In my pocket: probably a cup of rice
From early on, I knew I wanted to engage Kingston’s mind and senses in a way that was different from the way store bought toys do. I have been giving opportunities for different forms of play for a while now. But since around 7 or 8 months, I have actively tried to provide opportunities for sensory play. What does this mean? I set up situations where Kingston will feel different textures, hear different sounds, practice fine motor skills, practice playing independently, get messy, use new and old materials in different ways with his hands, get his whole body involved, etc. Luckily, Google is God and Pinterest is my best friend. I don’t have to come up with brand new ideas, just find them online and try them in a way that suits me and him. Again, I didn’t make this stuff up! I just use what I find! But people have asked me about it, so here are the answers to two of the questions I hear the most.
What is in Kingston’s sensory bin?
Anything and everything! Here are some things we have used (NOT all at once).
Objects made of different materials: wood, stone, plastic, metal, rubber.
Food with different textures and colors: wet or dry spaghetti (ziti, penne, bowtie, etc.), rice, cheerios, rice crispy cereal, yogurt, food coloring.
Outdoor materials: bean pods that fall from trees, leaves, rocks, sticks, twigs, water.
Art materials: pipe cleaners, felt pieces, large beads, paint, packing peanuts, foam shapes.
Recyclable materials found around the house: toilet paper tubes, paper towel tubes, bottle caps in different sizes, baby food jars, plastic spoons, egg cartons.
Things to scoop with, fill up, and pour from: spoons, shovels, funnels, rakes, yogurt cups, baby bottles.
Pre-made toys: plastic animals and dinosaurs, balls of different sizes, magnetic letters, foam letters
What does Kingston do in his sensory bin?
Wellllll, that depends on the day, his age, his mood, and what is in the bin. I often set up an invitation to play (set out the materials and leave it where he can see it and engage at his will) when he is on his way home from his dad’s house so that way it is out when he gets here. Here are some examples of sensory play experiences I have provided for him, his age, and what it looked like. You might notice that most of the early ones include edible materials. All experiences require some degree of adult supervision, with CONSTANT supervision in the early months. This is also not an exhaustive list of everything we’ve done but a pretty full one.
Yogurt Painting:
7.5 months old. I wanted Kingston to do his first painting but without real paint. I mixed some plain Greek yogurt with food coloring and put it on paper in front on him. He was in a diaper and on a mat (actually two clean puppy pee pads but you gotta work with what you’ve got!). He couldn’t totally sit up on his own for more than maybe 30 seconds to a minute. He stuck his hands in the yogurt, hit the paper a few times, ate it off his fingers, and cried. The experience lasted about 2.5 minutes.
Rice Crispy Cereal:
8 months. I put a bunch of rice crispy cereal into a small bin and sat him in front of it. He reached into the bin, squeezed the cereal, picked up handfuls of it, tasted some of it, drooled into the bin, and then hit and smashed the cereal a bit more. This experience likely lasted 3-5 minutes. But the set up was super fast!
Colorful Spaghetti:
First time was around 9 months. But this was a favorite from the age of 9 months to about 12 months so it was done many times with different colors, on playdates, in a baby workshop, and alone at home. I found online how to make colorful pasta with food coloring. The first time I was ambitious and made blue, green, AND red. Put them all into a bin separately. He sat next to the bin and reached in and pulled the pasta, tasted it, squeezed it, threw it into the air, threw it behind him, pulled at it with both hands as the colors started mixing, tasted some more, and then crawled away from it to get a book off the shelf. This lasted probably 6-8 minutes the first time we tried it.
My friend and I took our kids camping this summer. Her daughter is 8, and Kingston was about 13 months. There wasn’t much for Kingston to do independently in the woods. So we filled a container of water and threw a few cups in and he had his own water play experiences while we attempted to build a fire and cook.
Among many other places we have visited, Kingston enjoyed the hands on water play at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum.
Balls:
14 months. I put a bunch of different colored and sized balls into a large bin. Until now, this bin held shoes under my bed. I gave away some shoes and fit the rest into my closet so this bin could now be dedicated for play. He sat in the pile of balls, tried to walk over them, picked them up and squeezed them, and eventually threw most of them out of the bin. That was about it. It was available to him for a few days but each time he went near it, he only used the materials for about five minutes.
