Items required: several rubber balls three to four inches in diameter of varying colors. Large discount stores are good sources for the balls. Sometimes you can find tennis balls in yellow, pink, and white and these would provide a nice texture but very limited colors. You could mix some brightly colored tennis balls in with the rubber balls. Five to six empty plastic pop bottles. CD player and CD of soothing instrumental music.
Gather your participants around the table. Greet each one by name while looking them in the eyes and touching their hands.
Introducing the balls one at a time. State the color and roll it to a participant asking them to roll it back. Do this with each ball until you have all the balls on the table. Remove them.
Reintroduce one ball to the table and tell the participants that they are to roll the ball to each other. Assist when necessary.
Ask everyone to hold the balls as you place several plastic bottles in the center of the table. Then direct participants to knock the bottle over using the balls. Do this several times as it may take practice for participants to learn the requirements.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~Cognitive~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Items required: several small balls of different colors, color word labels, basket with no handle.
Clear the table. Present the balls one at a time asking participants to name the color of each. If they are unable to do this, you provide the color, show each player as you restate the color and encourage them to repeat it after you. As each ball is color identified, roll it to a participant. They will keep the balls until the second step of this activity.
When all the balls are once again on the table, take your set of color word cards and set the basket in the middle of the table. One at a time, hold up a word card and ask participants to read the word. If no one is forthcoming, you read the word. Reemphasize the color and ask that anyone having the ball of that color to toss it into the basket. You may need to move the basket closer to each player so they can easily reach it. Remember, if they are making an incorrect choice, move the basket away and re-emphasize the color desired.
When all the balls are in the basket, the activity is ended. If time permits, you might want to end the group by rolling all the balls onto the table for a final “roll around” and then having participants toss them again into the basket.
