Mommy Teach Me:: Manpulatives

Manipulatives

A picture says
a thousand words.

Barbara sitting in a huge chair

No preschool class would be complete without manipulatives - activities designed to develop cognitive and fine motor skills. To make the most of your child's preschool years, you'll want to invest in some of these yourself.

Break away from the discount toy ghettos with thousands of distracting gizmos for your kids (yes, some of this stuff is fun, but your money will be better spent elsewhere) and look in the phonebook for a Teacher Supply Store near you or check out some of the resources listed below.

	Unifix Cubes A must-have kids' manipulative with multiple purposes: counting, sorting, sequencing activities. Later, you can get pattern cards, a hundreds board, early math activities.
	ABC Nesting Blocks A lesson in size and proportion. Similar to Montessori's Pink Tower - but so much more affordable! - you can present it the same way. Take the boxes out slowly, one-by-one. Make a quietly dramatic show of finding the largest and set it in place. Make a quietly dramatic show of finding the second largest and set it squarely atop the first to begin building a tower. When the tower is complete, walk around it with your child, looking at it from every angle. Take it apart and ask him to do it again.
	Pattern Blocks A must-have for preschoolers. Exploring designs with them will leave a lasting concrete impression of geometric relationships on which your future learner will be able to build. With a set of pattern cards, the set will do double-duty encouraging concentration and attention to visual detail.
	Pattern Block Cards A must-have for preschoolers. Exploring designs with them will leave a lasting concrete impression of geometric relationships on which your future learner will be able to build. With a set of pattern cards, the set will do double-duty encouraging concentration and attention to visual detail.
	Counting and Sorting Bear Set Maria Montessori insisted that children be given lots of time to work with manipulatives before being introduced to the abstract. In other words, we would count small items with children over and over before showing them what the numerals actually look like. You can buy a set like this, or simply round up pennies or some all-of-one-kind objects to teach your child to count. You can use sets of buttons differing in size and shape to teach sorting.
	Dover Coloring Books I used to underestimate coloring books - thinking they stifled creativity. As I watched my children grow, I realized that creativity is not that easily stifled. Coloring books not only offer a kid-friendly challenge to improve handwriting skills (through exercising fine motor control), but also are one of the best vehicles for increasing a child's ability to concentrate on a given task for a long period of time. Since concentration is a portable skill - someone who's learned to concentrate on one thing is then capable of carrying that concentration to other tasks - coloring books are an excellent choice for kids. Knights and Armor is just one of many, many of the incredible Dover line of coloring books, which span all eras of history and culture, plus the animal kingdom. Search amazon under Dover coloring books to see the wide range of choices.
	Prisma Color Pencils These are pricy, but they so outclass any others in terms or performance and results. They just feel good to use - and feeling is important to keep kids motivated and working independently. br /> I'm not suggesting these for tiny tots, but for children old enough to work on the Dover coloring books. Here is how to maximize the benefits fo the coloring experience: When you introduce the pencils, handle them reverently so your child will do the same. Show him how to take out one at a time and put it back before taking out another. When teaching how to use the coloring books, make sure he's positioned at the right height at the table (with the tabletop at the level of his body where you would want it on yours), with the coloring book at the proper writing slant, and his left hand stabilizing the book at the upper left. Encourage him to sit up straight rather than leaning over his work. You begin coloring the first picture - or another you can finish side-by-side with him - with up-and-down, left-to-right movements. In this way, the fine motor control is further tuned toward developing a foundation for handwriting skills.
	Puzzles with knobs Puzzles with knobs encourage your child's pincer grasp - exercising the fine motor control which will lead to handwriting. Teach your child totake out the pieces and set them down carefully to the left of the puzzle; then when he puts them back, he will be exercising left-to-right eye hand coordination - creating a foundation for future reading and writing.
	Parquetry Blocks A really lovely set of brightly-painted wooden tiles designed to sharpen a child's awareness of shape and color through matching designs on cards, while imparting a subliminal message about geometric relationships - the basis for high school geometry.
	Pegboard Start at the youngest age with simply inserting the pegs randomly into the holes - great practice for your toddler's pincer grasp, so necessary for later writing. Later, she can sort rows by colors or build tall towers in sequence - red, yellow, red, yellow, and so on. A good "toy" lends itself to being used in more ways than one.
	Pegboard with small pegs A refinement of the pegboard your child uses first. See the natural progression from the larger pegs which involve the whole hand to these teeny ones which encourage the pincer grasp? Great preparation for later writing - and concentration.
	Primary Colors Lacing Beads These primary-colored beads beg to be caught up on a lace! All the better to keep your toddler practicing his fine motor control and concentration.
	Lacing and Tracing Classic preschool, this set - which my own children have used for years - is simple and sturdy, doubling as lacing cards and templates for tracing on paper to color. Good preparation for writing skills.

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