Chinese New Year is almost upon us! Have you been doing any arts,crafts or activities with the children to teach them all about it?
If you follow us over on Instagram you will have seen this activity in action, along with Symmetrical Dragon Paintings, Chinese Lanterns using old art work, China Tuff Tray and Paper Roll Dragons! I wanted to set up some sensory play inspired by Chinese New Year too. My children really enjoy sensory bins/trays so I try to do as many as I can. Today this set up greeted Neve as she arrived home from school.
You will need:
Food Colouring
Spaghetti
Bowls
Trays
Sandwich Bags
Utensils/Spoons/Chop Sticks/Scissors etc as desired
I purchased the bowls from Amazon. It took me back as I remember using them when I was at school as a child! Which, can I add - how fabulous were my teachers to totally understand the importance of hands on sensory play over 25 years ago!
I filled two sauce pans up with water and added food colouring. I recently invested in some Wiltons food colouring. I have had so many people over the years telling me to ditch anything other than this food colouring ensuring me that once I used Wiltons I would never go back to using anything else. Its true! I can't believe how little you need for such beautiful vibrant colours! I'm annoyed with myself for not converting earlier! I used a knife to scoop the tiniest amount of food colouring gel out and stirred it in the water. I added the spaghetti and cooked as required.
I removed the water once cooked and waited for the pasta to cool. I wanted the colour to be more prominent so I tipped them into a sandwich bag and added the smallest amount of colour and mixed it around till the colour dispersed evenly.
Colour was perfect, so I tipped it out onto the tray and added the bowls, some scissors and some chop sticks. I wasn't suprized that Neve made a B-line for it as she returned home.
She loved using the scissors to cut it up. She was nattering away to herself and although the topic wasn't anything to do with China - there was so much to gain from this.
I often have messages saying well I set up something for Chinese New Year (for example) but the children didn't talk about anything relating to Chinese New Year as they were playing.
That is absolutely fine. You may observe some talk about the topic the set up is intended for, but when children are busy playing they are learning. During this activity for example there was lots of cutting, operating the chop sticks and dishing the spaghetti out amongst to the two bowls.
All of this promotes - developing control in their hands, building fine motor skills and control. Through observing I could also tell that there was a real interest here with pretending to bake and make so I shall look at setting more activities up like this and improving/adding to our Kitchen Role Play area.
Something else that was a hit was the chop sticks. She used them perfectly! She had never used them before so I was taken back that she had better skills than me!
She loved using the scissors to cut it up. She was nattering away to herself and although the topic wasn't anything to do with China - there was so much to gain from this.
I often have messages saying well I set up something for Chinese New Year (for example) but the children didn't talk about anything relating to Chinese New Year as they were playing.
That is absolutely fine. You may observe some talk about the topic the set up is intended for, but when children are busy playing they are learning. During this activity for example there was lots of cutting, operating the chop sticks and dishing the spaghetti out amongst to the two bowls.
All of this promotes - developing control in their hands, building fine motor skills and control. Through observing I could also tell that there was a real interest here with pretending to bake and make so I shall look at setting more activities up like this and improving/adding to our Kitchen Role Play area.
Something else that was a hit was the chop sticks. She used them perfectly! She had never used them before so I was taken back that she had better skills than me!
There was lots of language, role play, imaginative play going on. It was a great activity for the senses too!
Lets take a took at this activity in action:
Have you joined our Learning Through Play GROUP yet? Its the place you can be inspired by other like minded people and share your photos to inspire too! We have everything being shared from Outdoor Areas, Tuff Trays, Dens, Literacy set ups, Funky Fingers and endless crafts!
You can request to join our GROUP here - Learning and Exploring Through Play GROUP.
Other posts to check out on Learning and Exploring Through Play:
This sensory tray is a fun way for young children to celebrate Chinese New Year whilst gaining a range of sensory experiences and getting the chance to practice fine motor skills whilst exploring the tray or develop communication skills through role play.
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