Folding the Laundry

Activity Overview

Teaching household work is not just essential to building autonomy, responsibility, and efficacy in our young learners, but also a beautiful way of exercising the gross and fine motor muscles in the body. The act of folding laundry helps children cross their midline, the imaginary line that splits our body into left and right sections. The act of crossing one’s midline in tasks like putting on socks and shoes, writing, and cutting promotes the use of both sides of the body simultaneously. Crossing the midline is foundational for coordination and promotes communication between the brain’s hemispheres.

What You Need

• Laundry

• Clean sheet or blanket

• Laundry soap

• Basket

Steps

1. Wash the clothes. Have your student help load the washing machine and add the soap, then turn it on. When the load is finished, have them engage is some good heavy lifting by helping put the clothes in the dryer.

2. When the clothes are dry, create a space for folding work and lay a clean sheet or blanket on the floor with all the clean clothes on top.

3. Show your student how to fold laundry. If your child has never done this activity before, start with laundry that has a simple shape, like towels and blankets. Gradually build your way up to more complex articles of clothing.

4. Once the laundry is folded, it is time to put it away. This is a great time to build in heavy work! Have your student help carry or push the laundry basket to where it needs to go.

5. Have the student help put the clothes away. Opening and closing drawers, bending and reaching, and maneuvering clothes into the drawers will be a challenge, but try to allow them to do as much as they can on their own.

Guiding Questions

• Can you fold that in half?

• How should we sort the laundry?

• How do these pieces of clothes feel the same or different?

Extensions

• If your student enjoys this activity, do it again! Repetition allows them the space to build confidence and autonomy. And parents love helpful children!

• Sock sorting - get all the socks together and have your students find the pairs.

• Counting - how many items in one category of clothes can you count?

• Is your student enjoying the heavy work? Make a game out of it!