Royal Playdough

 Playdough mats using clipart/ colouring sheet faces, laminated. With a host of collage materials to create royalty. There are loads of other uses for the cards also.... (to follow)

Calm Down Box

A possible tool in your strategies to support behaviour. There will be lots you can add to this.

Tactile Book (My House)

 A tactile book made for a homes project.

The group did not have children with visual impairment but made tactile for interest and would support if there was a child in future.

Budget Sensory Ideas

Here are two sheets I have devised to support you in creating sensory spaces on a budget/ movable. Sensory environment can be really rewarding/ relaxing/ engaging for all children.

Light Toy

this wonderful light toy that is designed for under water e.g. in the bath, but works equally well outside. It can be used for exploration of for themes e.g. light, stars etc.

It projects well onto ceiling and walls but even better onto close surfaces e.g. an umbrella or chiffon or indeed both as in one of the photos. I placed it in a large shiny Ikea fruit dish that reflected well.

It can be purchased from specialist SEN retailers or ebay and Amazon, search around under the heading "under water light show"  the vary in price from £5-£50 (depending on size/ amount of light sequences/ or just difference)

Here is a link to the one featured here (possibly not the same retailer) 

Rock Pool in the Garden

After a discussion about how we wished we lived closer to the beach, to explore rock pools thought it was a great idea to make a rock pool in the garden (we'd just been on holiday and been to an aquarium and so had bought these sea creatures)

Water and Sand Play Set Up

An example of set up for water and sand play, to enable choice, mixing sand and water but play separately also.

More Sensory Play Doughs

In search of ideas for cool "snake" sensory play recipes I remembered this recipe with cornflour (cornstarch) and liquid soap, I used a cheap hand wash but  I'm pretty sure shampoo or bubble bath will work too and you could use scent to relate to theme etc.

It's an amazing consistency a lot more solid than cornflour and water but can also go more liquid when you warm in hands and hold like bottom right picture or pull between two hands (kind of bubble gum ish)

I then posted this on a Facebook group "Parent Toddler Groups Together" and Nicci Eyles told me of another great cornflour dough "Ice Cream" dough and WOW!!! It actually looks like real ice-cream when you scoop! This one is made with cornflour and hair conditioner.

 As with the above dough I'd suggest just keep adding the liquid until it's an appropriate texture. 

Odd shaped felt taggie rattle

An unusual shaped very light weight little rattle. Filled with and clean empty crisp packet and a bell for two noises, and ribbon taggies to chew and fiddle with. Initially saw idea on pinterest and repined

Fun Stuff

The "stuff" in the background seems to have been an interest to some. The toys are marketed for children with special needs, and have "special" prices to match!!! But they are great resources despite the price, and are suitable for all children but have the durability to stand up to some major use. I don't know where they are available from in other countries, but in England they are available from Nes Arnold.

The Tubbie is available here and seems to be a hit with children of all ages (and adults) the only problem with this is if the wrong size balls or toys get posted accidentally it is a major job to remove them.

The mirror Chimeabout is also a rather fun resource and is particularly suitable for babies and individuals with SEN, but I admit to enjoying watching this spin, and then stop especially with a torch beam aimed on the mirrors an instant light show around the room! I would defiantly buy again despite the price, available here!

Magic Snow

I bought some "insta snow" (also marketed as magic snow) from pound land before Christmas and have just got around to using it. We milked the making of this for everything we could, following the instructions to the letter (reading, doubling the instructions so a bit of multiplying.....

dividing the water needed into tens
using a syringe to add the water in 10ml squirts,
watching the immediate reactions of the powder, !!)......
Oh we had fun, then played that was a little less successful (not so keen on texture and neither was I to be honest, haven't played in a while) But I think you will agree this is rather cute (with its features nabbed from the glueless collage) The "snow" is now in freezer awaiting another play session with a twist!!! I'll keep you posted

Glueless collage

We've got a bit of a winter weather theme going on in the playroom at the moment, how long that will last or how long it takes to evolve is a different matter! But it seemed appropriate with the weather just starting to get cold- maybe it will snow soon? Here is an art area for children to make moveable collages in picture frames and mirror.
The collage items are loosely wintery in nature, the blue picture frames containing some wintery inspiration. The black button has "can you make patterns on the frames?" recorded onto it."
The red button says "These pieces are really tiny, if you drop them pick them up" The colour paddles just add another dimension to view.

I added a children's camera to the display so pictures could be taken of their creations here are the first of two such pictures.

I also added a nice little kaleidoscope next to the mirror frame (again for inspiration and comparison)

Top Tips

TOP TIP! TOP TIP! TOP TIP!

Substitute cold water in playdough recipes for freshly boiled, it will "cook" the playdough immediately. No lengthy stirring/ burning problem

Scented Playdough

So on a mission tonight to make scented playdough with what I had! Ended up with, coconut and ginger spice, vanilla, peppermint, and in the process came up with what may be a serious time saving new recipe!

I made Coconut playdough using body shop coconut body butter, and this is how I came up with a way of making playdough that I can't believe I hadn't realised before (There are plenty of examples of this method over the internet now I have searched). I simply followed the recipe that I posted a few days ago, but substituted the oil for body butter. In order to ensure I didn't have clumps of butter I boiled the water and added the body butter to that and then added each of the ingredients to that, in order to avert any potential chemical reactions (you never know). When I finally added the flour to my shock it simply got thick very, very quickly and hey presto playdough, no cooking at all. I hope it will keep the same as the cooking, but whatever I will defiantly be using boiling water again.

The coconut dough has turned out a VERY different consistency/ texture, rather crumbly and almost like short crust pastry, I am wondering if the body butter acted like shortening? Who knows?

In order to check that the crumbliness wasn't due to the boiling water method, I made vanilla playdough using the same method but adding the boiling water last (this way children can join in the making and adults simply add water). This time the consistency was not crumbly at all, so must be due to body butter?

The ginger spice one was the basic playdough recipe (on a pan- pre coconut revelation!) and simply adding copious amounts of dried spices, the ginger seemed to turn it the best colour so it has more ginger in!

Lastly pepermint, as above but adding pepermint and blue colouring to preferred strength after cooking, more flour was added to deal with the extra liquid.

Photo Playdough Recipe

I have been meaning to make this recipe book for some time now, we have a lovely one we made YEARS ago and it's still going strong! However I wanted to be able to share it with others so have created this which can be downloaded as a PDF at TES (free joining). Here are all the pages:







Great for supporting independence, pre reading, sequencing and those with any communication difficulties, or who need visual prompts, particularly those with Autism to know the sequence and duration of an activity!

OHP Creations

The possibilities of the OHP for creativity are endless and parallel and extend the possibilities of the light boxes that are common place in many preschool environments.

The resources to create "art" with were available on the table the OHP was on these included: string, pipe cleaners, lollypop sticks, colour paddles, cocktail stirrers, colour blocks, magnifying glasses, clear acetates and white board markers.

Given freedom children created some amazing compositions, and here are a couple of them.

There is more explanation on the designs at All Play on Sunday

And there is SO many cool ideas for using lightboxes at Play at Home Mom