A Child's Brain Grows at Their Fingertips
"My child is still so young. Do they really need a pencil already?" Many parents ask this. Before the pencil, it helps to look at your child's 『fingertips』.
Fine motor skills and school readiness
『Fine motor skills』 are the ability to control the small muscles of the fingers and wrists. Cutting with scissors, stacking blocks, coloring and tracing lines all use them. The part of the brain that handles touch and movement in the hands is large compared with the size of the hands themselves.
Developmental researchers have studied how these skills relate to school achievement. An analysis of several large studies that followed children over time found that fine motor skills measured around the start of kindergarten predicted later achievement (Grissmer et al., 2010). In another study, fine motor skills measured before kindergarten, especially copying shapes, and 『executive functions』 such as attention control and working memory were each linked to achievement in kindergarten (Cameron et al., 2012). These studies show a link. They do not mean that fingertip activities alone will raise a child's grades.
Fingertip activities you can start at home
| Around age | Activity examples |
|---|---|
| 2 to 3 | Big stickers, stacking blocks, finger painting |
| 3 to 4 | Tracing lines, coloring, tearing and gluing paper |
| 4 to 6 | Tracing dotted lines, cutting with scissors, tracing letters and numbers |
Start with the easy ones and keep it fun. Short activities your child enjoys, done often, work better than long ones done under pressure.
Photo: a page from the 『NoryBook』 『Line Tracing』 worksheet (as of Oct 19, 2026). The first step, following a wavy dotted path. See it
Worth watching
Video: EBS Knowledge 『Why handwriting matters』 (official YouTube channel, Korean). Researchers at Seoul National University scan the brain during handwriting, and the video looks at why writing by hand still matters.
More from EBS: EBS Parenting School replays · EBS Kids on YouTube
How this continues in Budit
Budit's 『NoryBook』 has printable worksheets that go step by step from drawing lines to writing letters. The four stages in the image at the top are all real materials you can download and print at home.
- 『Line Tracing』: trace straight lines, waves and zigzags in Line Tracing.
- 『Shape Drawing』: pages in the same set trace circles and triangles.
- 『Object Drawing』: follow the dotted lines to finish animals and objects, as in Farm Animal Tracing.
- 『Alphabet Writing』: write uppercase and lowercase letters with Alphabet Tracing.
Related reading: From Lines to Letters 『Fine Motor Stages by Age』, The Power of Coloring 『Focus and Eye and Hand Coordination』
References
- Grissmer, D. et al. (2010). Fine motor skills and early comprehension of the world: Two new school readiness indicators. View the paper
- Cameron, C. E. et al. (2012). Fine motor skills and executive function both contribute to kindergarten achievement. View the paper
This article shares general information about child development and education. Every child grows at their own pace. For specific concerns, please talk with a pediatrician or a child development specialist.