Sensory Play
What is sensory play?
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Any experience that engages a child’s senses of touch, smell, taste, sight, and hearing.
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Sensory play also includes body awareness (proprioception—sensing where our bodies are in space) and balance.
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Sensory play is hands-on and child-centered as children actively explore different materials.
Why is sensory play a part of our curriculum?
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Sensory play develops fine and gross motor skills through the manipulation of materials.
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Research shows that sensory play develops neural connections that facilitate future learning experiences.
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Sensory play can be calming.
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Exposure to different sensory experiences can expand children’s threshold for sensory inputs.
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Sensory play can introduce mathematical and scientific concepts as children pour, scoop, sift, measure, and examine materials.
Examples of sensory play in our school:
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Every classroom has a water table and a well stocked shelf of supplies such as funnels, scoops, ladles, basters, and whisks. Water tables are also sometimes filled with other materials such as dried rice.
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Children dig, scoop, pour, bury and build in our large outdoor sandboxes and indoor sand table.
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Children create with play dough and clay.
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Children experiment with recipes for Oobleck and moon sand.
Sensory Play in Action