Just a little 15 month old painter.
Rocks and Animals:
15 months. I put many different rocks and shells into his large bin. I will admit I bought many of the rocks as a set from Michaels because they were smooth and I didn’t worry about sharp edges (as opposed to rocks from the park… I was still learning!). I cut up pieces of felt to include in the bin and then spread out many different small plastic animals. Kingston was interested in bringing his dinosaurs into the bin and then throwing the rocks. He climbed in and out and in and out and in and out. I would pick up rocks and hand them to him and he would lift them up and down a few times and then throw them. A lot of rocks were thrown over the next ten minutes and they were not light. I didn’t leave this bin out unless I was in the room and sitting with him because the rocks were so heavy that it became a safety hazard.
Pom Poms and Feathers:
15 months. Soon after the rocks and shells bin I decided to go with something very light to give contrast to what he just experienced. I put in feathers and pom poms that I purchased at Michaels, along with a few empty yogurt containers, a toilet paper tube, a small and large shovel, and an old baby food jar (he hasn’t had baby food since like six months so obviously I was saving materials for a while!). Kingston enjoyed scooping up pieces in the larger shovel and flinging them up because they would fly up and then land on his head or behind him or in the bin. He also liked filling the glass jar with pom poms and then dumping them out many times over. He enjoyed this bin for anywhere from five to twelve minutes during the week or so that I had it out and available to him. This one I just left out so he could go to it whenever he wanted, even if I was doing something else. It was safe enough for him to do on his own.
Shaving Cream in a Large Bin:
16 months. I sprayed shaving cream into his large bin and squeezed some drops of food coloring on top. I stripped Kingston into a diaper for this one. He was reluctant to touch anything so I put him into the bin. He touched the shaving cream and then looked at me. I stuck my hand in and put some onto my nose. He stuck his hands and feet in and squeezed the shaving cream. He patted his hands around. Then within three minutes he climbed out of the bin and ran around the house touching things. He laughed at his shaving cream footprints. I reassured myself that shaving cream is basically soap. It was a huge mess but one of the easiest to clean up! Thank goodness because it lasted less than 5 minutes total.
Shaving Cream in a Small Bin:
16 months. This was a week after the not so successful shaving cream in the large bin experience. I sprayed shaving cream into a smaller bin and added some food coloring. Then I put in a shovel and a scooper and stuck a bunch of his plastic animals in. He scooped for a bit and would get mad when the shaving cream was stuck to the shovel. Then he noticed the animals and picked each one up. I kept adding more so he kept finding animals in the bin. The whole activity lasted about ten minutes.
Dry Pasta:
16 months. It was way to hot in my apartment and I wasn’t feeling very well. I opened a box of ziti and threw it into the small bin. I looked through my sensory materials (yes I have a spot in the closet now for them!) and grabbed the pipe cleaners, which Kingston had never seen before, and put a few in. When Kingston found the bin he stuck his hands inside and enjoyed moving the pasta around because it made a loud noise. He did that for a while. I showed him how to thread the pasta onto a pipe cleaner, although I knew that was too hard for him to do on his own. He held a pipe cleaner and tried and tried and tried to get a piece of pasta onto it. I held the pipe cleaner for him and he was able to do it. Over and over and over and over and over again. Pasta on, pasta off, pasta on, pasta off. He was proud of himself and smiled each time. We probably used this bin together for over 15 minutes.
“Cloud Dough”
Almost 17 months. I made “cloud dough” from a recipe online. It includes flour and baby oil. I put some baby bottle caps and a few plastic spiders into the bin. We took it outside to use with friends from the building in the park. We also brought a tray for shaving cream and a bag of dried pasta. This might have been too much at once, along with being in a different location than usual and also on a play date. Kingston was not interested in the sensory items at all as he was much more interested in running to the playground and making me catch him or sitting on my lap. BUT his friends had a blast. One of them basically swam in the cloud dough and shaving cream, touching it, squeezing it, putting it on herself, sitting in it, climbing over it. And his other friend enjoyed picking up a few pieces of dried pasta and trying to fit them into each other. So fun to see the different personalities of babies when they attempt these activities together.
