6 Easy and Engaging Activities to Help Toddlers Build Grasping Skills
Engaging the arms and hands in diverse movements and varying speeds is a fantastic way to support upper body motor skill development. Activities like tossing soft balls, or reaching for objects.
Developing strong grasping skills is a vital milestone in your toddler's growth, paving the way for improved coordination, fine motor abilities, and independence. By engaging their tiny hands in purposeful activities, you can help them strengthen their grip while fostering creativity and focus. This page offers fun and practical ideas to make learning grasping skills exciting for your little one. Whether through playful challenges, interactive tools, or everyday tasks, these suggestions will empower your toddler to explore, learn, and thrive in their developmental journey. Dive in to discover engaging ways to support your child's growing abilities!
1. Indoor Basketball
Indoor basketball shooting is a fantastic way to stay active and have fun, solo or with friends and family. You can set up a simple hoop on a door or wall or go for an arcade-style basketball game with electronic scoring for added excitement. This activity can be done using any softball. It is an easy and fun activity. All it takes is some imagination. These setups are perfect for improving shooting skills and hand-eye coordination and even engaging in friendly competition indoors.
If you're looking for options, foldable arcade basketball games, mini hoops for kids, or even professional-grade indoor setups are available.
Engage your child in a fun and easy indoor activity by encouraging them to throw soft items like balls, stuffed toys, or folded socks into a basket. This playful exercise enhances hand-eye coordination and develops motor skills and focus. To make it more exciting, take turns with your child, cheer each other on, and even turn it into a friendly game by seeing who can score the most "baskets." This activity is perfect for bonding while promoting physical activity and teamwork!
How to make this game more challenging
Move the basket farther away each time your child scores.
Add some paper and markers for keeping score.
2. Catching And Throwing Balls Game
The Catching and Throwing Balls Game is a simple yet engaging activity that helps toddlers develop essential motor skills and hand-eye coordination. Here's how to make it fun and effective:
Set Up: Choose soft balls of various sizes or even use rolled-up socks for safety. Find a spacious area indoors or outdoors where your child can comfortably play.
How to Play: Start by gently tossing the ball to your child and encouraging them to catch it. Then, switch roles, letting them throw the ball back to you. Adjust the distance and speed based on their skill level.
Add a Twist: Introduce challenges like aiming for a target (e.g., a basket or a specific spot on the wall) or using colorful balls and asking your child to toss or catch a particular color.
This simple game of throwing and catching a ball allows your child to strengthen their fine motor skills. Skills such as grasping and coordination while trying to catch the ball. Do encourage your child's efforts and praise them as they play.
How to make this game more challenging
Each person has to do one exercise action when they don’t catch the ball.
Suggest different passing methods, such as rolling and throwing it with one hand.
3. Dancing While Holding Things
Playing upbeat music and encouraging your child to move their entire body is an excellent way to support physical development, coordination, and creativity. Incorporate items like ribbons, scarves, hats, streamers, or even musical instruments like tambourines or maracas to make it more engaging. These props can inspire imaginative movement and exploration.
Choose songs with clear hand, finger, and arm movements, such as clapping, waving, or pointing, to ensure your child actively uses their upper body. You could also introduce dance-along videos or create simple choreography together for added fun. This activity promotes motor skill development and fosters self-expression and a love for music and movement. Dancing while holding items is a fantastic activity that combines movement, balance, and coordination for toddlers. Here's how to make it fun and engaging:
Choose Safe Items: Select lightweight and safe objects for your child to hold while dancing, such as soft toys, scarves, or small beanbags.
Set the Mood: Play lively music that encourages movement and creativity. Songs with steady rhythms or playful lyrics work great for this activity.
Encourage Creativity: Let your child experiment with different ways to move while holding the item—spinning, jumping, swaying, or even walking in rhythm to the beat.
Balance Challenge: Use items that can be balanced on their head, shoulders, or arms to add a fun twist to the dancing.
Turn-Taking: Dance with your child and alternate moves, encouraging them to copy or invent new steps while holding the items.
This activity strengthens motor skills and coordination and fosters self-expression and joyful play—some songs.
Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes.
Row, Row, Row Your Boat.Â
Roll The Bobby Pin.
Listen to the Water.
If You Are Happy And You Know It.
The Wheels On The Bus.
Swimming, Swimming In A Swimming Pool.
One little finger.
The Itsy Bitsy Spider.
