1John 4:7 Beloved, let us love one another; for love is of God.

Monday, July 28, 2014

Sensory Bins

Is it still July?  Will September EVER arrive?  Yesterday I picked up a couple of bins at Fred Meyer to create some sensory bins.  I chose this size,  (16 QT) because of the height.  I didn't want the bins to be too long, just the right size for two or three small sets of hands to share.  The bins came in a pack of two for around $8.00.   Rice was going to be put inside and  the sides of the bins should be tall enough to accommodate pouring and containing. 
There has been a lot of  pinning on Pinterest about coloring my own rice, but I realized that I really don't want to do that.   Instead, I took the high road and ordered two pounds of colored rice from Discount School Supply.  It will be enough to mix that in with some white rice.  The result is great!  There is just enough color in the rice mixture to make it exciting.  Many of you know how frugal I can be, so buying that rice was painful.  The white rice came from Fred Meyer, and I paid $2.89 per bag.  I only poured two of them into the containers because I am sure that at some point I will need to add more.  It's not too expensive to create a simple sensory bin!
 It's soothing and addicting to run my hand through it.  That's the effect I hope it will have on the kids.  I don't often schedule in a sensory time.  This is the type of thing we use as a tool of diversion- for when we are all trapped inside due to torrential rain and the kids need a distraction.  Here is what I am excited about- ADDING SEASONAL ITEMS!  (Nerd alert, but I'm not apologizing.)
My second bin not only contains the rice, but I added one bag of beans and another bag of split peas for color.  In September, we can add some felt leaves, small plastic apples, small sticks, rocks, anything that represents the change of a season.  October will be my favorite- spider rings, small jack-o-lantern toys, real jack-be-little pumpkins.  Every month we can add something to keep these bins interesting. 
I was thinking it would be fun to put some notecards and small cars in a bin.  The notecards can stand up in the rice and create walls that a car can maneuver through or around.  Need other ideas?  Add blocks, pom poms, cotton balls and clothes pins, measuring devices, feathers, paper clips, marbles(age appropriate), bouncy balls, dinosaurs, army guys.  Anything small!  Time to remove items from the bins?  Kids LOVE to do stuff like that.  Many hands make light work.
Something else that I keep as a diversion is a collection of homemade matching games.  I have seasonal sets.  I just printed off clip art from my typing program and laminated each card with contact paper.  See Smudge?  He was following me around all morning.  Anyway, the sets each store nicely in a ziplock bag and the sets together in a bag that was used for a toy set at one point.   
Each set has 12 cards.  This is a short game designed for 3 year olds.  5 year olds enjoy playing it, too!  This set is the summer theme.
Here is the Fall theme.  We also have Spring, Winter, Halloween, Christmas and Jesus sets. 
Come on, September!
Song for today is called Sunrise by Norah Jones.  My daughter and I were yard saling Saturday and I found a few CDs for .50 each.  Metallica, Norah Jones and Michael Jackson.  How's that for variety? 
♥♥♥Happy Music Monday!♥♥♥

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