Sensory Bins

When I first started this journey as a therapy mom, I had very little knowledge on how I could help my children. Over the years, I have had incredible therapist train me on activities to do at home. One of my goals with my blog is to share weekly some of the ideas they have given me.

Last week, I went to my daughter’s therapist desperate for activities to help stimulate her. We had been to church that week, and my daughter was scratched ten times by another little girl. The teachers did not catch it because she never cried or made any type of noise. They never called me because they thought she was fine since she wasn’t crying. When I went to pick her up, she had totally shut down. You see, my daughter is opposite of my son. Where he is a sensory seeker, she is low registry and an avoider. I need to stimulate her and regulate him. To help both children, the therapist recommended sensory bins.

We made eight sensory bins that can be used all at once or one at a time. If you use several at a time, I recommend doing it in a room or even outside where there is a lot of space and limited distractions. Also, provide a good amount of space between each bin, so the child doesn’t get over stimulated.

Here are my bins:

1.       Cooked spaghetti bin- cook spaghetti, let it cool, and place it in the bin with preschool scissors. This is great for sensory and fine motor.

2.       Spaghetti and pom pom balls- put spaghetti straight from the package into the bin with colorful pom pom balls. This combines hard with soft. For older children, you can even include colored cups for the child to sort the pom pom balls. Sorting is a great fine motor activity to add to this bin.

3.       Sand with army figurines- put the little army figurines in the bin and cover them with sand. This combines gritty with hard. The kids love finding the army guys.

4.       Water with soapy bubbles and ocean figurines- fill the bin half way with water and add a quarter size drop of dawn soap and stir to make bubble. Then, place things that are found at the ocean inside the bin. We had small plastic figurines (fish, seahorse, starfish, shark, turtle, and boat) and some sea shells. This combines wet, soapy, and hard.  

5.       Salt with paint brushes- glue colored scrapbooking paper to the bottom of the bin and fill the bin with a very thin layer of salt (just enough to cover the paper). Then, add paint brushes. This combines the gritty with a fine motor activity of salt painting. My kids love making pictures in salt. It is also one of the less threatening bins for sensory avoiders because they can hold a paint brush if they do not want to touch the salt right away. For sensory seekers, they can salt paint with their fingers too!

6.       Brown rice with gummy worms- place gummy worms at the bottom of the bin and cover them with brown rice. This combines the hard with the gooey. If you have more than one child, you can play a game and see who can find the most worms.

7.       Zip lock bag with LA Looks blue hair gel and ocean figurines- place small ocean figurines (fish, seahorse, starfish) in the zip lock bag and fill bag ½ way with hair gel. Tape the bag at the top once zipped to insure closer. This combines the gooey and hard in a less threatening way because the kids do not get their hands dirty.

8.       Beans with farm animal figurines- place small farm animals at the bottom of the bin and cover them with beans. This combines smooth with rough. When the child finds a farm animal, have them name it and make the animal's sound. If this is too hard, see if your child will copy you as you name it and make the animal's sound.

 

Some of my bins I have to redo every time I want to do the activity (# 1, 4, and 6), but the others I store in our hallway closet. Since I store some of them, I purchase smaller bins (the ones that are a little larger than a man's shoe box) with a lid. I bought my bins at Walmart. They have several different sizes of plastic bins with lids there. I also found the figurines in the toy section at Walmart. They come as a set in quart size bags.

 

Both of my children enjoy the sensory bins. My son jumped right in and wanted to touch everything. My daughter was very resistant and needed a warm up time to process them. For her, I started with the less threatening bins, and I let her join in the fun when she was ready. I never forced her to touch anything. I started doing the bins with my son, and let her watch. Finally, she decided to join us in the fun.

 

I hope these bins will help your family too, and provide stimulation and regulation for your children. Enjoy!