4. Doing More Arts And CraftsÂ
Encouraging your child to engage in arts and crafts with recycled or loose parts is a brilliant way to spark creativity while developing essential motor skills. By providing open-ended materials—such as bottle caps, fabric scraps, cardboard pieces, or buttons—you allow your child to experiment freely and explore their imagination. Activities like gluing, tearing, cutting, or assembling these items help strengthen their grasp, improve hand coordination, and enhance fine motor control.
Art projects that involve grasping movements, finger manipulation, and palm pressing—like stamping, sculpting with playdough, or creating collages—challenge the whole hand to work in different directions. This combination of skill-building and self-expression makes arts and crafts a powerful tool for your child’s development.
Grasping skills activities
Pressing Playdough: Use cookie cutters to create shapes, enhancing hand strength and creativity.
Drawing: Provide markers or fat crayons for easy grip and doodling to boost fine motor skills.
Magnetic Exploration: Use magnet wands to collect magnetic items, combining fun with learning about magnetism.
Toy Assembly: Pull apart and reassemble toy pieces of various sizes to practice grasping and problem-solving.
Winding Up Toys: Encourage winding motions to develop hand strength and coordination.
Building Fun: Stack and build with blocks, cups, and sticks for imaginative play and spatial awareness.
Sound Play: Shake rattles or other sound-making instruments to engage auditory senses and motor skills.
Paper Ripping: Tear different kinds of paper to strengthen finger dexterity and precision.
Bead Stringing: Thread large beads onto a sturdy string to enhance focus and hand-eye coordination.
Painting: Experiment with various tools and brushes for colorful, creative expression.
Car Play: Push and drive toy cars to work on movement and spatial understanding.
Walking While Pulling Toys: Encourages physical activity and coordination.
Peeling and Sticking Big Stickers: Strengthens fine motor skills and finger dexterity.
Stamping with Bottle Caps or Potato Stamps: Enhances creativity and grasping skills.
Playing with Sea Animals in Colored Water: Combines sensory exploration with imaginative play.
Hanging Clothes with Clothespins: This develops hand strength and precision.
Pulling Zippers Up and Down: Improves fine motor control and hand coordination.
Opening and Closing Bottle Lids: This teaches problem-solving and strengthens grip.
Spreading Glue and Adding Decorations: Combines artistic expression with hand movement.
Picking Up Loose Parts with Tongs and Big Spoons: Refines hand-eye coordination and motor precision.
Putting Large Buttons into Containers
Encourage creativity and motor skill development through arts and crafts.
Provide open-ended materials like recycled items (bottle caps, fabric scraps, cardboard, and buttons).
Let your child experiment freely, fostering imagination and exploration.
Activities like gluing, tearing, cutting, and assembling help strengthen hand coordination and fine motor skills.
Projects such as stamping, sculpting playdough, or creating collages involve the entire hand with movements like grasping, palm pressing, and finger manipulation.
Arts and crafts seamlessly combine self-expression with essential skill-building.
5. Tissue Box Exploration Fun
This simple yet stimulating activity is perfect for children under 18 months, as it helps build their grasping skills and introduces them to sensory play. Here's how you can set it up:
Materials Needed
An empty tissue box.
Pieces of cloth, towels, ribbons, scarves, or similar items that are soft, easy to pull, and fit snugly into the box.
How to Play
Place the items inside the tissue box, ensuring some parts are visible or sticking out to grab your child’s interest.
Hand the box to your little one and let them explore freely.
Watch as your child pulls the items out and perhaps even try to put the items back in.
This activity encourages fine motor skill development and fosters curiosity and self-directed play. It’s a delightful way for your child to engage their senses while strengthening their hands
6. Picking Up Magnetic Objects
This engaging activity is perfect for developing your toddler's grasping skills and introducing them to the wonders of magnetism. This activity not only strengthens hand coordination and grip but also introduces basic STEM concepts in a fun and interactive way. Activity can consist of using different magnetic objects; stick to medium size and safer things because your child will try to mouth them. Magnetic sticks or magnetic bars are great for grasping and work well when picking up objects. Please keep an eye on your toddlers as they do this activity. Here's how to set it up:
Materials Needed
Medium-sized, safe magnetic objects (e.g., magnetic balls, toy magnets).
Magnetic sticks or bars are designed for children.
How to Play
Scatter the magnetic objects on a flat surface or in a shallow bin.
Give your child a magnetic stick or bar and encourage them to pick up the objects.
