Motor skills are the ability of an individual to successfully complete a physical task that requires the coordination of the muscles of the body. Motor skills are broadly divided into fine motor skills and gross motor skills. Running, jumping, walking, crawling, etc. are the gross motor skills whereas writing, eating, drawing, etc. are the fine motor skills.
How are Motor Skills related to Autism?
As you know an autistic child faces a lot of difficulties in some kinds of work whether it is reading or drawing or simply playing with a ball. We cannot say that all autistic children face the same kind of difficulty while doing an activity and so we have to analyse the areas where a child is weak. Some children might be excellent at dextrous activities like writing and drawing while some may face difficulty even while holding a mug.
The first step is to see as to which activities your child faces difficulty in. The next step is to learn about the various activities and exercises that can improve the motor skills of your child. Autism does limit a few of the brain activities but also sharpens some of them. Hence it is important to recognise your child’s abilities.
Activities to enhance Fine Motor Skills of children
There are a number of activities that can help you improve fine motor skills of your child:
- Play-Dough – Play dough is one of the best and cheapest ways of making your child use all of their three organs that are responsible for fine motor skills. Using play dough requires a good co-ordination of their fingers, eyes, and their imagination. No child is a born sculptor or artist and hence it shouldn’t be important that your child makes something sensible out of their dough. Never restrict them on shapes and colours. Let them feel the shapes and colours for themselves. A blue cow or a purple tree won’t make a big difference to the world!
- Finger Painting – Finger painting is an amazing and colourful activity that can make it exciting for children to work with colours. All you need is a big sheet of paper and a bunch of finger paints. Let their fingers move the way they feel naturally and let the imagination and creativity of the child come out on paper. Be careful and see to it that they do not consume the paints. Let them get messy and do not restrict their finger or hand movements.
- Sponges – Sponges are also an excellent ay of helping your child strengthen their hand and finger muscles. Taken a few small buckets of water and a small sponge. Fill in different coloured food dyes and let the fun begin. Ask your child to soak the sponge in one bucket and then empty it in another by squeezing the sponge. This activity will strengthen their muscles and also fascinate them as they see different colours mixing to form new colours in the buckets.
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