Articles:
HOW ARE HAMA BEADS AN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCE?
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Our exploration into Hama Beads started when my daughter
was aged 5. She struggled to concentrate on any task,
had poor fine motor control and lacked any inclination
to finish a task.
I bought a set of beads, hoping to engage her in them
and was astounded by the effect they had.
She was fascinated, filling board after
board with beads, initially with no pattern i could discern
but clearly absorbed in the task. Tiny set of beads were
flowers, sets of 3 colours were mingled on endless geometric
boards, slowly she began to explore shape by working
with the geometric pegboards.
One of the great advantages of a value
for money craft like this is that apparently "pointless" shape
filling is not costly; relaxing and allowing a child
to experiment and fill boards, even beyond any apparent
use or reason, is acceptable. I kept boxes of my daughters
early work, fascinated by the careful efffort she put
into them.
By the time Fran was six we were exploring
themes using these beads; flags, animals, pattern, countries.
Two of our most notable projects was an exploration of
African animals and making a set of 3D boxes depicting
flags of Europe. The multicoloured elephant was my daughters
first really thoguhht out project; i have always thought
him beautiful!
There are instructions for the African
Map Project on BeadMerrily and free
animal patterns too. We had an awful lot
of fun doing this; it still hangs on our wall and
has featured in a BBC documentary!
The main educational benefits of Hama
Beads are
* simple tool for improving fine motor
control
* tool for learning colour, shape, pattern,
counting
*imaginative play
*design concepts
* pattern following, patience, concentration
*opportunity to have a cheap, easily
available, easily stored craft material that lends itself
to a wide variety of themes and exploration
It is amazing how children grow and their
abilities change; my 7 and 6 year old recently produced
these designs, counting and copying carefully from a
set of complicated patterns. What skills they have gathered
since their first tentative steps into the world of Hama! |
