Simple DIY Fine Motor Activities for Toddlers

Let’s talk about the powerful simplicity of fine motor activities for toddlers. These activities are some of the simplest to set up and have a huge return on investment, at least in our household! I want to share with you 5 DIY fine motor categories of activities that you can try with your toddler to support finger dexterity and concentration during any season!

Table of Contents

The Need for Purposeful Work for Toddlers

If you have a toddler, you know how eager and excited they are to learn about how the world around them works! It is important to prepare our minds with an arsenal of ideas and activities that we can quickly put together to get them engaged in meaningful and purposeful work!

I hope that these fine motor activities like scooping, tweezing, pouring, cutting, and lacing activities fill your home with joy and peaceful concentration. If you are looking for some seasonal DIY activities, check out these DIY Montessori fall activities for toddlers! There isn’t anything I love more than a great fine motor DIY project that engages my toddler completely! Okay, well there probably are things I love more, but these activities are still great.

A toddler sorting pine cones into an egg carton.

Scooping

Transferring things from one place to another is a wonderful fine motor activity for a young child. We can set up a simple scooping transfer activity with two small dishes on a tray and a small scoop. I typically grab my teaspoon or tablespoon from the kitchen for this. You can use whatever materials you have on hand. For younger toddlers, I recommend something bigger like dried beans or even small objects like these little pumpkins I picked up from the dollar store. You could use jingle bells around Christmastime or some beads. Always observe your child during these activities to make sure the objects are not a choking hazard.

Two containers, one with jingle bells and a stainless stell scoop. — Scooping jingle bells.

A Montessori activity of scooping dry beans between two bowls. — Scooping dried beans.

Tweezing

These small little tongs are so versatile! We use them in the kitchen when serving foods like shredded cheese or small pieces of something. They also work so well as a fine motor activity. By 22 months old, I was surprised to see that my twins were capable of using these small tongs to transfer objects like pom-poms and jingle bells.

A dish of mini jingle bells, a tongs and an ice cube tray.

You can set up tweezing activities very similarly to a scooping activity. Just have two bowls and allow your child to transfer the objects from dish to dish using tongs. Another variety would be to have them transfer from a dish into an ice cube tray or egg carton. For an initial transfer activity, they could transfer large pom-poms into a mini muffin pan. I like to check out the dollar store to find seasonal small items to use in these sorts of transfer activities.

Two bowls and a tongs on a wooden tray. One bowl has pumpkin seeds in it. — Pumpkin seed transferring from bowl to bowl.

Transfering pumpkins into an egg carton.

Pom poms tranfering to an ice tray. — Pom-Pom transfering into an ice cube tray.

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Pouring

Another version of transfer work is pouring from one vessel to another. We have loved both our pouring cup and pitcher from the Realist LovEvery Play Kit as well as these small stainless steel pitchers. Here are a few ideas of materials your child could pour. As always, set this activity up on a tray to allow for easier clean-up and awareness of spills.

Pouring Materials To Try

Water
Dried beans
Dried pasta noodles
Jingle bell
Pumpkin seeds
Dried lentils
Rice (for an older toddler)
Cereal

Two small pitchers. One filled with small jingle bells. — Jingle bell pouring

A Montessori activity of pouring dry beans between two small pitchers. — Pouring dried beans

A Montessori activity of pouring water between two pitchers with a sponge for spills. — Pouring water

A Montessori activity of pouring dry pasta between two small pitchers. — Dried pasta pouring.

Lacing

Lacing beads onto string is a fabulous fine motor activity that requires tenacity and concentration. The Threadable bead kit from LovEvery is perfect, it comes in The Adventurer Play Kit. A simple DIY version is to tie a shoelace to a basket with a handle on it, this way you are creating an ending place for the beads so they don’t just slip off. Then place a few beads into the basket.

We have these chunky wooden beads, but you definately don’t want to put these all out at once, at least not while your child is just getting the hang of lacing. Instead, place just a few, 3-5 beads, into the basket. You could also use large dried pasta noodles like Mezzi Rigatoni or Calamarata noodles. Later, you could use a longer pasta like Penne, which you can still thread the string through, but would offer a bit more of a challenge.

Chunky wooden beads and a string to thread them.

Cutting

Cutting work is another opportunity for fine motor skills to develop. A great first pair of scissors to offer are these loop squeeze scissors. Just squeeze the loop together, and it cuts.