sensory bin

Pumpkin Pie Scented Moon Dough

This pumpkin pie scented moon dough is the perfect Fall sensory bin filler. Create a sensory experience that involves both the olfactory and tactile sensory systems.

To me, the smell of Fall is encapsulated in pumpkin pie spice. The scent reminds me of my grandma’s pumpkin muffins and takes me back to my childhood.

Pumpkin Pie Scented Moon Dough Recipe:

Supplies:

4 cups flour
2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
1/2 cup vegetable oil

Directions:

In a bowl, mix the flour together with the pumpkin pie spice.
Pour in the vegetable oil.
Stir well and then knead by hand.

Since everything in this play recipe is edible, this moon dough is taste safe. This makes it a good sensory play option to use with babies and toddlers. Of course, adult supervision should always be used.

Dump the scented moon dough in a plastic bin. If you want, you can add some Fall themed items. I added silk fall leaves, leaf confetti, and a small scoop in our bin. If using this bin with babies, skip the addition of the leaves and confetti.

This recipe is included in our Sensory Play Recipes eBook. It includes more than 25 easy to make recipes for awesome sensory activity options. You can get a sample of 5 of the recipes in the book by filling in your email below:

This dough is soft and mouldable. It forms shapes in your hand but can still revert to its powered state. The addition of the pumpkin pie spice provides the scent and also a slight hint of brown in the dough, adding to the Fall feel of the experience.Moon dough can be messy. Messy play is great for kids, but not always as fun for parents!

It works well to put an old sheet or tablecloth underneath the area you are playing in. You can also use a shower curtain purchased from the dollar store. This contains the mess. When the kids are done playing, you can gather up the corners and shake it outside.

You may be interested in some of our other sensory experiences:

Pumpkin Scented Puffy Paint

How to Colour Moon Dough

Rainbow Soap Foam

O Holy Night Nativity Sensory Bin

By Sharla Kostelyk

One of my daughters and I were walking through the hardware store when we saw a bright yellow star shaped cookie cutter. I’m not sure why it was at the hardware store, but immediately, I thought that it would make a great nativity star in a sensory bin. It was a bit harder to find the rest of the items for this O Holy Night Nativity Sensory Bin, but it all came together once I had the star to plan it around.

I’m really happy with how this turned out. I used dry black beans as the base to represent the darkness of the night when Jesus was born. I wanted to use a round container this time to make the sensory bin just as a change from the rectangular ones that I usually use.

O Holy Night Nativity Sensory Bin:

Materials needed:

dry black beans
foam wise men, shepherd and camel
ceramic baby Jesus and sheep (I got mine at the dollar store)
small angel shaped metallic cookie cutter
yellow star shaped cookie cutter
container

To put together this nativity sensory bin, fill a container with black beans and place the other items on top. You could add a Mary and Joseph of course as well. You can also add other animals or pieces of hay. If you already have a children’s nativity set or manger at home, you could add that into the bin instead of purchasing new items.

The nice thing about using black beans as a base is that you can easily stand up the foam pieces and cookie cutters within the bin. This allows kids to move things around within the sensory bin and set up the scene the way they want to.

This O Holy Night Nativity Sensory Bin is an effective way to reinforce the Christmas story with your kids. It pairs well with many children’s books that tell of Jesus’ birth.

Join me for a free 5 part email series Sensory Solutions and Activities and get your Sensory System Behaviours Easy Reference Cards.

Check out some of our other Christ-Centered Christmas Activities:

Nativity Chalk Silhouette

Paper Plate Manger Craft

Christmas Gifts Sensory Bin

By Sharla Kostelyk

‘Tis the season of giving and when I saw that package of Christmas bows waiting to be put on packages, I knew they were destined for another purpose in this house! Pretty much any item that comes through the door into our home becomes used for sensory play in one way or another. Using those decorative bows and some other sparkly festive items, I put together this Christmas Gifts Sensory Bin for the kids.

A few years ago, when I put together our Winter Wonderland Sensory Bin, I used a foil tray instead of a plastic bin. I like to change up the containers to keep it interesting and also to provide additional sensory input. The foil tray has ridges that provide that extra sensory feedback and it’s shiny so it provides a different visual component than a matte plastic container would.

When I saw how shiny the bows were, I decided that the foil tray would be the perfect container for this sensory bin. I looked around the house and in our sensory drawers and found some other items to complete this sensory play experience.

Christmas Gifts Sensory Bin:

Materials needed:

foil tray
Christmas gift bows
small decorative Christmas gifts (I found mine at the Dollar Store)
green shiny pompoms
mini Christmas ornaments

Place all the items into the foil tray. You can use a plastic bin if you don’t have a foil tray. You could also add ribbon curls or strips of holiday wrapping paper. The beauty of this sensory bin is that it uses items that you may already have. You could in fact create it after Christmas by reusing your gift wrap, bows and ribbons.

