These DIY dominoes are a great tool for addressing auditory processing needs!
When I saw the theme for this week’s Learning with Manipulatives series was dominoes, I was excited. My kids love playing with dominoes! They love dominoes of all kinds, from craft stick dominoes to our math sensory bottle that had slowly sinking dominoes. I had a few different learning activities in mind…but then I couldn’t find our dominoes! Not to worry, I threw together these DIY bell dominoes that were perfect for color matching with an auditory processing twist.
DIY Bell Dominoes
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To make these bell dominoes, you need just three items:
Corrugated cardboard
Pipe Cleaners
Bells (Ours were from www.craftprojectideas.com)
You’ll also need scissors and a black marker.
Cut rectangles from the sheet of corrugated cardboard. Using the wire in the pipe cleaner, poke a hole in one end of the rectangle. Thread the bell onto the pipe cleaner. Bend the pipe cleaner over and poke it through the cardboard again. Gently twist the ends of the pipe cleaner together and snip the long end of the pipe cleaner. Repeat on the other end of the domino.
I used random colored bells to create dominoes that were perfect for color matching. My preschooler loved this game and we played several rounds, just working on color matching.
Auditory Processing Activity with Bell Dominoes
- Play the bell dominoes game and ask your child to close their eyes when it is not their turn. They need to listen for the sound of the bells and tell with it is their turn by saying when the bells have stopped. Listening for the bells’ sounds addresses auditory attending.
- Play from further distances by having the child cross the room after they’ve taken their turn. They need to listen to hear when the bell has stopped before coming back to take their turn. This addresses auditory attending and auditory discrimination.
- Play with various background noises.
- When playing, take turns tapping out patterns before placing the domino in it’s place in the game.
- Grade these games by rolling a dice and assigning a number on the dice with a colored bell.
