And, Ross says, "Our principal has them up her arms." While boy crazes like Bakugan balls and Pokemon cards are about collecting and competition, many kids make loom band items to give to friends and family.Īt Ross' son's school, a group of students recently sold loom bands to raise funds for an animal shelter. They don't always create exactly what they set out to make, but they're usually proud of the result.Įdwards says the experience of "social comparison" is another key stage of development for kids this age: "Feeling like you can do something that's at least as good as your peers if not better than your peers," she says, leaves kids feeling competent and connected with others. They love attempting increasingly complex designs taught in these videos, but they also like the freedom to customize them as they wish. Ross says her kids search YouTube for instructions if they see a friend wearing a design they haven't tried yet. Loom bands can be woven into just about any shape, especially with the help of step-by-step videos available at. "If he can't find his loom," Jones says, "he will make them with his hands." Shauna Jones has seen her 9-year-old son, Jordan, put effort into loom bands that he doesn't put into much else. "And you want to keep going until it's done." With loom band weaving, kids must choose what to create (it's gone beyond bracelets to everything from backpack fobs to Minecraft-style action figures), pick a color scheme and style of weaving, gather the materials and then do the necessary weaving steps in the right order.Īs work progresses, "you can see it starting to make a pattern," 8-year-old Cooper explains. Kids in this age group are also developing "executive function," the ability to plan and execute tasks, Edwards says. "Anything that helps them to use those hands together, left and right, helps to develop those areas of the brain and the muscles themselves."
"Right around age 7, you see fine motor skills taking off," says Cynthia Edwards, professor of psychology at Meredith College in Raleigh, N.C. Loom bands are popular among kids age 7 to 12, a key time for developing many of the skills that weaving crafts can teach. It also helps, Volkman thinks, that they use rubber bands rather than fluffy yarn or delicate materials. Ross and Volkman both find that while many craft products are packaged in pink boxes emblazoned with pictures of smiling girls, the gender-neutral packaging of loom band products make them more boy-friendly.
"There's a sense of accomplishment" that comes with finishing a bracelet, Tricia Ross says, and it's enough to inspire her son to "sit there until it's complete." He's begun taking orders for bracelets from his younger sister, cranking them out in the styles and color schemes she requests.
But he and many of his male classmates in Charlottesville, Va., have seized on loom bands. Tricia Ross' 8-year-old son avoids playing with any of his older sisters' toys. Once you have mastered a few designs you can then try out different looming kits including the Monster Tail Loom, Hair Loom Studio with Finger Looms or the Alpha Loom - note that Alpha Loom also has a different style of bands but you can also use regular Rainbow Loom Bands with the Alpha Loom Kit.Liz Cheney’s last stand: Why she is staking her career on Jan. We recommend you start with the original Rainbow Loom Kit and a few spare packets of Rainbow Loom Bands.
#Rainbow loom bands how to
Looming encourages patience and creativity, gives children a sense of achievement with each design, teaches them how to follow simple or complex instructions, fosters good hand-eye coordination and develops fine motor skills. In addition to being a fun craft activity looming has a host of educational benefits. Popular as a creative activity with children and adults alike, looming can go from extremely simple designs that only take a few minutes to complex creations that may take hours to complete. Rainbow Loom is the amazingly popular craft kit for making rubber bands into bracelets, jewellery and an endless array of creative designs and shapes.
0 kommentar(er)
