for an easy little learning activity. Two of us Sugar Aunts were together one afternoon for a little play session with the kids and this was quick and easy to put together.
One bottle of sand.
A handful of foam sheet shapes (we wrote a few beginner sight words on front and back of each shape).
It was perfect for the different age groups of the kids (5, 4, 3, 2, and 1!)
And these kids seem to LOVE anything they can put into something else. The little fingers were everywhere when we told them to drop the shapes into the bottle opening!This is Awesome for tripod grasp skills.
This was great for the 5 and 4 year olds who are learning their sight words. We used some beginner reader words that they recognize (Their current favorite book around here is “Sam I Am”. Seeing those words in a new place is pretty cool way to emphasize reading confidence, I think!)
The 3 year old knows most of his shapes (that rectangle gets him every time!) so this was good for his learning level.
The two year old could point to the colors (and with only three options in the bottle, it was not overwhelming for him).
And for the one year old, this was overall great for language development!
((and super fun to shake !!)
We had fun with our sensory sight word bottle. Have you done one of these? Link them up in the comments, we would love to see them!
When I saw how the thread matched the color of some of the crafting poms, I knew we had to do a color matching activity.
Fine Motor Strengthening
I wrapped the thread around the ends of the clothes pins.
We received a great package in the mail one day from http://www.craftprojectideas.com/. This was just a small part of the free goods we received… There are SO many project ideas and crafting supplies on their website.
(we have a lot more crafting to do!!)
And Big Sister helped, too. What a GREAT fine motor and bilateral hand coordination manual dexterity task! She reaaaallly had to concentrate on this. It was such a novel task for her. It was neat to see her watch me wrap the thread, follow my verbal directions and cues, and as it became easier for her…wrap that thread around faster and faster!
Big Sister and Little Guy liked matching up the colors to the clothes pins.
After they sorted the poms, we changed it up just a little. I pulled out washable markers in the same four colors and Big Sister wrote right on the plastic tray. She is learning to sound out words so we worked together on the letters to spell out the colors.
Pre-handwriting Warm-up Exercise
The pinching and fine motor strengthening with the clothes pins is a great mini-hand exercise to warm up the hands before a handwriting task.
This is part 2 of a two-part outdoor messy play activity. If you missed part one, Sensory Paint Play(Part1) was very fun…Check it out! We left the bubble wrap/blue paint dry right in the bins overnight.
The next day was another super hot and sunny day. Add a bin of water and some empty plastic bottles, and let the fun begin.
Sensory Play
The paint-y, texture-y, messy play returned when the water was added.
Plus, it’s just fun to pour water from bottles.
And put the bottles on your head, of course.
What a fun sensory play experience!
Fine Motor Play
Baby Girl thought it would be pretty fun to drop the gems and beads into the plastic bottles. She did this for a LONG time. That little ‘bonk’ sound was pretty cool!
and, such a great fine motor task.
{{LOVE this picture!}}
Colors
When all of the water was added, we had a blast on this 85 degree day in our BLUE water bin!
This sensory paint activity used bubble wrap for a wonderful tactile experience. We loved to feel the bubble wrap sensory activity. Kids can use this as a way to work on sensory touch and tactile defensiveness, or just for fun, creative painting!
Sensory Paint
This sensory paint idea is easy. You’ll need just a couple of items:
Paint
Bubble wrap
Paper to press onto the bubble wrap
How to do this bubble wrap sensory play
When you get a package in the mail that has bubble wrap, it’s a special day! After some jumping and a little popping, we used the bubble wrap in a fun sensory play activity.
Finger paint, and a handful of beads, and glass gems made this extra special.
This sensory painting activity is a great activity for sensory exploration. Add it, along with this rubber duck painting activity to your painting ideas!
This was SO much fun! Perfect outdoor play for a hot day.
Don’t you just want to get messy and play with this???
It was such a neat sensory experience…and very BLUE. After we were done playing, we squirted the kids off with the hose. I left the blue bubble wrap, beads, and everything right in the bin until the next day. I had plans…
*stop back tomorrow to see what we did the next day after the whole mess dried!*
UPDATE: Here is the post for the next part of this two-day sensory play activity…PERFECT for a hot, sunny, outdoor messy play day! Fine Motor/Sensory/Water Play (Part 2)
We did use a little of that wet blue paint for some face painting. Big Sister gave me a nice smiley face on my foot 🙂
This was a fun activity that the toddlers around here loved. I put a bunch of little objects out on a tray, all in shades of blue. Different textures, shapes, and sizes were perfect for little exploring hands. Baby Girl and my niece and nephew played with these for a while.
