Living Sensory Box

This was our sensory box for the last few weeks and it was alive! Baby Daddy brought home a 'sheet' of this special type of plant used to cover green roofs. It was impossible not to want to play with this as it looked as though it had mini trees everywhere. We added a fence and some plastic farm animals that normally go with our Melissa and Doug Farm House and there you go a fun sensory box. 

At preschool we have grown our own grass int he sensory box to create such an affect and that in itself is a lot of fun. Spraying the grass with a water bottle to water it and then using scissors to cut the grass (sneaky skill building and fun to use scissors for something else then paper!) 

Little Ocean Pasta Sensory Box

As promised here is something I created using the rainbow died pasta from the sensory pasta box  . I decided to take a pice of tinfoil to place at the bottom of the wood tray, it's nice and reflective and looks shimmery like water too me, I added the cool colours of pasta on top, a couple of little plastic cups from the dollar store, pom poms, jewls (glass bead things)  and some small sea animal figurines.  


The cups are great for propping up the animals, for shorting the pasta, collecting pasta or as little homes for the animals. 

This is a fun little activity I have in Baby T's playroom on top of the Ikea expedite. It's the perfect hight for T to play wish and enjoy whilst she is having some independent time.  Occasionally the whole thing gets dumped which does not bother me, if I am there when it happens I usually prompt her to set it up herself, her own way and that is fun to watch too. 

This activity is great for fine motor skills, sorting, collecting and dramatic play. I set this up shortly after a trip to the aquarium and it was a way for Baby T to act out what she saw and process the trip. 

Happy sensory box playing!  

Sensory Spice Play

This was a fun little activity we did during a rainy day. I took a bunch of spices off the shelf and put them on the table for Baby T and I do explore.  

Baby T grabbing a spice jar... very excited to get her hands on them as she always sees me using them

I suggested she smell them, which she gladly did. Funny thing was after smelling them she said "Flower"! I suppose since we normally smell flowers she associated smell with flower. We talked a bit about how many things have smells and some are stinky (which we often laugh about during diaper changes) and some are nice like flowers. Baby T obviously liked the spices since she often said "hmmm" after a sniff. 

Baby T tasted some of the spices too - afraid I was not fast enought to get pictures of the facial expressions but they were good! 

So there you go a little something different to break up the play, talk, learn and explore the senses!  

Little Rice Sensory/Dramatic Play Box

Seriously don't YOU want to play with this!? 

These have to be my favourite to create! I just love trying to think up what little worlds I can create for play and exploration. For me it starts with what sensory materials I can put in the box then what can live there followed by what can I put in to enhance the experience with the sensory items (scoops for pouring?) or to extend the dramatic play (scoops as stools?). 

inside the big sensory bin - great having the area around it to put things too.

I decided to put this little rice box in our big sensory bin to minimize the mess. We, the big people 'round here, get a little 'ahh mess' when we are inside the house which stunts the play and learning experience. So to minimize that why not make it more mess friendly and therefore play friendly!  So now if Taya decided to pour rice from a high distance she can and I won't be standing holding my breath waiting to run for the dust buster.


 I do however remind her at the beginning with comments like "T where can we pour the rice? Is it okay to throw the rice? Where can we put the rice?" If she decides in her play that she needs to transport the rice, which is a common goal, I try to facilitate that but if it is not possible at that moment I often will comment on what I think she is trying to accomplish confirm that is what she wants to do and tell her that we can do that later/tomorrow when I can set that up for her. This works for us!  

Baby T testing gravity and making the rice 'rain' down - fun! 

Here is what I used to create this little box: 


Wood box (old drawer found at a recyclable art supply store) 
Rice 
Measuring spoons
Wood swatches (also found at above mentioned store)
Bean pods (again found at above mentioned store) 
Old apple sauce cups 
Jewels (glass beads used for vases) 
Safari animals 
Woven placemats (found at thrift store)

great for fine motor, we also like to play 'hide the jewls'

Overtime I will add and take away materials depending on the direction Baby T goes with her play/exploration. Likewise if I find something is being abused (i.e. bean pods being used as sward) I would take it away for a few days and reintroduce it and model how it might be used (slide for the animals or 'ohhhhh listen to the rice when we pour it onto of the bean pod" type of thing). 




check out more of our sensory explorations in the right hand menu bar under sensory play! 


