5 Easy Play Ideas For Little One At Home! – @my.little.food.critic
Sometimes entertaining little one at home can feel quite overwhelming and, at points exhausting! Here are 5 fun, quick and easy play ideas to keep your little ones occupied!
1. Wash the dirty animals
This sensory play activity is such a fun for toddlers and pre schoolers.
It takes minutes to set up and is great for their imaginative play, story telling and singing!
You can use any animals you have to hand for this. Simply add some warm water and washing up liquid to a bowl with a sponge/brush and ask your little one to wash the animals.
You can add some “dirt” to the animals by combining cocoa powder and flour if you like!
2. Sand, Dinosaurs & Eggs
Kinetic sand is great for this as it’s mess free but regular sand works just as well!
If your little one isn’t into dinosaurs, you can change up the experience by adding whichever toys they are interested in.
Just throw everything into a tray and let them explore.
This activity encourages imaginative play, pouring, mixing, touch and story telling.
3. Painting with cups or other objects
Children love exploring with paint and using different objects as paint brushes is great for the sense of touch and exploring texture, pattern and mark making.
We love using cups, cotton, fruit/veg, fingers and sponges.
4. Play dough tray
Play dough trays are so quick to put together and lend themselves to many different invitations to play. You can tailor them to your little ones interests, different celebrations or anything you like!
Add the play dough and a range of objects centred around a theme to a tray and let your little one explore and create!
This activity encourages exploring shape, size, texture and helps to develop their hand strength.
Examples of ideas for trays:
Shapes – add play dough, shape cutters, lolly pop sticks, pip cleaners, rolling pin
Monsters – add play dough, shape cutters, googly eyes, pipe cleaners, rolling pin
Construction vehicles – add play dough, construction vehicles, pebbles
Under the sea – add play dough, sea animals, sand, rocks
5. Puzzle treasure hunt
Children love treasure hunts! Find any puzzle, alphabet puzzles, shape puzzles, whatever you have to hand and hide the pieces around your garden, in the house, or in a tub of rice or sand. Explain to your little one that they need to find all of the “treasure” (puzzle pieces).
This is such a fun opportunity to explore the shapes/sounds.
