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Learning Skills

  • Eye/hand coordination
  • Motor control
  • Social interaction

Handy Clap

Developing eye/hand coordination takes time, but if you watch your baby carefully, you'll see her beginning attempts to control those tiny hands. Fun fingerplays can help your baby work on motor skills.

Materials

  • Soft blanket or an infant seat
  • Fingerplays, songs, and rhymes
  • Your hands and baby's hands

Instructions

  • Lay your baby on a soft blanket or sit her upright in her infant seat, and sit close by so she can see you.
  • Sing or chant songs and rhymes while you play with your baby's hands and fingers. Try one of the following Handy Clap games:

    Pat-A-Cake

    Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man, (clap your baby's hands)
    Bake me a cake as fast as you can; (repeat clapping)
    Roll it (roll baby's hands) and pat it; (pat baby's hands)
    Mark it with a B. (draw a B in the middle of baby's hand)
    Put it in the oven for baby and me. (gently poke baby in the tummy)

    If You're Happy

    If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands. (clap baby's hands)
    If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands. (clap baby's hands)
    If you're happy and you know it, then your hands will surely show it.
    If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands. (clap baby's hands)

    Whoops! Johnny!

    (Start by spreading your baby's fingers open.)
    Johnny (touch your baby's baby fingertip),
    Johnny (touch baby's ring finger fingertip),
    Johnny (touch next fingertip),
    Johnny (touch next fingertip),
    Whoops! Johnny! (slide your finger down in between the forefinger and the thumb, then repeat going backwards)
    Whoops! Johnny! Johnny, Johnny, Johnny.

Safety

Hold and move your baby's hands gently as you play.

* Play and Learn activities reprinted from “Baby Play and Learn” with permission of its author, Penny Warner, and its publisher, Meadowbrook Press (1999).