Happy Playing 

Baby T could not resist getting inside the box to play! 

Rainbow pasta sensory box

Here is another one of our recent sensory boxes. 

I took some pasta, I found these great wheel shapes, and dyed them colours of the rainbow. You can dye by taking your pasta, rice etc put them in a zip lock bag with 1 tbs colour (I used liquid water colour bought from a daycare supply store) and 1 1/2 tbs of vinegare34d and mix. Once the pasta has been nicely coloured lay it out on a flat surface to dry, I put mine on backing sheets. 

I think they look wonderfully awesome and the kids that have come around to play with it I think agree as it took up a lot of their attention. I added some clear cups (old apple sauce containers) some tall tub-like containers (these are for breast milk storage but in preschool we also have used those cheep gerber baby bottles) and occasionally some other bowls and shovels. 

The rainbow pasta was a great way for Baby T to explore the colours of the rainbow and begin to recognize them. We sang songs and played games with the colours. She still has not mastered it though as this is not her focus of interest right now and I don't push it if it's not what she wants to learn. I doubt she will enter elementary school not knowing her colours so why drill it into her right now? 

Baby T does however like to fill and pour with the cups and tubes. She also likes to transport the pasta. So to facilitate that but not get frustrated with finding little piles of pasta round the house I offered her a larger bowl to transport the pasta to. I also remind her that we keep that pasta in the box or in the bowl when we play with it and she seems good with that reminder. 

So there you have a very pretty little sensory box that lasted in our house for well over a month maybe it was two months! I have kept the pasta and stared to use it for other play activates which I hope to share soon. 


To see our other sensory boxes look here or check the labels on at the top of the bar to your right under sensory. 

Sensory Box Explorations

Oh how I love the sensory box and kids tend to love them so much they spend a fair amount of time exploring them. Sensory boxes can be any kind of box, bin, or container full of fun items that engage the senses you know, touch, sound, smell and sometimes taste (for Taya taste is still important at 20 months!)


We have had a few over the past year so I have a little catch up to do on this post and in the future I hope to post one at a time as we are doing them. 


We started when Taya was about 9 months but you could start way sooner - there are so many possibilities and if you think about it a bath is a sensory experience too. 

Taya playing with water coloured ice cubes (water colours wash out way better then food colouring). I used IKEA fish and flower ice cube trays

we added a little water with the ice cubes which melted after a little while in the sun

Once Baby T was walking I asked my wonderful babydaddy to build me a sensory table (I am lucky he is handy!). Baby T was very used to having a sensory box on the floor but she would almost always want to sit in it amongst the play. Really though who wouldn't want to explore it while sitting in it what ever it is?! With her standing over the box it changed the experience and what she did with the items in the box. We still on occasion will take the tub and put it on the floor for her to explore. 

Here is the box filled with rolled oats which was great for her to explore in her hand and mouth! I added pine cones, they made a great sound when pouring oats over.

Here was our Christmas sensory box. I put garlands, bells, ornaments, candy cane decorations. It was fun for the holidays and was a great place for her to explore christmas stuff without taking everything off our tree! 

One thing to keep in mind with sensory items is to start simple. Coloured sand is beautiful but to a child regular sand is amazing - in fact try really looking at it again it is just as intriguing as coloured sand. Keep the scoops and containers minimal or just pick one to start. Once the initial investigation has taken place slowly add more intriguing items to the box. This extends the child's experience their knowledge of the items and makes it possible to use the boxes for longer periods of time. Another thing to remember that it can possibly be overwhelming to be presented with a box full of a sensory item and many tools which then might dictate the type of play that occurs. 

Through a sensory box children learn: 

Math Concepts 

By playing with cups, spoons etc they discover the idea of volume, more, less, full, empty, weight.  

Science concepts 

What happens if..... (fill in the blank) or what is happening (referring to melting, changing colours etc) 

The photos above our a bunch of the boxes we have done so far. I have our current sensory box to post shortly but wanted to get these one out there. Hope you try your own they are lots of fun! 

