One of the basic skills of a kindergartner that I have not focused on with Jake is cutting with scissors. I know that he had quite a bit of experience in preschool cutting with scissors and we've done some cut and paste projects at home. Still, I thought it would be a good idea to test his skills just to find out for sure if it is something we need to work on.At the beginning of the summer, the school sent home a packet containing suggestions for different activities our little kindergartner-in-training could do over the summer. One of the items was a sheet similar to the one shown below. The idea is to have your child cut along the black lines, trying to stay on the lines as often as possible.
Jake did pretty well, except for when he rushed. For this particular activity, he stayed on the straight and curvy lines about half the time. He cut one side with the short lines perfectly and the other side he cut perfectly in between the black lines (most likely due to rushing).
(Right click on the image and then select print)
You can draw your own lines on a piece of paper easily with a thick marker. The thicker the lines, the easier it will be for your child to follow it. For the next cutting with scissors project, I drew the outline of a t-shirt in one continuous thick black line. I encouraged Jake to take his time and he did much better with cutting out this shape. After Jake cut out the shape, he had fun decorating the t-shirt with a design of his choice. It turned out to be a fun project.
