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Sidewalk chalk can be a magical thing. It’s easy for little hands to grasp, it’s colorful, and you play with it outside. Here are some great ways to use sidewalk chalk to optimize its developmental benefit:
- Build Upper Body Strength: Got a chimney? Let your kids draw on the chimney or redecorate it by coloring the bricks. This is a great activity because the chimney acts as a vertical surface. Drawing and coloring on a vertical surface works wonders for developing shoulder and upper extremity strength, which, in turn, develops the stability a child needs to build handwriting skills.
- Develop Gross Motor Skills: Create fun gross motor games. Hopscotch is a classic game that builds coordination, balance, and motor planning. You can also work with your child to create other games. Draw different colored circles, squares, triangles, hearts, etc. Then create different movements and actions to get from one shape to another, such as hop on one foot to the purple circle or frog jump to the yellow triangle.
- Build Imitation Skills: Ability to imitate is one of the foundations of handwriting. Challenge for toddler to copy vertical and horizontal lines. Challenge your preschooler to copy circle and squares. Challenge your older kids to copy more complex designs incorporating overlapping shapes and intersecting lines.
- Teach Body Awareness: Have your child lie on the ground and use the chalk to outline his body. Then have him draw in the parts of their face and draw/color in their clothing.
- Develop Creativity: Challenge your child’s imagination and creativity. Call out different features and see if your child can create a picture using all of them, such as something green, something that flies, and something that is heavy. For toddlers, you can draw pictures and see if they can guess what it is.
- Build Social Development: Incorporate sharing and turn-taking skills throughout your child’s play. The gross motor games are great for developing these skills. Organized games such as Pictionary are also wonderful to play with sidewalk chalk.
And the best part? Sidewalk chalk is fun AND cheap. You can always find it at your local dollar store!