Snow play!

We have finally been blessed with some snow where we live. I love the snow, kids love the snow! This year Baby T was old enough to really get into snow - literally and cognitively. 


Earlier in the week it was nice enough to go out side and enjoy the snow at the park. Baby T, her little mate Big A and I got to enjoy ourselves before anyone else came along so it was 'virgin snow'! The slide was the most fun as they pushed the snow down the slide with their boddies - sadly I had to be a spotter at the bottom as the gained so much speed they were flying off the end so no pictures of that.  

I was so glade that I was able to take the kids out in the fresh brisk air. I sometimes wonder if children are getting less and less of these opportunities to interact with the natural world for one reason or another and on a day like today if people are saying 'oh it's too cold to bring the kids out side!'. Anywho I did, snotty noses be damned they needed the experience, the fun and most of all the fresh air - in my opinion anyway. 

Today we did not have enough time to get all bundled up and go outside for what is apparently the last snowy day before we get freezing rain tomorrow - boo to that. Since we could not go out side to enjoy the snow I brought some in.  Enjoying the snow inside was wonderful. Were I used to work we would do it all the time and it does bring a whole new dynamic to play involving snow. The play is much smaller, there is less snow and it is in a confined space. I find it can be much more focused depending on the circumstance which leads to more in-depth exploration. Four our little snow play I gathered some 'clean' snow, a tub to put it in, a bunch of laundry scopes, an old apple sauce container and a penguin.  

This activity entertained Baby T for a substantial period of time, very nice for me to sit back and watch!  During her play she spent time, scooping, transferring snow, playing with penguin making tracks, squeezing the snow, dropping the snow (yes it gets a little messy - get a picnic table cloth from the dollar store if your worried), talking.  

Oh yeah and tasting the snow - who can resist, especially my little T who will put anything in her mouth - clean snow, it is important. 


So what is Taya learning, 


Language - as always I verbally observe her actions 'oh you are squishing the snow' 'does that cold feel cold on your hands?' 'look at the penguin tracks your making' etc  and she is talking to me though often in her own language still


Fine motor - small tools such as the scopes help her fine motor skills


There is tons more that she is learning too but the above are the major ones and my brain is half asleep... so let me get back to it!  

Bringing The Outdoors In

It has been awhile... ok a long while but summer was too much fun to sit inside and blog and then I got off track.... way off track! 


So here I am blogging again, hopefully more frequently and hopefully about more then just kids activities. For now I have somethings that Baby T and I have been up to that I thought I would share. 


As it colder and sadly wetter in our part of the world I have been trying to bring some of the outdoors inside for us to explore. I also wanted some exploration/play things in the living room that looked like they almost belong there (we have a earthy short of living room). Sidetrack but I remember before I was pregnant and when I was pregnant I was like 'I will never have toys all over my house' yeah right! So there are toys in pretty much every room of our little apartment but I wanted to try and make our living room look a little bit more hmmm how to put it 'calm' without the super colourful crazy stuff that are generally kids toys.  


Here is what we ended up with: 

Basket with pine cones and and natural balls I bought at IKEA

Some rocks which we collected locally

To you and me they may look boring but to a baby or toddler they are very exciting! Baby T is all about putting things in her mouth (will this ever stop!!) so I make sure I am close by to keep an eye on her when she plays with these toys - you know your baby so do what you need to do. I promise you though these free and natural toys  are fun. 

So what does Baby T do with them?? 

We use them with of course the muffin tin! The items get sorted, placed in and out of the tin, mixed, examined. They occasionally get dropped intentionally perhaps Baby T is interested in the noise that makes, maybe she wants to see my reaction? Either way I try to make it safe and not too noisy by having her play with them on a blanket. I suppose she might one day try to throw them and if she does we might have to take it outside to try that out or redirect if we can't do that right away. 

So these are the cheapest toys we have and they have been in out living room for months and Baby T and her friends love them! 

What is she learning with rocks and pine cones??? 

Early math skills! - yep crazy but she is by sorting, pattern making and by exporting a pin cone which in itself is a se-metric mathamatic marvel. 

