As a mom of busy twin toddlers, not all my activities are planned. I know! Life is much easier when we have activities planned and prepared. Being prepared makes for an easier day, but unfortunately, that’s not always the case because life happens.

This sensory sand foam bin is a fun activity to put together at the last minute to entertain your little ones. This activity is great for exploring textures, and you are free to add toys of your choice to make your little ones experience while playing an educational and fun one.

Some Benefits of Sensory Play Activities:

• Develop oral language skills: While your little ones are exploring a sensory tub, they are talking about their play. When they do, you can foster their discussion by asking prompting questions or talking about the ingredients that are loud, quiet, cold, warm, wet sticky or smelly.
• Life skills: Children learn through play. When we add spoons and tongs to sensory bins, our little ones are developing their fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination as they pour and scoop. They can also learn some early math concepts.
• Provides opportunities to create memories: Setting up sensory play invitations are great for bonding with your little one.
• Most are quick and easy to put together.
• Provide little ones with opportunities to have fun.

Tips for setting up a sensory activity:

• Prepare in advance
• Plan for the mess
• Supervise your little ones as they play
• Document memories
• Consider how you will clean up
• Keep invitations simple

Materials you will need for this invitation:

• Shaving Cream
• Clean sand
• Shallow tub for play
• Some toys of your choice

How to put a sand foam sensory bin together:

I was not going to mention any defined amounts for the sand and the shaving cream because you are free to adjust the amount until you are satisfied with the consistency. However, I used two cups of sand and a can of shaving cream I purchased from the Dollar Store.
This sensory bin is easy to put together, and if your child is old enough to put this activity together, by all means, allow them to. I placed the ingredients in the tub for my girls because even though they tried to spray the shaving cream, they were not strong enough to get out enough for our activity. All I did was pour two cups of sand into a container and spray some shaving cream into the container. I allowed the girls to mix with their hands and kept adding shaving cream until we were happy with the consistency.

After about five minutes into play, the sand foam started to lose its foaminess, and so, I added more shaving cream. This step is optional because your little ones can continue to work at moulding the sticky sand into shapes of their choice by using their imaginations.

After playing, the best way of cleaning up is taking your little ones outside to wash their hands and to clean your tub. Sand can clog your pipes and we do not need that!

Some ideas of what you can add to a sand foam sensory bin:

My girls love playing with creepy crawlies, so I added some of their favourite bugs.
You can also add:

• Shells
• Stones
• Toy cars
• Plastic letters, numbers
• Any plastic toys of your choice.

This activity was super fun for my girls but also provided them with some learning opportunities. While the girls played they developed in the following areas:

• Fine Motors
• Hand Eye Coordination
• Oral Language
• Creativity
• Using the sense of touch.

This activity was a win and will be used in the future. Next time, I will try using some coloured sand or adding food colouring to the shaving cream.

  I do hope you find this article useful. If you have any questions please feel free to contact us by sending us a message or visiting us @learning.stepbystep on Instagram, Learning Step By Step on Facebook and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel for educational resources that will help you and your littles on their learning journey as they continue to Learn Step By Step!

Thank you for being here!

Kimberlee and the Learning Step By Step Team.