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Work on pouring water with your toddlers using this super simple activity that they will love!
This simple and fun water play activity will teach them an important life skill!
Pouring water for drinks!
A simple life skill to learn, but how do they learn it?
With practice!
Fine Motor Pouring Water Activity for Toddlers
This begs the question… is pouring a gross motor skill or a fine motor skill?
I suppose it depends on the size you do it at. It builds gross motor skills by lifting.
It works on fine motor control with hand eye coordination to aim the water into the glass.
The smaller the glass, the more concentration and coordination it will take.
How do you do a pouring activity?
Take your water activity outside while your toddlers work on their pouring skills. It’s pretty messy at first!
Once they become more precise, you can bring it inside to the dinner table.
Its been super hot here, so playing outside has been minimal. But I thought with some water we could sneak out there for a little bit for a quick activity.
Supplies Needed to Make Your own Pouring Water Activity for Toddlers
- Plastic pitcher
- Plastic cups
- Water
When can kids start pouring?
Earlier than you may think!
I was thinking this pouring activity would be more fitting for Henry (my preschooler) than it was for George who’s just a toddler.
But George surprised me and not only got a kick out of doing it, but did it pretty darn well!
How do you teach a child to pour?
Start small. Don’t fill the pitcher completely full. Start with just a little in it to build their strength and confidence in the practice of pouring.
We filled our Kool-aid pitcher about half-full with water and set out some plastic cups to practice pouring into. George filled the cups, emptied the pitcher, and asked for more water.
I refilled and refilled that pitcher!
Set up a pouring station for you or your child to refill. And if you’d like, set up an area to keep the water in, so you don’t have it all over. You can set out trays to put the cups on, and a large bowl of water to dip the pitcher in to refill easily.
Or, you may want to try this water pouring activity for toddlers close to a hose or near the door closest to your sink.
And sneaky me. Or sneaky George.
He snuck sips of water during the entire activity. Extra water drinking is always a plus for a hot day!
It wasn’t until Henry joined the activity for only a minute or two that my toddler began pouring the water from the cups back into the pitcher to reuse it.
Duh. That saved me a few trips back to the faucet!
Nothing like having my preschooler outsmart me.
With the spills, I was having to refill our water pitcher often.
George gained confidence through this pouring activity for toddlers.
And towards the end of our activity, he was pouring water one-handed (whoa! Look out fine motor skills!), holding the cup in his other hand and mostly making it all.
His only problem (throughout all of the activity) was not knowing when to stop filling the cup. He always overflowed it.
But the water nearly always made it into the cup.
Tip for next time: You could try adding in small plastic toys into the cups that would float. That way your toddler could see when the toy made it to the top of the cup, it was time to stop.
George also absolutely loved painting the driveway with water.
Water activities are definitely go-to activities for both the boys in this house!
And this pouring water activity for toddlers was a definite win around here.
You could sneak in a pouring activity when you have a water sensory bin. Just add in a small pitcher and cups to your sensory bin that you already have of spoons and whatever else. They can be used to transfer water as well and are great for fine motor skills.
Check out these scoop and transfer activity for more ideas.
If you’d like, you could also try a dry pouring activity with dry items, such as oatmeal, cereal, rice, beans, lentils, flour, or even small pebbles, pom poms or beads… and have your child dry pour it into plastic bottle, muffin tins or ice cube trays. Those are much smaller targets to really work on their fine motor skill development.
For older kids (kindergartener or preschooler), you can give them a target to work toward. Mark lines on the inside of the cup for them to see how close they can stop pouring the water. Give each line a value and work in some math by adding their score together! How can they get to 20 points? How many cups do they need to fill?
What are your favorite water activities? Share your favorites with us!
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