Pom Poms & Ice Cube Trays

I've made it my goal to do a few minutes of structured develoment-focused playtime every day, whether it's motor skills, nature, art, music, sensory play, or colors/letters/shapes .  I started this a couple months ago, so far, I've only been able to maintain it a few days per week, mostly due to lack of planning up-front or realizing we don't have a supply we need to do one of the activities.  However, we do own some great puzzles and educational toys that I use when I haven't planned something crafty.

I saw an idea on Pinterest for an activity involving pom poms & ice cube trays that combined fine motor skills, colors, counting, and 1:1 coordination (1 pom per 1 ice cube cup).

The idea is simple: grab a pom from the tray

And place it in it's individual slot in the ice cube tray.

After watching me do a few, she picked up on the "game" very quickly.  She got a big kick out of shouting the color before she picked up each pom pom.  This girl really knows her colors!  We also practiced sorting the poms by color and filling the tray with only blue poms, or only yellow poms.

She wasn't into the counting so much.  It was all "One, Two, Ten!" over and over.  After awhile, we became bored with sorting, and it was more fun to feel the fuzzy texture and dump them all into the tray at once.

Also, I've recently been teaching her how to smile, but as you can see, we still have a way to go, because I get this face every time :)

It was a fun, frugal activity!  We'll probably be trying it again in a few weeks, maybe using spoons to transfer the poms for added motor skill challenges.