Easy and Fun Sensory Bin Learning Ideas

Are you looking to incorporate learning activities into sensory play? This post shares many great sensory bin learning ideas for literacy and math.

Incorporating early literacy and math skills into play is a great way to engage your child in learning while still having fun. I’m here today to show you easy ways to incorporate letters, numbers, sounds and measurement into your sensory bin.

It’s first important to realize that a tremendous amount of learning is going on while your child is engaging in free play at the sensory table. There is experimentation, gross and fine motor skills, vocabulary development, critical thinking and so much more happening, all while your child is playing.

Never feel guilty about allowing your child ‘free play’ time at the sensory table, or anywhere else. Unstructured play is a goldmine of learning and should be encouraged!

However, you may also want to provide more structured activities during your sensory play time. I’m here to show you that with just a few materials, so many educational topics can be covered.

You can freshen any of these ideas by switching out your sensory bin filler. The activities I’ve featured in my photos are from a rice bin, because that’s an easy sensory bin filler that is inexpensive and accessible.

But you don’t have to stick to a rice bin. You can do the exact same activities using different fillers (click here for a list of 100+ sensory bin filler ideas, and here for taste-safe sensory bin ideas if you have a baby or toddler around).

Sensory Bin Learning Ideas for Literacy

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Vocabulary Development

Vocabulary development will naturally occur as you explore sensory bin fillers with your child.

Sensory play is a natural setting to use words describing texture, such as sticky, gooey, soft, fluffy, etc.

You can also introduce vocabulary words based on the theme of your sensory bin.

You can also bet that your child will have plenty of opportunities for speaking and listening if they are playing with a sibling, peer, or with you.

Providing opportunities for small world sensory play (e.g. adding figures or props to your sensory bin) is a fantastic way to develop your child’s vocabulary and speaking skills through rich imaginative play!

Phonological Awareness

Phonological awareness skills refer to being able to recognize the sounds in words. They are a crucial building block to reading development!

You can incorporate phonological awareness into your sensory bin play in several ways.

• Rhyming: hide matching pairs of rhyming items in the sensory bin, Have your child search for the items, then match them.
• Beginning Sound Matching: hide pairs of items with matching beginning sounds in the sensory bin (e.g. cat and cow). Have your child search for the items and match them. You can also do this for ending sounds (e.g. lion, chicken). I used these cute Melissa and Doug Magnets.
• Syllable Search: hide a number of objects in the sensory bin that are one, two, or three syllables in length. Provide a sorting mat labelled 1 syllable, 2 syllables, 3 syllables. Have your child search for the items you’ve hid and sort them onto the appropriate mat.

Alphabet Learning

Learning the alphabet is another important stepping stone to learning how to read! Using magnetic letters or an alphabet puzzle is a great way to incorporate the alphabet into sensory play.

• Alphabet Puzzle: Hide puzzle pieces and have your child find then and put their in the correct spots. I used this adorable puzzle.
• Matching letters: Hide letter manipulatives and provide a matching sheet with letters printed on this. Your child does not need to know letter names in order to do this activity. For toddlers, provide 5-10 letters to match, rather than the whole alphabet, so it’s not overwhelming. See here for an even easier sensory bin set up using this idea.
• Alphabetical order: If your child knows their letters and can sing the alphabet song, you can have them start to work on putting the letters they find in order. For a preschooler, I would create an alphabet mat, leaving a few blanks for some familiar letters. For a child towards the end of Kindergarten or older, challenge them to find all the letters of the alphabet and order them, using the alphabet song to help guide them.
• Matching words to beginning sounds: Hide objects (magnets, small toys, manipulatives, etc.). Have your child find the objects and place them on their correct letter/sound on the alphabet chart.
• Drawing Letters: Put whipped cream or another foamy substance into the bin. Have your child use their index finger to practice forming letters.

Name Activities

• Hide the letters of your child’s name in the sensory bin. Have them find the letters and spell their name
• For children who are just beginning to work on spelling their name, print their name on a paper and have them match the letters.
• For extra fun, put a thin layer of whipped cream in the sensory bin and let your child trace his or her name with their fingers!

Sight Words and Spelling Words

Hide the Letters/Words:

• Print your sight words on paper or objects (e.g. gold coins for St. Patrick’s Day) and hide them in the sensory bin. Have your child find the items/papers and read each word as they find them.
• Make a sheet with spelling words. Hide letters and have your child find the letters of their spelling words and place them in the correct order on top of the spelling words.
• Print your child’s spelling words, leaving out 1-2 letters for each word. Place only the letters you’ve left out in the bin. Have your child find the letters and place them on the correct word.

Spell the Words

Put a goopy substance in the sensory bin. Call out a word and have your child spell the word.

Examples of substances that will work:

• whipped cream
• pudding
• foam
• sand
• sprinkles

Sensory Bin Learning Ideas for Numeracy/Math

Number

One-to-One CORRESPONDENCE

• Place any kind of manipulative into the bin. Provide an ice cube tray. Have your child practice moving one manipulative into each ice cube tray at a time, filling the whole tray.

Making Sets

• Bury any kind of manipulatives. Provide bowls with a number written on them. Have your child under the manipulatives, placing the correct number of items in each bowl.

Numeral Recognition

• Similar to the alphabet activity, provide a mat with the letters 0-9 written on it. Hide plastic numbers (could be magnetic, or any manipulative you wish) in the sensory bin. Have your child match the numeral they find to the numeral printed on the mat.

Number Sequence

Print out the number sequence, leaving a few blanks in place of where some of the numbers should be. Hide numbers in the sensory bin, Have your child find the hidden numbers and place them on the mat in the appropriate space.

Creating Number Stories

Providing a small world set up, such as a beach and some water, with some figures, perhaps duckies. Act out number stories together. For example, thee duckies were swimming in the water. Two more joined them. How many duckies in the water now? These number stories are the first steps to developing a robust understanding of addition and subtraction.

Addition and Subtraction

Act out number stories, as described above, but this time, have your child record an addition or subtraction sentence to represent their number story (e.g. 3 + 2 = 5).

Provide addition or subtraction problems. Allow your child to use the items in a small world set-up (like the duckies) to act out the story and find the answer.

As your child becomes more proficient with addition and subtraction, write addition/subtraction problems on a manipulative (e.g. rocks, pretend coins, etc.) Have your child search through the bin to find the rocks, then answer the number sentence each time he/she finds one.

Measurement

Volume and Capacity

In young children, volume and capacity is developed through experimentation. Provide your child with containers of different shapes and sizes, and a sensory bin of water and rice. Have them choose two containers and predict which will hold more. Then test it out by filling one container, then the other.

It sounds simple, but the more practice they have with this skill, the deeper their comprehension of volume and capacity will become! Comparing a tall and skinny container with a fat, short container is an especially good challenge for preschool/kindergarten age!

 

These are just some of the ways to incorporate learning into sensory bin play. I hope this has helped you in finding fun and educational ideas for sensory bin play!

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