Sensory Play!

So Why is Sensory Play so Important?

It encourages young kiddos to explore using their senses. This kind of play is great for all types of learners, visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. Regardless of whether your child’s learning style falls under one or all four of these categories, sensory play can play a vital role in their development. There are all types of experts who dive deeper into the benefits, so I won't reiterate. My goal here is to share with you why it is so important to me and maybe, just maybe something might resonate with you.

For my oldest, sensory play was so important in helping him develop his fine/gross motor, communication and problem solving skills when he was younger. These were all areas that he was delayed in. He also had an aversion to having anything on his hands. He was non-verbal until age 4, so trying to figure out what bothered him when there were so many different things in a given environment was difficult and led to so many meltdowns. Exposing him to different sensory inputs, one at a time through play, helped me to better understand his likes and dislikes. This in turn, helped minimize his meltdowns significantly. Sensory play also helped him with spatial awareness and language development. It was completely life changing for us, in the best way possible.

For my younger two, while they reap all the same benefits as my oldest did in building developmental skills, it is just so much fun. They love to explore different sights, sounds and textures. Throw in some movement activities and they couldn't be happier! The more they can do, the better they learn. When it comes to messy, sensory play, the messier the better! From simple sensory bins to slime and oobleck, most of the hands-on activities I do with my younger ones involve some aspect of messy sensory play. I hope you enjoy these sample pictures of some fun sensory activities we do!