Here’s a quick and simple gross motor color game that E LOVES. It gets her moving and memorizing her colors.
(E was 3 years and 11 months old.)
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Materials for Gross Motor Color Game:
- Plastic cones in different colors. {They’re sold as party supplies.}
Yep, that’s all. This is about the simplest activity you’ve ever set up and taken down – especially for me, as E has been doing all of it herself ever since I’ve first explained this game to her 😉
The basic idea is that E runs to the cone whose color I call out. Easy peasy, but surprisingly fun and engaging for E.
She can hardly get enough of it and grabs her cones to “play game” all the time.
We’ve played different ways, and hardly ever the way I’d envisioned it, with the cones all set out in a square around E.
For one thing, you can set up these cones anywhere. ANYWHERE, I tell you 😉 But E isn’t averse to gentle suggestions of alternate placement.
We’ve played this game with Papa standing on one side of the backyard and Mama on the other side, taking turns calling out colors for E.
E and I have taken turns calling out colors for each other.
And we’ve added some extra gross motor practice {and fun!} by picking up the cone when we get to it, lifting it over our heads and yelling “Yoohoo!!!” 😉
Additional suggestions:
- The cones are just a nice touch, you don’t really need them. Tape sheets of paper to the walls, put items on the ground, whatever you have on hand.
- The best part is that this activity can be so easily modified for different developmental ages. Run to shapes? Letters? Numbers? Animals? Sight words? You can include whatever your child is working on.
- You can adjust the gross motor portion as well. Walk sideways or backwards. Run holding hands. Put one foot right in front of the other. Walk on tiptoes. Just have fun!
Have you ever combined gross motor exercises and learning activities? What’s your favorite gross motor game to play with your kid? Tell me in the comments!
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I love this idea! One of our preschoolers seems to need more active and creative learning methods than the other. I think he would really enjoy this game. So now I just need to be on the lookout for colored cones, although you could probably use other colored objects as long as they were all the same. Thanks for sharing at Weekly Kids Co-op! 🙂
Thanks for visiting, Jen! You really don’t need the cones, I have a few suggestions in the post but basically, as long as it’s recognizable and a good representation of the concept you want to reinforce, you can use stuff you already have around the house. I hope your preschooler has as much fun with it as E does!
My very active preschooler would have lot of fun with this game. His brothers would love coming up with different activities for him.
Thank you, Barb! Sounds like fun to have older siblings come up with activities for the little one!
I love this idea so much I am going to use it for my university assignment (Health and Physical education-Primary school education).
We are in a group and have to organise a lesson plan warm up etc (there is 3 of us) and I am organising the warm up. So yes this will be our warm up for the pre schoolers.
So glad you like it and are able to use it for your assignment 🙂