Tracing Activities can help improve handwriting skills! Not only are kids working on motor memory and visual memory as they trace, but they are also working on motor control and coordination!
I am excited to share these FREE PRINTABLES to help kiddos with these skills AND because they can be used in so many different AND fun ways!
Just print off on card stock, laminate, and you’re ready!
First, let’s look at what’s inside the 17 page FREE downloadable Tracing Activities Pack:
- Instructions on how to use the free printables
- A simple guide to the development of handwriting
- 6 Prewriting strokes
- Circle
- Cross
- Square
- X
- Triangle
- Diamond
- 8 Designs and Mazes with a Variety of Difficulty
Next, let’s talk about HOW we can use these tracing printables:
I tend to use these printables without a writing utensil. Instead, I have the child use their index finger. I would also laminate them for durability!
POSITIONS TO COMPLETE THE ACTIVITIES IN:
- sitting at a table
- prone over a ball
- prone propped on elbows
- all 4’s
- standing with the tracing activities taped to the wall
- side sitting
- 1/2 kneeling with the activities taped to the wall
- Spread the tracing printables around the room and have the child use a scooter or animal crawl from one to the other
The variety of positions can either simplify the task or make it more challenging. Different positions can also work on other needs like weight bearing to the arms and hands working on arm strength, input to the muscles of the hands, core strength, and balance.
Want to crank up the difficulty a bit? Add an unstable surface to really kick in the core and work on balance!
In the first picture, some of the tracing activities were used as part of a warm-up activity at the beginning of our OT session. This idea can also be implemented into a sensory path, too. I like to use the carpet footprints HERE and the stepping stones HERE for activities!
In the next picture, I had the child get on all 4’s with his knees on a seating disc like this one. The orange arrow helped him know where to put his helper hand to stabilize the tracing printable and the buzzer (which the kids LOVE to use by the way!) was used as a crossing midline activity to hit after he was done tracing. Here’s the answer buzzers that add a little extra fun to our work sessions!
As with all activities on THE FINE MOTOR DETECTIVE, please use proper safety awareness and adult supervision. These activities are not to take the place of medical or therapeutic intervention.
I’ve talked a little bit about different ways to use these printables and even mentioned a sensory path, but another way I’ve incorporated them is for a sensory break during inclusion time! I always try to find simple solutions to help kids be successful in the classroom and for some of my kiddos with higher functioning autism, we’ve found that these tracing activities can be relaxing for them. So, after laminating them, we put them in a binder and made them accessible in the classroom. They can keep the binder in their desk or on a shelf and use them as a needed break!
Who are these tracing activities for?
Occupational Therapist, Teachers, and Parents will love the activity variations, skills that can be addressed, and all the fun with these printables!
This is a 17 Page Downloadable Printable PDF. No physical item will be shipped.
For other prewriting and handwriting activities, follow this link!