends on them? I’ve seen some that wouldn’t be “hand-friendly”, especially to a child. Did you snip the sharp points off?
Janice West says
I recently saw a similar activity with a plastic Dollar Store wisk and large pompoms. The toddlers at my church love to stick them in to see how many they can load up and then pull them out and start over. Very economical and fun.
Janice West says
Did your pine cones have the sharp ends on them? I’ve seen some that wouldn’t be “hand-friendly”, especially to a child. Did you snip the sharp points off?
Nicolette Roux says
mine didn’t have sharp points but definitely snip those pointy ends off if yours does! :O