Early literacy skills and language  - learning the works for the objects. Creating patterns 

Fine motor skills- hand eye coordination, grasping

Muffin Tin Fun

Who new a muffin tin could be so much fun!?

If you have one pull it out, put things in it and put it in front of your baby. I find Baby T has a blast putting things in and out, banging items in the tin and pushing the tin forwards and backward with items in or out of the tin. 

So what have we put in it so far: 

Toilet paper rolls (fun but Baby T also likes to eat cardboard!!!)

Blocks (super fun yet noisy)

plastic eggs 

Balls

Spoons

Stacking cups 

So what is Baby T learning? 

Spacial awareness (does that fit?? can I put two in??)

Hand Eye coordination 

Noise (and how much one can make!)

weight (heavy nor heavy) 

cause and effect 

The list goes on as always but there are a few things she is learning, 

Have fun! 

Magic Cloth Box

Seriously it has ben ages since I last posted! Wow time really does fly when you have a baby and sometimes it's hard to find the time to do 'extra' things like blogging!


Here is a post I have been meaning to do for ages! In fact I had this made up months ago and have had the pictures for a long time. Any way here it finally is! 

So Baby T loves pulling things out and examining them so I created this box to stuff things in and have her pull them out. Origonally a shoe box I cut a hole in the top and covered it with pretty paper (what can I say I like pretty things!). You could easily use an old tissue box but I would take the plastic off incase you child is anything like Baby T and likes to eat plastic (!?). I filled the box with scraps of fabric, wash cloths and some small play silks we have. 

I made the hole at the top big enough so I could put other random things in like spoons, blocks or a mixture of her toys. 

She loves it! 

I have found that she has been enjoying it more and more these days and even takes liberties to pull out of any bag around the house! I have Baby T help me with laundry these days since she likes pulling clothes out of baskets and bags so much. I also have taken to filling a paper bag with random baby friendly items which helps keep her occupied if I need 5 or 10 minutes to do something (like clean the toilet -yuck!). 


So what is Baby T learning during this activity?? 


Shapes
Spacial awareness (getting things in and out of the box) 
Fine motor and hand /finger grasping
Texture 
Colour 
Pattern  




Simple, easy and fun - give it a try! 

Eggs For Easter And For Fun!

You know those easter eggs you can get this time of year? The plastic ones that you can open up and put things inside... they are fantastic! Get them... seriously go out and buy some. These treasures are great and not just for easter they truly are great little open-ended wonders with endless possibilities! Due to the fact that they are open ended and you can do so many things with them I justify buying plastic for use as a toy. I am not a plastic lover for many reasons but I will save that for another post. 

So what to do with these beauties? Well I will share the first little exploration I created for Taya... SHAKERS! It really is too easy, fill them with what you have around the house. 

I filled them with Nutrios/cheerios, lip balm container, another small container and a wood ball that goes onto of our wooden stacker. I don't leave Baby T alone with these as some things might be choke hazards plus part of the activity is for us to explore them together... I'll explain in  moment. 

I placed the eggs in a muffin tin to make them easy to grab as without it they can get a bit roly-poly which is unnecessary frustration to start an activity with.  

At first I just let Baby T explore the eggs. Being a former preschool teacher I tend to run a commentary on what she is doing when we explore things together and that goes something like this; "what's that Baby T?", "are you picking up the purple one?". " is it heavy" etc etc. This keeps me engaged but more importantly it helps develop her language and puts labels to things and helps make meaning out of what she is doing.  

After a little exploring on her own I suggested shaking the eggs, which she did. Each egg had a different weight and sound so we talk about that for a bit. She then did some more solo exploring. 

 One of Baby T's favourite way to explore things is of course her mouth. Yum?


A few other things that you can do with the eggs: 
Bath time toys
Sand toys 
Filling and pouring toys (use sand, water, rice- best with kids that don't put everything in their mouth!)
Hid and seek toy (use open eggs and hide items underneath some of the halves- great game) 
Playdogh- great for cutting or filling 
Dramatic kitchen play
Dramatic play scenes 


What would you do with the eggs??? Would love to hear your ideas and try them!


Hope you enjoy and have fun with these!