Activity for ages 3 to 7

This activity is perfect for developing fine motor skills. This salt writing project was a creative and fun fine motor skills activity perfect for building the hand muscles my boys will use later when they’re writing. I was excited to play it again at home.

To Prep

The prep for this activity was quick and simple. I gathered a couple pieces of colorful construction paper and filled a squeeze bottle with salt. {Normally the bottle would be used with ketchup or mustard}. I left one of the papers blank but used a black Sharpie to draw dots and designs on the other paper like this:

Fine Motor Skills Activity

When my four year old came in from playing outside, I invited him to join me. I gave him the blank page first so that he could squeeze, draw and scribble with the salt.

When my son was ready to finish free play, I gave him the paper with designs and had him “trace” the lines and dots with salt. He loved the extra challenge.

After playing with a few more homemade tracing pages, we cleaned up our mess. A little tip: brooms and dust pans work so much better than vacuums – even on carpet. The latter only makes the mess bigger. And if it’s nice outside, heading outdoors is ideal.

Extra Challenge

Although C wasn’t quite ready for it, salt writing would be an awesome way to have kids practice sight words. Just write the words they’re practicing on a piece of paper and have them trace the letters, dump the salt, and trace again.

More Fine Motor Skills Activities

For more fine motor fun, take a peek at what we did with pipe cleaners and a strainer,  25 Fun Quiet Time Activities and check out our printable Pre-Writing Activity Pack.