Ping Pong Ball Activity

Nowadays, I find lil princess  very active.  I used to think that girls are quiet and behave well, whereby they can sit still and play their own toys.  Somehow, lil princess is different as she grows older.  She is also as active as my lil prince.  I now not only have one hyperactive child at home, in fact, now I have two!  Sometimes, I find it hard to concentrate when I am guiding lil prince in his homework.  My lil princess will be disturbing us most of the time. 

 

Yesterday, I decided to distract her by giving her some activity to focus on.  I prepared two bowls (big and small), six ping pong balls and a tong.  I asked her to transfer the ping pong balls from one bowl to another bowl.  Although it seems like an easy task, but for a 23 months old baby with small hands, she seems to struggle a bit at the beginning.  After 20 minutes, she began to get hold of it and this activity managed to make her sit at the same spot for 1 hour!  I had the other 1 hour to focus on lil prince and his school work and also we did some colouring activities.   

I believe that this activity also benefit lil princess with her hands movement.  I remember reading about this activity from one of the Montessori blog.  The purpose of this activity is to teach a child to move objects using tongs.  This help them to develop their fine motor skills, concentration, coordination and control.

I remember when lil prince was young, I read about some Montessori activities that are pretty interesting for baby.  I guess I should start searching again.