From birth to early childhood, children use their five senses to explore and try to make sense of the world around them. Picking things up and feeling their texture is what people often associate with sensory play, but it’s about much more than touch.
Sensory play includes any activity that stimulates a young child’s senses of touch, smell, taste, sight and hearing, as well as anything which engages movement and balance.
The benefits of sensory play
Sensory activities, in addition to being fun and interesting for babies and young children, encourage children to explore and investigate. Furthermore, these activities support children to use the ‘scientific method’ of observing, forming a hypothesis, experimenting and making conclusions.
Sensory activities also allow children to refine their thresholds for different sensory information, helping their brain to create stronger connections to sensory information and learn which are useful and which can be filtered out.
For example, a child may find it difficult to play with other children when there is too much going on in their environment with conflicting noises or sights.
Through sensory play, the child can learn to block out the noise which is not important and focus on the play which is occurring with their peer.
Another example is a child who is particularly fussy with eating foods with a wet texture such as spaghetti.
The use of sensory play can assist the child with touching, smelling and playing with the texture in an environment with little expectation. As the child develops trust and understanding of this texture it helps build positive pathways in the brain to say it is safe to engage with this food.
Other reasons sensory play is beneficial for children include: It helps to build nerve connections in the brain, it encourages the development of motor skills, it supports language development, it encourages ‘scientific thinking’ and problem solving and it can involve mindful activities which are beneficial for all children.
What Can You Use for Sensory Play?
The possibilities are endless. You can encourage sensory play through sensory bins, activities, or even in the garden and around the house. While sensory play does not have to be set up and managed with fancy materials, it can be fun and inviting to set up invitations for your children to join in the play. By adding colour and variations to the sensory materials, you make the activity more inviting while integrating senses even more.
