Have you ever had a candy tray, chocolate gift box, cupcake holder, or other container and wondered if you can use it in play? Incorporating Valentine’s Day activities into occupational therapy sessions is fun with interactive play ideas like this one. We used a chocolate gift box as a Valentine’s day play dough activity with a fine motor component.
Valentine’s day activities for kids can be a fun way to work on skills like fine motor strength or eye-hand coordination. Take this heart maze or instance. This is an easy prep activity that can be upgraded or downgraded for each child’s needs and levels while working on visual perceptual skills and eye-hand coordination with a heart theme.
Valentines Day Play Dough
Creating this play dough activity is easy. Make a set of colored play dough. Our crayon play dough recipe will get you set up with literally any color in the crayon box.
Valentine’s Day Fine Motor Activity
Playing with play dough and rolling small balls of play dough is a great way to build fine motor strength, especially intrinsic hand strength.
The sky is the limit when it comes to this open-ended play activity. Encourage imagination and play in a fun, Valentine’s Day theme!
Kids can press the dough into the trays to strengthen the hands, work on finger isolation, separation of the sides of the hand, and more.
Invite your kiddos to use their imagination. Can they make teeny tiny sprinkles from the play dough? Hellloo, precision and fine motor work!
Use the play dough to make play dough chocolates, candies, chocolate bars, or other treats from play dough.
They look good enough to eat, right??? Use the dough to roll balls of “chocolates” using just the fingertips. It’s a great way to work on separation of the sides of the hands, intrinsic strength, and arch development.
More Valentine’s Day occupational therapy activities
Valentine’s Day Sparkle Fine Motor Craft
Valentine’s Day Fine Motor Busy Bag
Colleen Beck, OTR/L is an occupational therapist with 20 years experience, graduating from the University of Pittsburgh in 2000. Colleen created The OT Toolbox to inspire therapists, teachers, and parents with easy and fun tools to help children thrive. As the creator, author, and owner of the website and its social media channels, Colleen strives to empower those serving kids of all levels and needs. Want to collaborate? Send an email to contact@theottoolbox.com.
Now I've seen everything! It is amazing what things people are coming up with for Valentines Day. We tend to be very low key about it at our place. Hope you are having a good week.
This is sooo cute! I love it. We are definitely doing this 🙂