Building Site Sensory Play

When my daughter was turning 2, I prepared a Things That Go-themed shelfie and created this simple building site sensory bin to go with it.

For this invitation to play I used kinetic sand and some of A’s construction vehicles. We paired them with Usborne’s Things That Go book, which has two pages dedicated to building site vehicles.

She enjoyed “driving” the different vehicles and using the tractor and her scoops to fill the dump truck with sand, carrying it around the “building site”.  Then we took an ice cube tray and filled it with sand to make building blocks. This part was really fun!

Kinetic sand has been one of her favorite sensory bases since she was a very young toddler. She can play for hours. The texture of the sand, the way it sticks together but also slowly crumbles is incredibly therapeutic. I love joining her when she plays with kinetic sand.

Sensory play offers a number of benefits. It helps strengthen fine and gross motor skills, problem-solving skills, and helps support cognitive growth and language development. Research also shows that it helps build important connections in the brain’s pathways, which will enable the child to complete more complex learning tasks later on.

Cleaning up is part of the learning process, so make sure to encourage your child to tidy up after they finish playing. Model how to do it until your child feels confident enough to initiate the tidying up process independently.