I have always loved threading. It is brilliant for developing fine motor skills and hand eye coordination and a great precursor to learning to sew. The only problem is that for little fingers holding a thread can be really tricky. It’s just to bendy to put it through a tiny hole. Of course that is the point of practicing but some children get so frustrated they don’t want to continue.
Which is why I was thrilled when we were at the twins toddler group and they used this amazingly simple solution. Simply tie a small piece of pipe cleaner to the end of the thread and it becomes so much easier to do. I’ve used shoe laces before which do the same job, but this is good because thou can have any sort of string you want.
The twins love listening to The Very Hungry Caterpillar. They like to poke their fingers through the holes in the leaves and fruit and cakes and all the rest. So it seemed natural to make a little caterpillar to thread through the leaves.
The caterpillar is simply a bit of green pipe cleaner wrapped round a small piece of red pipe cleaner. I drew some eyes with black permanent marker but you don’t need to do that.
Molly made the leaves for her sisters. She cut out a simple leaf shape from craft foam and punched holes around the edge with a hole punch.
The twins then threaded the little caterpillar through the leaf. At the moment they need a lot of help although they can pull it through.
They also liked to thread it through the holes in the book.
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For another post on threading look here:
