Hello Fellow Brooklynite-Parents.
Last blog-post we discussed how Sensory Bins could keep your young ones entertained during the holidays when you yourself might also need/want/dream-of a break.
Sensory bins are undoubtedly magical and amazing tools for educational childhood play, but they may not have been for you?
SENSORY-BIN ANGST / DELIGHT
Perhaps while watching your child sling what looked like muddy water and beans across the living room floor, you’ve muttered (like I have): “These things are incredible, they should really be used ONLY IN OTHER PEOPLE’S SPACES!”
Or maybe while pouring food coloring into the corn-starch bin as you removed dried rice from your daughter’s hair, nose, ears, belly-button, and toes, you’ve said (as I did): “These things are incredible, but THEY REQUIRE MY CONSTANT SUPERVISION AND PARTICIPATION AND I’M TRYING TO WORK/COOK/READ-A-BOOK!”
Or conceivably you’ve thought quite simply like me one sunny snowy January morning arm-deep into a bin of fake snow side-by-side with my daughter: “What a special day.”
Whichever one it was (or all three), release yourself from your Sensory Bin guilt — or keep them around for a fun afternoon pastime, your choice. But here, as promised, are 5 Easy Sensory Activities That Live In Your Kitchen Drawers Or Bathroom.
1. TRAVEL-SIZED BOTTLES
My daughter swears by this activity. Granted, she’s only (almost) two and I’m not even sure what activity it is. But put one – or any number of tiny-sized bath bottles, she’s not choosy – in front of her travel-bottle sized hands and she’ll have a field day, without any help from me, either! I like to empty them out and then safely let her play. But sometimes I don’t empty them.
2. LARGER SIZED BOTTLES
My daughter’s obsessed with my husband’s Gatorade bottles. Possibly because she intuits I’ll never let her drink one of them. Regardless, filling the empties with water and soap bubbles, water beads, food coloring, and rhinestones, or a dry version with beans, rice, or rocks, and rhinestones, and gluing the top shut has also kept her independently entertained for stretches of whole minutes on end.
RAIDING THE BATHROOM AND THE KITCHEN SINK
The Play Lab’s founder, educator Magda Lahliti, has some more fun and readily available sensory activities to recommend that also activate small motor skills and critical thinking.
3. SCOTCH TAPE FUN
Put scotch tape on the wall and stick a small plastic ball, cotton ball, or pom-pom to it. Really. It’s that simple!
Place a circuit of scotch tape on the floor like a mini-track and then race cars down it. (To be perfectly honest we’ve run out of scotch tape taping the last Mo Willems library books before returning them, so we haven’t gotten to try this one yet)
4. Keep your toilet paper and paper towel rolls to make a chute for pom-pom balls (if your kid won’t try to eat them), or little plastic ponies (if your kid is mine). You can connect them together to make a long chute then scotch tape this to your wall, or let your tiny human run through the house clutching it in their chubby sticky hands, thereby solving two problems at once: childcare & recycling.
BREAKFAST, ANYONE?
5. CEREAL BOX FUN
If the average adult knew how much fun could be obtained from a mere cereal box, they’d probably hold on to theirs too. But don’t take my word for it, here’s 5 fun activities from KIX Cereal, ranging from maze-making to cereal box drop and yarn loom!
Last Tips for Recyclers / online orderers
Keep your boxes from Amazon (or wherever you’re choosing to buy these days) and make A FORT! Glue egg cartons to it. Glue anything to it! Tissue paper, rhinestones, glitter, your kid — kidding! Paint them and add wind chimes to have, to quote Magda, “a big gigantic adventure.”
Not to be a downer but the only thing my kid wants to do with boxes is rip apart the tissue paper. I keep putting her in them but she never stays! Maybe yours will play fort.
One day.
Till next time.
Your Play Lab Tip-Tryer.
Don’t forget to check out our upcoming class Science Sensory for children ages 1.5-3 years old, and pencil us in for your Valentine’s Date, February 15th, 11 am-1 pm (community event for families with children 2-6)! Check our class schedule here!
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