Fine motor1½–2½ yrsAt home

In & out of the bottle

An empty bottle that holds twenty minutes of focus.

Prep

1 min

Mess

None

How to play

The challenge is dropping the pom-poms through the bottle's mouth, one at a time, then flipping it to empty it. Repeating is the game, not a failure.

  1. a bottle beside three pompoms
    1

    Set out a wide-mouth bottle and some pompoms.

  2. a pompom dropping into the bottle's mouth
    2

    Drop them through the mouth, one at a time.

  3. the bottle upside down, pompoms tumbling out
    3

    Then flip it over and tip them all out.

What you need

A wide-mouth bottle and pom-poms or clothes pegs.

What it secretly builds

Fine motor

Fitting something through a tight space trains precision, and repeating it over and over trains sustained attention.

Safety first
Stay close — pom-poms are a choking size. Use objects too big to swallow if he still mouths things.
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