Mealtime Activity: 4 Years

Create placemats together for family meals. You can use construction paper, printer paper, or any paper easily found in your house to get started. Ask your child if he can write (or trace) his name on his own mat. You can also ask him if he would like to try writing names of other family members. Pre-cut circles for the placemats to represent plates; using a glue stick, your child can glue the plates in the middle of the placemat. Follow suit by creating rectangles or triangles to represent folded napkins, etc. Encourage your child to draw a picture of himself on his mat or to color it in his own way!

Possible Intervention Strategies & Supports

• When setting out the placemats at meal time, you can say, “This is Mommy’s placemat because mommy starts with the “mmm” sound and the letter ‘M’.” Do the same for the names of other family members. After a few days or weeks of doing this (depending on your child’s level), ask your child to find a specific family member’s mat on his own. You can provide clues by saying, “Remember, Daddy’s name starts with the letter ‘D’. Can you find the mat that has a ‘D’ at the beginning?” If your child isn’t ready to recognize letters, associate a picture with each family member. Then, you can say “Daddy’s placemat has a dog on it. Can you find it for me?”

• Sometimes children who are not interested in art projects because of fine motor difficulty are highly motivated by pictures. Use your cell phone or camera and have your child (with your assistance of course) be in charge of taking everyone’s picture. Then, print the pictures and have your child glue them onto the paper placemats.

• When setting the table, use positional words/terms to describe where you put the utensils, cups, and plates. For example, “The cup goes above the plate and the fork goes next to the plate (or to the right of the plate).” At this age, your child is not expected to know right from left, but this is a great opportunity to begin to model it for him. If he has trouble with basic positional words (e.g., above, next to, below), be sure to put an extra emphasis on those concepts when participating in this routine with him.

Tips

If you would like the placemats to last a little while, cover them with clear sticky-back shelf lining paper. This is a great alternative to pricier lamination.

Family Handout

Click here to download an editable one-page handout of this age range's mealtime activity, interventions, and tips.