It’s no secret that as the weather cools, it becomes harder for parents to find and plan activities that keep their children engaged. One of my absolute favorite ways to keep my preschoolers engaged was to create sensory activities for them!
If you have already heard of or used sensory bins with your child, and know all of the benefits that they possess, feel free to scroll down to the bottom of this blog post and you will find some links to winter themed sensory activities!
What is a sensory activity?
There are many different vessels in which you can create a sensory activity including empty bins, bags or bottles. And the list of ingredients you can choose from goes on forever, making it very easy to cater these activities to any age group. But the best part of this activity in my opinion, is the endless variety in ways that you can theme them.
For the seasons you can use ingredients that relate to that time of year, like leaves and twigs for fall, snow (or something resembling it) for winter, flower or insect toys for spring, water or sand (or whatever else your heart desires) for summer. You can tailor them to reflect a certain book or movie your child has been especially interested in lately, encouraging them to tell parts of the story as they play. You can even create holiday specific bins to teach your children about the holidays that your family celebrates. The opportunities are truly endless.
And you can almost certainly never have to go to the store for the ingredients. Most times they are created, or can be slightly changed, to only include items you already have in your own home!
Photo by Tatiana Syrikova from Pexels
Why?
I’m hopeful that with the studies shown in recent years, most of you reading this will already know that children learn best through play. Not only do sensory activities enhance their fine motor skills but, like it says in the name, they are learning through their senses!
Your children are hearing the sounds that the rice makes as they wiggle their fingers through it. They are seeing the way the beans or the water moves when they pour them, and they are feeling the cold, slimy texture of the water beads through touch. Your bin will allow them to explore the scents that some of the ingredients will give off, and you can even include edible ingredients to allow your child to learn through taste! Sensory bins truly allow them to explore the items in their everyday world around them, with very little guidelines.
What about the mess?
Another aspect of the sensory bins that I used in my classroom was the fact that, yes the bins can often offer quite a mess, but this is a wonderful opportunity for your child to understand the consequences of their actions.
Yes, it is very fun and exciting to move our hands too quickly causing the contents to spill out a bit, and it's natural to wonder what will happen with the rice if I hold it over the floor and then open my hands. But when I am done exploring, it’s my responsibility to clean my mess, because it's not comfortable to walk on grains of rice the rest of the day, or I don’t want anyone getting hurt by slipping on the water that spilled on the ground while I was playing.
By having your child help you clean up (and by this I mean that they do the most of it while you guide them no matter how painstakingly long it takes) you are again growing their gross motor skills, as well as starting the early stages of teaching them how to be responsible for the messes that they create.
Photo by Tatiana Syrikova from Pexels
To sum it all up…
Every skill that a child is working on during sensory play is a skill that they will take with them as they grow. Just like any other play activity that you create for your child, sensory activities are helping you build the stepping stones for the way that they will learn for the rest of their lives.
Want Some Winter Sensory Ideas?
Click on the images below to find some fun winter sensory bin ideas!
For the younger ones who are more likely to try and eat ingredients that might not be edible…
