Sensory Bags

I wanted to do some more sensory learning but a lot of the ideas I have seen are messy ... like taking a bath in corn meal or making a sandbox on my kitchen floor... well, I would be finding grains of sand for weeks (if not years) to come. No chance. Not at this point. Maybe once I have five kids and have given up on a clean kitchen. Until then, I'll stick with self-contained non-messy, "messy fun" - thank you very much.

Here's what I did... I made four "sensory bags." They are fun to feel, squeeze and squish with different colors, textures and densities.

The first one is clear hair gel with glitter and large colored rhinestones. It sounds feminine but it was very fun to find the "red ones" and "blue ones" in a sea of glitter. Much manlier in person, I promise.

The second bag was clear hair gel, a pinch of silver glitter, and little plastic frogs I found in the party-favor section.

The third bag was filled with Quaker Oats, mini rubber dinosaurs and plastic turtles. The oats were a much different texture than the gel (obviously) and also made sound as the bag was handled.

The last bag I filled with shaving cream and drops of food coloring. It was light, fluffy, and you could see the colors mixing.

I used ziploc freezer bags and then reinforced the edge with clear packing tape (not taking a chance on an explosion).

Which ones were a hit? The silver glitter/gems was a runner up but the one he really liked was the Quaker Oats! Little man liked searching in the oats for the brightly colored toys. He also shook the bag quite a bit. He wasn't too interested in the frogs or the shaving cream. I'm saving the bags to re-introduce in a few days. He might have a completely different reaction. It's hard to predict what will catch his eye and it really changes day to day!

PS- When I went to our local Wal-Mart to buy clear hair gel, I searched for the largest/cheapest container. Turns out, I bought men's hair gel and it smells like a cross between Old Spice and Brut cologne, TIMES TEN.  It is so strong it makes your eyes water (not kidding).  Even when the bags were sealed and taped we could still smell them from across the room.  I wasn't planning on little man's "sensory bags" including the sense of smell, but I guess it was bonus!  Eventually, the bag lost (part of...) its smell (or we got used to it) so it ended up working out, but the moral of the story is spend the extra twenty cents and pick up something that smells like fresh linen, it is worth it!!