The
benefits of playdough
Children and adults make gains in health and in development when
access to dough is made possible.
The fine motor skills involved with pinching, pulling, kneading and
rolling a mound of dough exercises all fingers, hands and wrists, strengthening
the smaller muscles and providing the actions needed to maintain supple
joints and hone hand-to-eye coordination - the cerebellum. A few ways these movements impact
on daily life include children's pre-writing dexterity, shoe lace tying,
button fastening, zipper opening & closing, bead threading, operating
switchs, clothes pegs, turning knobs, dials and inserting keys into locks.
For anyone who makes dough from the raw materials, the process itself
is an interesting one for exploring descriptive language and sharing observations
about what's happening, the tactile feeling of the compounds in hand and
concepts such as quantity, weight, equipment, time and assessment. The changing
consistency of dough as different ingredients are combined link to science
and the properties of each individual component. Cooking then adds the catalytic
effect of heat as it alters fluid states to solid ones.
Incorporating
scent, colour and other mediums expands the versatility of dough, creating
sensory learning experiences and thereaputic activities that may benefit
anyone wanting a resistant material thats helps to stretch and flex stiff
joints, smells nice! and supports the stress-busting effect of concentration,
that in turn helps as relaxation technique, focussing in on breathing as
you work and shape your dough - ways to relieve stress on NHS
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Playdough is just one part of the whole modelling material spectrum,
other equally intriguing mixtures are mud, pottery clay, airdry-clay, polymer
clay, plastercine and putty. They all invite engagement and support our
unique creativity. So if you're rolling sheets of soft dough for a young
child, building clay furniture for a doll's house or garage car park, filling
balloons as stress-squeeze balls or conditioning putty for a window frame!
enjoy your malleable activities and know that you're not alone!
Ways to use playdough, clay and putty |
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