For dozens of other sensory bin ideas, check out all of our past Sensory Bins.

If you are looking for information on making sensory bins, you may be interested in my book all about it.

Join our free 5 part email series Sensory Solutions and Activities and get our Sensory System Behaviours Easy Reference Cards.

Christmas Ornament Sensory Bag

Take Flight with a Sky Sensory Bin

By Sharla Kostelyk

Last year, we did a flight unit in our homeschool and I always like to add sensory elements to everything we study. It allows the kids to explore and use their imaginations and helps their retention. Recently, we created three sky sensory activities that would have complemented that unit nicely including this sky sensory bin. They would also work well with a weather unit.

For this sky sensory bin, we used a base of dry pasta that we dyed blue. If you’ve never dyed pasta before, you can read about how to do it using either rubbing alcohol or vinegar. (click those words and it will take you to simple tutorials for each method)

For the actual bin for this, I used a clear food storage container that was fairly deep. After filling it with the blue pasta shells, we added some of the items from the In the Sky Toob and used the remaining items from the tube to add to our Sky Sensory Bag and Sky Sensory Bottle.

The kids cut cloud shapes out of white foam and added them into the bin. We also added cotton balls to represent fluffy clouds. I like how colourful the items are. They make this such a cheerful looking sensory bin.

The hot air balloon from the In the Sky Toob was a particularly popular element and there were several imaginative play scenarios that resulted from it.

For dozens of other sensory bin ideas, check out all of our past Sensory Bins.

If you are looking for information on making sensory bins, you may be interested in my book all about it.

Join our free 5 part email series Sensory Solutions and Activities and get our Sensory System Behaviours Easy Reference Cards.

Joy Sensory Bin

By Sharla Kostelyk

This Joy Sensory Bin is perfect for a bit of sensory play around the holidays. Even though we have been making sensory bins for a very long time now, it never ceases to amaze me how much enjoyment my kids still get out of them. I also am impressed at the different, out-of-the-box ways the kids think of playing when each bin.

I am in love with that picture because Dancing Queen’s face looks so peaceful which shows the power of sensory play with kids who have sensory needs and anxiety.

Making this sensory bin was a two part project. We made the letters for JOY by covering wooden letters with Modge Podge and sprinkling generously with silver glitter. When they were dry, I mixed Modge Podge with water and went over the sprinkles with it to seal them.

I used a blue bin and added fake snow (also called buffalo snow). I used a type that was iridescent because I liked the look of it but regular would work too.

I added white and blue pompoms, holiday shaped mini cookie cutters, white feathers, snowflake confetti in white, blue and silver, and the JOY letters.

Last year for Christmas, I made a Winter Wonderland sensory bin and while the kids loved it and we decided to use the same snow for this one because it was such a hit, I wanted to do something this year to convey a bit more about the real reason for the holidays so that is where the idea for the Joy Sensory Bin came from.

For hundreds of other sensory bin ideas, you can also follow my Sensory Bins board on Pinterest.

Follow Sharla Kostelyk’s board Sensory Bins on Pinterest.

If you are looking for information on making sensory bins, you may be interested in my book.

Join our free 5 part email series Sensory Solutions and Activities and get our Sensory System Behaviours Easy Reference Cards.

Eyeball Sensory Bin

By Sharla Kostelyk

This sensory bin was most popular with my older kids. In fact, I happened to have it on the counter during a zombie theme party we had for our son and the preteen and teenage guests at the party loved it! Some of those boys spent more than twenty minutes playing in it. Don’t believe anyone who tries to tell you that sensory bins are only for little ones!

To make this eyeball sensory bin, I used purple water beads, water, googly eye stickers, bright coloured eyeball finger puppet rings, and cartoon eye glasses. I began by filling a clear plastic bin with water and the purple water beads to allow them to soak up the water. When the water had been absorbed, I added the other items.

One of the ways the kids played with this bin was to play seek-and-find with the eyeball stickers that were here and there and everywhere.

The cardboard on the cartoon glasses got wet from the water beads after a few days so we ended up having to take those out, but they were a fun element while they lasted. The kids enjoyed trying them on and laughing at each other! They also liked playing with the ring finger puppets.

This would be a good sensory bin to go along with a Monsters theme unit or for Hallowe’en.

If you are looking for information on making sensory bins, you may be interested in my book.

Join our free 5 part email series Sensory Solutions and Activities and get our Sensory System Behaviours Easy Reference Cards.