Infants, toddlers and young children learn best through their senses. The sensory learning center should be an integral part of any preschool or home school Early Childhood program. For more information, read The Importance of Sensory Play In the Preschool. Once you have your sensory play area set up, then you'll need to gather materials to fill it, changing it often.
Sensory Play explores the world through the five senses
Here, then, is a list of twelve great activities for sensory play:
- Rice: Pour bags of clean, dry white rice into the sensory table. Add measuring cups and spoons, funnels, toy dishes and pitchers. You can color the rice for special occasions, like red and green for Christmas, or orange and black for Halloween.
- Elbow macaroni: Pour bags of dry elbow macaroni into the sensory table. Add shoe strings (or yarn strings, with the tips reinforced with tape) for the children to lace.
- Chocolate pudding: Dump several boxes of instant pudding (any flavor) into the sensory table. Have children wash hands before and after playing there. How does it smell? Taste? Can they describe it? Help them learn the words.
- Scented playdough: Make your own playdough, adding different scents or flavors. Try banana flavoring with yellow coloring, or orange flavoring with grated orange peel. Add some dried coffee grounds with brown coloring for a different texture. Use grape flavored, plain (unsweetened) kool-aid for a different color and scent.
- Cooked spaghetti: Cook a quantity of spaghetti, dump it in a clean sensory table. Have children wash hands thoroughly before playing there. Let them taste the pasta, squish it, mix it, smell it, serve it on clean, toy dishes. Only do for one day – as pasta will not keep.
- Sand and glitter: Sand is a basic item in the sensory table, but you can renew interest by adding glitter. Let children sift it, measure it, pour it, pat it, stir it, and discuss it. Talk to them when they play. Help them to express themselves.
- Salt: Dump a quantity of salt in the table. You can leave it white, or color it. Add funnels, water wheels, dump trucks. Children will want to taste it. Watch them, to make sure no one consumes too much, which could be dangerous.
- Coffee grounds: Save old coffee grounds. Let them dry. When you have enough to half-fill the sensory table, set them out. Let children use the sand-play toys – shovels, pails, dump trucks.
- Dirt: Fill the sensory table with clean potting soil. Let children rake it, push it, shovel it. Let them build roads in the dirt with their small vehicles. Add small road signs, and little block houses.
- Pine Cones: These can be sticky with sap, but they smell nice. After the children have had a day to touch them and smell them, add a bucket of soft lard. Children can roll the pine cones in the lard, then in bird seed. Add a ribbon to tie it to a tree, for a pretty bird and squirrel feeder.
- Corn: Large sacks of dry corn are cheap, available at feed mills or pet stores. Use all the usual sand toys – buckets, pails, shovels, funnels, measuring cups and spoons. You can bury small toys in the corn for children to uncover.
- Cornstarch and water: This makes a mix called Oobleck or Gloop on different websites. Cornstarch and water is a non-Newtonian liquid – it won't splash when you slap it. It reacts like a solid when you hit it, but turns into a liquid when you touch it gently. The mix is about 2 cups of cornstarch to 1 1/2 cups water – add more cornstarch if it's too watery. You can add food coloring to suit the season. Don't cover it. It will mildew and start to smell. Left uncovered, the water will start to evaporate. Simply add more water when you want to play with it again, or let it dry completely to save for a rainy day.
Now you've got twelve weeks of activities to get your sensory play area rolling. Listen to the children and look for clues. They may help you discover some new possibilities for the weeks that follow. Look for ways to extend the learning experience. For example, during the cornstarch and water week, read Dr. Seuss's book, Bartholomew and the Oobleck. Or on the spaghetti day, read Tomie DePaula's Strega Nona.
Children learn best through their sense of sight, smell, touch, taste, and sound. Sensory play helps them develop their five senses, which in turn, helps them to learn better. Sensory play can also help develop fine motor control, which is very necessary before learning to write. But most of all, sensory play is just good, plain fun!
Lorelei Sieja - "Coming Home, Staying Home", The Teaching Home magazine "On Death and Dishes","Buzzard Morning", Our Family Magazine "The MacGyver ...
Join the Conversation