Safety Note: Always supervise your toddler during this activity to ensure they don’t mouth the objects.
For Toddlers 18-20 Months
Magnetic Fishing Game: Use a magnetic fishing set with colorful fish to encourage hand-eye coordination and grasping skills.
Magnetic Animal Figures: Provide large magnetic animal shapes for imaginative play and storytelling.
Magnetic Drawing Board: Introduce a magnetic doodle board for scribbling and drawing, which helps develop fine motor skills.
Magnetic Gears: Offer magnetic gear sets that toddlers can connect and spin, promoting problem-solving and exploration.
Magnetic Shape Sorters: Use magnetic shapes that fit into corresponding slots to teach shape recognition and matching.
Magnetic Train Sets: Provide magnetic train cars that connect and move, encouraging creative play and coordination.
Magnetic Foam Letters and Numbers: Use soft magnetic foam pieces for early learning and tactile exploration.
Magnetic Maze Boards magnetic fridge magnets.
Magnetic Sensory Bottles: Fill clear bottles with magnetic items like paper clips or small metal balls, and let your toddler use a magnetic wand to move them around.
Magnetic Shape Matching: Create a board with outlines of shapes and provide magnetic pieces for your child to match to the outlines.
Magnetic Animal Safari: Use magnetic animal figures and let your toddler "rescue" them with a magnetic wand.
Magnetic Painting: Place a piece of paper in a shallow tray, add a few drops of paint, and use a magnet to move a metal ball around to create art.
Magnetic Treasure Hunt: Hide magnetic items in a sensory bin filled with rice or sand, and let your toddler find them using a magnetic wand.
Magnetic Maze: Create a simple maze on a board and let your child use a wand to guide a magnetic ball through it.
Magnetic Dress-Up Dolls: Provide magnetic dolls with interchangeable outfits for imaginative play.
Magnetic Stacking Rings: Use magnetic rings that repel or attract each other to create fun stacking challenges.
For Toddlers 22-30 Months
Magnetic Marble Run: Create a simple marble run on a magnetic board using magnetic strips, and let your toddler guide magnetic marbles through the track.
Magnetic Sorting Game: Provide a mix of magnetic and non-magnetic objects and let your child use a magnetic wand to sort them into two groups.
Magnetic Construction Challenge: Use magnetic building tiles or blocks to create specific structures, like towers or bridges, encouraging problem-solving and creativity.
Magnetic Fishing Pond: Set up a "pond" with magnetic fish and let your toddler use a magnetic fishing rod to catch them.
Magnetic Maze Puzzle: Create a maze on a magnetic board and have your child guide a magnetic ball using a wand.
Magnetic Letter Matching: Pair magnetic alphabet letters with corresponding pictures or words on a board for early literacy practice.
Magnetic Vehicle Play: Use magnetic train sets or cars to build tracks and explore movement and connection.
Magnetic Shape Patterns: Provide magnetic shapes and challenge toddlers to replicate patterns or create their designs.
Magnetic Art Board: Let your child arrange magnetic pieces to create pictures or abstract art on a board.
Magnetic Treasure Hunt: Hide magnetic items in a sensory bin filled with rice or sand, and let your toddler find them using a magnetic wand—fridge magnets.
Magnetic Marble Sorting: Provide magnetic marbles of different colors and let your child sort them into containers using a magnetic wand.
Magnetic Shape Towers: Challenge your toddler to stack magnetic shapes into tall towers without them toppling over.
Magnetic Animal Safari: Hide magnetic animal figures around the room and let your child "rescue" them using a magnetic wand.
Magnetic Letter Hunt: Scatter magnetic alphabet letters and ask your child to find specific ones using a wand, promoting early literacy.
Magnetic Art Creations: Use a magnetic board and pieces to create imaginative scenes or patterns.
Magnetic Maze Challenge: Create a maze on a magnetic board and have your child guide a magnetic ball using a wand.
Magnetic Vehicle Assembly: Provide magnetic vehicle parts and let your toddler build cars, trains, or planes by connecting the pieces.
Magnetic Puzzle Boards: Offer puzzles with magnetic pieces that fit into specific slots, encouraging problem-solving.
Magnetic Fishing Adventure: Set up a "pond" with magnetic fish and let your child catch them using a magnetic fishing rod.
Magnetic Building Challenges: Use magnetic tiles or blocks to create specific structures like bridges, houses, or animals.