Once they had enough of that activity, I poured the whole tray into the sandbox and we had a ball covering everything with sand, finding little things, and starting all over again.
We’ve been on a blue kick around here. It started when we filled our bird feeder and had a Blue Jay in our front yard.
We’ve been playing with blue, sorting blue, crafting blue, eating blue (berries), and even reading about blue…
Toddler Sensory Tray
((I love the little knuckle dimples in these pictures!!))
Watch this space for more BLUE play and craft activities!
There are many ways that Wikki Stix are used for fine motor skills and this homemade floor race track is a favorite! We loved getting down on the floor…hello, core strength!) to make this DIY race track with wikki stix, but the fine motor benefits are even greater! Let’s break it down…
wikki stix for fine motor skills
If you aren’t familiar with wikki stix, then you should be because they are an occupational therapy prover’s favorite tool!
Wikki Stix are sticky strings that you can peel off and stick to things, but then they can re-stick. As an occupational therapist, this is one of my favorite OT tools! Build skills in:
Pincer grasp
Eye-hand coordination
Separation of the sides of the hand
Tactile defensiveness/discrimination (they have a sticky texture)
Motor planning
Range of motion
Hand strength
Visual motor skills
Core strength
Plus, you can use wikki stix on various surfaces:
Paper for tactile input to create borders around coloring areas
Lines on paper, chalkboards, dry erase boards for a bumpy baseline
The floor…like we did below!
Windows to create a fun suncatcher
Walls to work on the vertical plane
SO many more ways!
Wikki Sticks Fine Motor Activity
We had a ton of fun with this activity this past week.
Have you played with Wikki Stix (also called Bendaroos…) This set came in a book that Big Sister had, but Wikki Sticks are widely used by OT’s working on handwriting, line awareness, fine motor skills…
We used them for a little fine motor play, visual perceptual skills, and most importantly, fun play with some matchbox cars!
We lined them up on our dining room floor and made a super fun race track for Little Guy’s cars. Pressing the sticky stings together requires a little pinch of fine motor strength, so this is excellent for working the little muscles in little hands.
Matching up the ends correctly, and creating two parallel lines is perfect for visual perceptual skills and line awareness. Both of these skills are vital for letter placement in handwriting.
We had SO much fun making roads, gates, and even a little parking lot.
We will definitely be playing racetrack again…soon!
This purple sensory bin is a fun way to explore the color purple using one of our favorite sensory play materials: a water bead sensory bin! While this is a very old post on our blog (circa 2013), we still love the mesmerizing impact of a color themed sensory play activity. Plus, if you are looking for more fun ways to extend the play, check out our water bead activities!
Purple Sensory Bin
A purple themed sensory bin has many benefits beyond exploring the color purple. Of course, you could make a color themed sensory bin based around any color and gain so many benefits:
Tactile sensory experience- Targeting tactile discrimination and tactile exploration is one of the main skills that are address with a sensory bin. You can address various aspects of tactile defensiveness through engaging and motivating play.
Social Emotional Skills- Playing in a sensory bin like our purple sensory activity is an engaging activity that fosters group play (parallel play) and encouraging peer interaction by borrowing tools, working together. Engaging in a new situation is an excellent way to foster communication, cooperation, and other social emotional skills. Here are more social skills activities kids love.
How to set up a purple sensory bin
In our colorful sensory bin, we gathered just a few items from around the home:
Add a few spoons, cups, and manipulative items, and you are ready to go!
This was a fun and easy little sensory bin to put together. Someone (cough, Big Sister, cough) threw some bath water colors into the bin of blue water beads we had out. They absorbed the color reeeeally fast. And are VERY vivid in their new purple hue.
I found a few purple bracelets and cookie cutters, and a few other purple things, and voila!
Purple Sensory Bin fun!
I’m not sure why, but every time we do water bead or corn bin sensory play, Little Guy goes into the kitchen and grabs my whisk and whatever other utensils look right. So, now Baby Girl does the same thing. I guess it’s just fun to mix and stir when you’re playing with a sensory bin!
Scooping and Pouring for Toddlers and Preschoolers
is such a great fine motor and visual perceptual activity for little ones. Not to mention the neat pinging sound you get when pouring grains of corn onto a metal tray 🙂
Toddlers who are learning to control the spoon during eating, scooping food with a spoon, and using controlled motions to bring food to their mouth benefit from an activity like scooping corn. A child with poor muscle control would benefit from different modifications to this activity: different sized scoops/spoons, lighter or heavier objects to scoop (sand, rice, beans, crafting pom poms, cotton balls…)
I had a set of these orange bowls and spoons sitting around and they worked great to scoop, pour, and dump corn. Baby Girl was occupied with this activity for a looooong time.
