Duct Tape Roads

My Baby Bear loves toys with wheels, especially if they are cars! He can entertain himself for 10 minutes easily just by holding these little toys and spinning the wheels. In my activities research, I have seen many ideas for making homemade roads and car ramps out of cardboard or construction paper. These ideas sound great, but my Baby Bear still puts everything in his mouth. That is why when I read about using duct tape to create roads on imaginationsoup.net, I just had to try it out with my son!

I created a simple intersection with two long strips of duct tape on the living room carpet. I tried adding a city block, but Baby Bear was quick to pull that up. Simple intersection it was! Baby Bear was not overly interested in this activity, and it only held his attention for a few minutes. He liked watching me put the duct tape on the carpet more than driving his toys along the strips. I think it would be worth trying again in a few weeks, though. He liked watching me make the vehicles drive along the roads, and he helped make them drive a little, too. I think I will make an intersection inside a square next time so the vehicles have corners to turn.

The thing I like most about this activity is that it can grow with my son. As he gets older we can add more roads and make them more complex. We can also start drawing little lines along the tape for lanes. Perhaps in another year or so we will start making our own little cars to drive along the roads, too. There are so many possibilities for this activity. It can be as simple or as complex as you want! It also helps with those fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination, and it teaches a little about how road systems work in a simple and fun way.

Fire Truck vs. Horse

Baby Bear putting the fire truck on the road to drive