Rain Play:
Almost 17 months. OK, so this isn’t specifically a sensory play idea but it actually IS sensory play. I put Kingston’s rain boots and raincoat on and we went to the park across the street on a very rainy day. He walked through puddles, picked up wet leaves and threw them in the air, ran around, tried to lift heavy rocks, and helped me collect a few nature items to bring home. The sensation of rain on his face instead of sun, and walking in boots instead of sneakers and on a wet ground instead of dry, feeling the wind and seeing people run past as we slowly strolled (seeing a wet rat near the bushes instead of a dry one, eek!)… things he would never learn from an indoor activity! This activity lasted about 45 minutes.
Halloween Objects:
17 months. When I took down my Halloween box and then proceeded to be too busy to decorate for Halloween, Kingston opened it and found a closed package of fake spider webs and brought it to me. He babbled and bounced up and down and made the sign for “more.” I said why the heck not and opened the package. Luckily his large bin was empty at the time so I spread out the spider webs and added in some fake pumpkins, monster fingers, and a few plastic bugs and spiders. He got excited and reached right in, pulling things out over and over. But he got frustrated very quickly because the dumb fake spider web sticks to everything it touches and he couldn’t escape from it even if he walked away from the bin. But he did enjoy picking up the fake pumpkins and throwing them onto the fluffy web, until they started sticking of course. I consider this one a flop.
Rice:
17 months. We did this today. Kingston was home sick today at his dad’s house. So I had time to create this bin before he got home. I poured rice into the bin (left over from a sensory experience in kindergarten last year so of course I brought it home!). I added a few gourds and some fake pumpkins. I also added the large white and small orange pumpkins that we had gotten at the apple orchard last weekend. Then I found a few wooden pieces we had recently collected outside and added them in too, along with some glass jars. Kingston went straight for the bin when he walked in the door. He sat on the side and touched the rice. Then he put some into a fake pumpkin and then into a glass jar. He scooped the rice and dumped it out. He dug his hands into it and dragged the gourds through it. After a while, he got out his coloring book and a maker sat down next to the bin and signed “help,” handing me the marker. I helped him open the marker. He drew on his coloring book and then used the marker to drag through the rice and poke into the rice. He tossed the marker to the side when he saw the wooden pieces and then started digging into and swirling the rice with those pieces. The floor was a total mess when he walked away. I swept up the rice but left the bin there. A little while later he came back and climbed into the bin. He dug into the rice for a bit and then started lifting handfuls and throwing them into the air, out of the bin, and all over the floor. After not too long I decided rice play was done for the day. I know I will find rice around this apartment until Kingston leaves for college. This time I had to move the bin out of reach because he didn’t want to stop playing. Rice play lasted for about twenty minutes.
So, why sensory play for Kingston?
As you can see from my descriptions, there’s no magic happening in Kingston’s sensory bin, just everyday regular baby/toddler learning.
He is practicing pinching, pulling, squeezing, lifting, digging, rolling, smelling, tasting, filling, scooping, pouring, shaking, listening, and many other verbs. He is learning to play on his own. He is seeing new materials and finding new ways to use old materials. He is building stamina for working on one activity (started at around 2 minutes and today he played for close to 20!). He is working on his fine motor skills, something he was actually behind in previously. Are these all things he can learn from a myriad of other toys and experiences? Yes, of course! I am using a sensory bin in our home to add to his other play opportunities and out of the home experiences and to help him grow as a little person. I enjoy finding new things that I can present to him as an invitation to play. If I am too tired to play with him or to think of something new, I just throw some things into a bowl, like bottle caps, cotton balls, magnetic letters, or q-tips (he loves q-tips!). When I do sit with him, I talk to him about what he is doing and help name the objects he is working with. Sometimes I just sit next to him and play and dig and scoop and pour on my own, without interacting with him. Sometimes I go in the other room and peek in to see him work by himself. I love seeing this little person developing at his own rate, in his own time, and with his own very special personality.