This rainbow sensory bin will incorporate bright, fun colors and allow you to explore your senses and fine motor skills! This activity is for preschool aged children, and there are so many things you can do with your sensory bin! You can scoop and dump, you can string beads onto pipe cleaners, and you can sort colors! This will benefit you by allowing you to explore colors and practicing your fine motor skills like putting beads on pipe cleaners and scooping and dumping!
Supplies:
Plastic bin with lid
Measuring cups
Rainbow bin supplies (All supplies should be rainbow color)
Examples: Beads, pipe cleaners, buttons, pom pom’s, foam shapes, plastic easter eggs, small plastic containers
Activity Steps:
Step 1: First, you want to make sure that you have gathered all of your necessary supplies. Go ahead and grab your bin and the lid, your measuring cups, and all your rainbow supplies that you are going to be putting into your bin.
Step 2: Now that you have all of your rainbow supplies gathered, we need to fill our bin with all of our supplies. So, pick what you want to fill your bin with, and start to open the packages up, and dump them into your bin. Add everything in except for your measuring cups.
Step 3: After you have all your rainbow supplies into your bin, put your lid onto your bin, make sure it is closed all the way, and shake it up so that it all gets mixed together. If your bin is too big to shake, you can also use your hands to stir up all of your materials!
Tip: Think about what kind of textures you feel while you are stirring your bin up. You may feel things that are smooth, fuzzy, soft, or hard and you also may feel different shapes like circles or flowers.
Step 4: After you have shaken up your bin, take the lid off, and add your measuring scoops into your bucket.
Step 5: Now that everything is in your bin, it is time to play! You can scoop up the beads and buttons and dump them out. You can take a bead and a pipe cleaner and put the bead on the pipe cleaner, there are so many options!
Tip: You could also add small plastic containers that you can fill up using your scoop.
Step 6: Keep playing and exploring all those fun, bright colored supplies! Since it can close with the lid, you can even take it with you anywhere you go! Have fun!
Tip: You can also change up the way you play with it, maybe find all the blue pom poms, or all of the green buttons.
Games to play with your sensory bin
Game #1: Scooping and Dumping
You can play this game by using your scoops and your plastic containers that you added to your bin. You can scoop up your beads and buttons, and dump them into your plastic container. You can also scoop different amounts of beads and buttons into each plastic container.
Game #2: Stringing
To play this game, you will need to take one of your pipe cleaners and you can choose the color. Then, pick up a bead or a button and string it onto the pipe cleaner. You can use whatever color button or bead you want! Continue to do this until you have as many beads and buttons on your pipe cleaner as you want.
Game #3: Sorting
Sorting is a great way to identify colors and materials. There are many ways that you can sort the materials in your bin. Some examples are you could sort the beads by color or the pom pom’s by color. You could also sort the materials, so put all the pom pom’s in one bowl and all the buttons in another.
Game #4: Number Game
For this game, you will need to take some paper and rip it up into little pieces that you can write on. You will also need to use one of the bowls you used to sort. If you did not sort, go ahead and grab any kind of bowl. Take the piece of paper, and write a number on it as well as an item. For example, on one piece of paper I am going to write “3 green pom pom’s”, and on another I am going to write “6 blue beads”. You can write as many as you want, and you can also just write numbers on them like “6” or “4”. Put all the pieces of paper in your bowl and mix them up with your hand. Close your eyes and pick a piece of paper, and open it up. Read what it says, and get whatever out of your bin it tells you too. For example, if I chose a piece of paper that said “3 green pom pom’s”, I would take one of my empty plastic containers, and pick out 3 green pom pom’s from my bin and put them in my container. If I choose a piece of paper that just has a number on it, like 4, I would just choose 4 items from my bin and put them in the bowl.
~Made by Nick P.
