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Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity

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Last Updated on November 12, 2021 by Sheryl Cooper

Inside: This tweezing corn activity is a fun way to build preschool fine motor skills. Perfect with your farm or fall theme!

Using tweezers is one of our favorite ways to strengthen the fingers and hands, getting them ready for writing.

We’ve used them in the sensory bin, while exploring nature, and with our table activities that involve transferring small objects.

Today I’m going to show you how to put together a fine motor activity that involves tweezing corn.

Make sure to add this to your farm or fall theme!

Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity

Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity

Every fall you see those ears of corn with multicolored kernels.  You might have even used them to decorate your Thanksgiving table, or as a display with some pumpkins. They are known as flint corn, or Indian corn.

Its kernels, which come in a range of colors including white, blue and red, have “hard as flint” shells, giving this type of corn its name. Flint corn kernels contain a small amount of soft starch surrounded completely by a larger amount of hard starch, which means the kernels shrink uniformly when drying and are dent-free and less prone to spoiling (and therefore ideal for autumnal décor). – (Source)

Because the kernels are hard, and there is some space between them, they make an excellent fine motor tweezing activity for preschoolers.

Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity

What you will need for this tweezing corn activity:

 

Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity
Setting up this activity:
Place corn on a tray along with tweezers and a small cup for the loose kernels.
First invite your preschooler to feel the texture. Is it smooth or bumpy? (You might want to have something smooth nearby as a comparison.)
 
Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity
Explain that they are going to use tweezers to pull each kernel off the cobb, placing it in the dish.
It might take awhile to get the hang of using the tweezers, depending if they’ve ever used them before.
Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity
Once they do, give them time to remove as many kernels as they’d like.
Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity
How to adapt for younger children:
For younger children who don’t yet have the strength to use tweezers, they can try pulling the kernels with their fingers. Make sure to supervise at all times, watching that the kernels are not put in mouths.
Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity
Our younger children had just as much fun picking the kernels off the floor, and that, too, is a great fine motor activity!
Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity
Check out how we painted with corn!
A great extension to this activity:

Looking for more fine motor activities?

Preschool Tweezing Corn Fine Motor Activity


 

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About Sheryl Cooper

Sheryl Cooper is the founder of Teaching 2 and 3 Year Olds, a website full of activities for toddlers and preschoolers. She has been teaching this age group for over 25 years and loves to share her passion with teachers, parents, grandparents, and anyone with young children in their lives.

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Comments

  1. Michelle

    Sheryl,
    Do you do this activity with your 2’s also?? I bought some Indian corn awhile back and I have some left over from some painting we did. Wondering how well the little ones do with the tweezers 🙂
    Thanks,
    Michelle

  3. Anonymous

    How do they get so colorful ? I’m afraid we don’t have this in Norway…We have corn, but I have never seen something called indian corn….and I have never seen corn beeing so colorful…Torild

  5. Sheryl

    Michelle – I haven’t done this activity with my 2’s because I think it would be too hard to manipulate the tweezers. However, some Indian Corn’s kernels pop off easily, allowing the children to sort of pluck them off with their fingers. That would probably work for 2’s. You’ll want to select corn with some space between the kernels.

    We used regular eyebrow tweezers for this activity. The Pre-K 4’s teacher had this pair and I loved the vinyl-coated handles.

    Not sure about why or how Indian Corn is so colorful or where it’s available. Guess I better do my homework! 🙂

    Sheryl

  7. Holly

    Were the corn cobs dry or fresh? Where do you purchase them? I am in California. I really like the handled tweezers too. Where did she come across those?

    • Sheryl

      Hi Holly – in Oregon we can purchase the corn cobs in grocery stores during the fall season. They are dry. Unfortunately, I am not sure where the tweezers were purchased, as they were given to us. 🙁