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You are here: Home / Fine Motor Activities / Smarter Pizza Game

Smarter Pizza Game

March 30, 2016 by Amy Smith

This fun pizza game will keep your child’s interest and attention while developing math and fine motor skills! The game is simple and inexpensive to prepare, yet durable enough to withstand lots of use.  Plus, there are numerous ways to adapt this game so that it can grow along with your child’s developmental and academic progress.  Keep your child excited about learning with this hands on game!

This smarter pizza game develops fine motor and math skills as the child becomes a pizza baker and places various toppings on a felt pizza

Materials Needed

1 sheet of red felt (the sticky back kind works best)

Scrap pieces of various colors of felt for the toppings

1 round cardboard piece

Small plastic cups

Plastic tweezers

Pizza box (optional)

How to Construct

Cut the red felt piece in a circle to match the size of the round cardboard piece and stick on top.

Cut out the toppings from the other colors of scrap felt into different shapes

Separate “toppings” into different cups and place to the side of pizza inside the box

numbered cups

How to Play

There are numerous ways to adapt this game for your child depending where he/she is developmentally and academically.  Listed below are a few of the most popular ways to play the game.

1. Counting Toppings- Write numbers on slips of paper and place the numbers inside the topping cups, then have the child place that amount of toppings on the pizza.

pizza-game

2. Shape and Color Recognition – Cut different shapes out for the toppings and ask your child to place specific topping shapes or colors on the pizza

3. Addition/Subtraction- Instruct the child to add or subtract toppings to the pizza to develop addition and subtraction skills

4. Fractions-Divide the pizza up into halves, quarters, sixths, etc…and have your child only place toppings on that portion of the pizza to develop division and fraction skills in a hands-on manner

Developing pincer grasppizza game

Have your child use plastic tweezers to pick up the toppings and place them on the pizza using his/her pincer fingers (thumb and index finger).  This action will help to develop the child’s pincer grasp which is essential for:

-Feeding tasks
-Toy and object manipulation like building blocks, turning pages, holding items
– Self-care tasks like snapping, zipping, buttoning
-Pre-writing skills such as pencil grip
-Toy and object manipulation like building blocks, turning pages
-Pre-cutting skills such as scissor grasp and manipulation

 

Leave me a comment and let me know how you adapted this game to meet the needs of your little pizza baker!


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Filed Under: Fine Motor Activities Tagged With: fine motor activities, hand strengthening, learning

Disclaimer

Kids Play Smarter is a blog about general ideas, theories, and concepts related to the field of occupational therapy and the growth and development of all children. The information presented on this blog is not intended to serve as or replace occupational therapy services for your child. The information on this blog is for entertainment, informational, and educational purposes only. This blog is not meant to replace formal professional consultation or evaluation from a qualified clinician. All children need to have the approval of a physician to participate in physical activities, including those described on this blog. In addition, children need to be supervised by a responsible adult at ALL times when completing activities that are illustrated and described on this blog. The author of this blog is NOT responsible or liable for any damage, injury, accident, illness, death, or adverse reaction due to participation in the activities described on the website.

Welcome to Kids Play Smarter

Amy Smith I am an occupational therapist with over 10 years of experience working with children. I created this website to offer parents, teachers, and therapists FREE ideas, strategies, and activities that they can do with their children to improve their fine and gross motor skills, handwriting, academic learning, and regulate their sensory system all while "playing" (just playing smarter)! Read More…

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