Pouring from a pitcher with something like corn is perfect play practice for the real world task of pouring drinks from a water pitcher. Preschoolers often do this in a preschool setting at snack time, and pouring drinks for their friends is fun! I’ve seen Big Sister glow with excitement when I have her pour water for us at lunch time here. You can see her self-confidence growing!
Pouring materials from a pitcher is also a great activity to work on bilateral coordination, visual perceptual skills (stop pouring before you overflow the cup!)
Baby Girl watched Big Sister fill the pitcher with corn and pour corn into the muffin tins. (We were making “cupcakes” for Daddy!) Baby Girl then had to copy and pour the corn.
Of course. This girl does EVERYTHING the big kids do!
If you are worried about the mess, lay down a blanket first and do all of the pouring and scooping on the middle of the blanket. You could also play in a baby pool. Or, just head outside now that we are having some warmer weather.
Kids LOVE rainbow sensory bins! These rainbow sensory bin ideas are some of our absolute favorite sensory bins, and they are the perfect addition to our rainbow activities, rainbow crafts, and a rainbow theme in therapy. Be sure to use our rainbow breathing exercise, too. Let’s talk rainbow sensory play!
Rainbow sensory bins
A sensory bin is a container filled with materials that are designed to engage children’s senses and encourage exploration and play. They can be as easy or as complicated as you like, but the concept is the same- sensory based, tactile play with a theme or play idea with items to manipulate and explore as the user explores their tactile sensory system.
These materials can include a wide range of sensory inputs such as sand, rice, beans, water, or small objects like toys, beads, and stones. Here are many sensory bin base ideas to get you started.
The goal of a sensory bin is to provide children with an opportunity to explore their senses through play. As they play with the materials, they can feel the different textures, see the different colors, and hear the different sounds they make. This can help to promote their sensory development and stimulate their curiosity and creativity.
Sensory bins are often used in early childhood education and therapy settings as a tool for sensory integration therapy, which aims to help children develop and organize their sensory systems. They can also be used at home as a fun and engaging activity for children to play and explore.
We’ve been playing with a rainbow theme alllll week around here. These are three rainbow sensory bins that we have been exploring.
Any time that I pull out the corn bin, everyone gets very excited. I added ribbons in different colors and some “gold coins” (aka yellow Connect Four game pieces!)
Another little sensory bin that we’ve been playing with is a simple bowl of these Fuse ‘M Beads.
I added a couple of pairs of tweezers and an ice cube tray and let them go at it!
This was a fun fine motor activity, but mostly they just loved running their hands through the beads.
Baby Girl loved exploring these little beads.
((These are really little, so if you play with these…or any little parts…keep an eye on your little ones if they tend to put things in their mouths. Baby Girl does pretty well and won’t put things like this in her mouth.))
This last sensory bin used the Fuse ‘M Beads again. The next day, I put the beads and some cotton balls (clouds) into a big ol’ bowl and added a melon baller and kitchen tongs.
More fine motor skills and sensory play combined into one colorful activity!
We hope you get some good ideas from these sensory bins. have you done any fun sensory bins recently?
If you are setting up a rainbow sensory bin, be sure to grab a copy of our colors handwriting kit. There are many items in the printable kit that can be used in a sensory bin to challenge letter writing. It’s a great colorful addition to rainbow play!
Rainbow Handwriting Kit– This resource pack includes handwriting sheets, write the room cards, color worksheets, visual motor activities, and so much more. The handwriting kit includes:
Write the Room, Color Names: Lowercase Letters
Write the Room, Color Names: Uppercase Letters
Write the Room, Color Names: Cursive Writing
Copy/Draw/Color/Cut Color Worksheets
Colors Roll & Write Page
Color Names Letter Size Puzzle Pages
Flip and Fill A-Z Letter Pages
Colors Pre-Writing Lines Pencil Control Mazes
This handwriting kit now includes a bonus pack of pencil control worksheets, 1-10 fine motor clip cards, visual discrimination maze for directionality, handwriting sheets, and working memory/direction following sheet! Valued at $5, this bonus kit triples the goal areas you can work on in each therapy session or home program.
Colleen Beck, OTR/L has been an occupational therapist since 2000, working in school-based, hand therapy, outpatient peds, EI, and SNF. Colleen created The OT Toolbox to inspire therapists, teachers, and parents with easy and fun tools to help children thrive. Read her story about going from an OT making $3/hour (after paying for kids’ childcare) to a full-time OT resource creator for millions of readers. Want to collaborate? Send an email to contact@theottoolbox.com.
