With Easter coming up, I was so excited to create an Easter sensory bin for my kids to use and explore. As I explain in my post Sensory Play: What It’s All About?, there is so much that children can learn from sensory bins and other forms of sensory play. In this post I’m sharing how I created my Easter sensory bin. I’m also detailing the various ways that my kids used the bin, with commentary about the skills they were developing along the way.
Note: This and other Easter activities can be found on my Easter activities for kids and Easter printables pages.
I created our Easter sensory bin from the following items:
- A base of green and white rice (left over from our Christmas sensory bin)
- Two small pails
- A handful of fabric Easter eggs
- Some plastic Easter eggs
- Mini Easter egg beads (inside the plastic Easter eggs)
I also prepped some tools for the kids to use with the sensory bin, including:
- An egg carton
- Some measuring cups (from Goodwill)
- A pair of tongs (also from Goodwill)
- A set of aluminum scoops
- A pair of scissor scoops
I put together our Easter sensory bin one evening after the kids had gone to bed, and I left it on the floor in our office. As soon as the kids saw it they were begging to play with it, but we were so busy for the next couple of days that it took us a while before the kids had a chance to dive in. When it was finally time, the kids were very anxious to help take the lid off. 🙂
And they were eager to explore all the materials inside the bin.
They were excited to discover mini Easter eggs inside all of the plastic Easter eggs.
The kids and I ended up playing with the bin for an hour that afternoon. By the end, rice was everywhere (which is why I put a sheet underneath before I let the kids start playing) and they had explored all of the materials.
Here are some of the ways we played with the sensory bin and some of the skills QBoy and XGirl got to practice during our play.
Opening and closing the plastic Easter eggs
The kids spent a lot of time just opening and closing the plastic Easter eggs. They opened them to get the mini-eggs out. They closed them up with rice inside. They closed them up to put into the egg carton. All of the opening and closing was a great opportunity to build fine motor skills.
Further, the kids got to work on color matching skills when I encouraged them to put the eggs back together with pieces that matched.
Fine motor practice: scooping
The kids did lots of scooping of the rice using different materials. They scooped using the measuring cups.
They scooped using their hands.
The scooped using the scissor scoops.
And they scooped using the aluminum scoops
Fine motor practice: tonging
The kids used tongs to pick up the Easter eggs.
It was challenging, but eventually QBoy managed to pick up an egg using just one hand.
Collecting and counting eggs
One of the first things QBoy did was to collect several of the plastic Easter eggs and line them up. He is very interested in order right now, and lining up his eggs was a manifestation of his preference for order right now. Once he lined them up, I invited him to count them.
He also collected eggs inside the egg carton.
XGirl, on the other hand, started by opening all of the plastic eggs and collecting the mini-eggs that were inside. Every time she added a new egg to her collection I asked her to count them up, which she did quite happily.
Sensory play using feet
At one point, QBoy decided to sit down inside the sensory bin in order to get a sense for how the rice felt on his feet.
Of course, XGirl and I had to take advantage of this opportunity to bury his feet in the rice. 🙂
Imaginary play
The kids also used the items in the sensory bin to engage in imaginary role play, pretending they were making me some eggs for breakfast.
First, they filled the eggs with rice egg white and yolk.
Then, they “cracked” the eggs into the buckets, pouring out the rice egg to prepare for “breakfast.”
QBoy also filled up the egg carton with rice and gave it to his dad as a “present.”
I’m always amazed at the creative play my kids invent for themselves when I allow them to engage in open ended play.
More Easter resources
More Easter posts from Gift of Curiosity:
- Easter Printables Pack
- Easter egg memory game
- Easter egg sound matching game
- Easter Bingo
- Easter do-a-dot printables
- Easter coloring pages
- Easter I Spy game
For more Easter activities and printables your kids will love, see my Easter Activities for Kids page and my Easter Pinterest board.
Follow Katie @ Gift of Curiosity’s board Easter on Pinterest.
I love this idea! I always have a hard time with ideas for my sensory bin. This is perfect for Easter!
This was one of the simpler sensory bins I’ve done, but there was so much learning involved for the kids. Sensory bins definitely don’t have to be complicated to provide a wonderful learning experience.
I love this! Thanks for the great ideas!
I use and create sensory bins all the time for my clients (I’m a speech therapist) but I LOVE LOVE this one. Putting it a clear container only adds to the excitement and anticipation. I can’t wait to try this one with some of my clients (as long as they don’t try to eat the rice…may try dried pasta instead!).
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for your comment. And you are right that a sensory bin with rice would not be appropriate for all kids, especially those who still put things in their mouths. Fortunately my kids are past that stage. 🙂 But there’s so much fun to be had with all the Easter eggs. Hope your clients enjoy!
Oh what fun! I love sensory bins too and I really need to get on the ball and do more for my girls they really love them and they are great for keeping them entertained too! Thanks so much for sharing on We Made That!
Another cute idea. Thanks so much for sharing.
Cynthia
I was just thinking about making a sensory bin for my 2-year-old this week. I’ll be sure to include some of your ideas. Thanks for sharing!
What a great sensory bin; so many play options! Thanks for sharing at Mom’s Library!
Just want to let you know I will be featuring this on Mom’s Library this week! I hope you stop by!
I love the sensory bin. I especially love the picture of the kiddos inside the bin. It is a great tactile experience, I have to admit that when setting things up, I never can resist the urge to run my fingers through the rice, pasta, lentils, or whatever filler I have decided to use!
I love your Easter table and Easter sensory bin! Lots of fun things to play with. 🙂
That colored rice is awesome! Their feet look like they having such fun in there. Pinned!
What a great project. I was ignorant about sensory projects until my children had outgrown them. I hope you’ll consider sharing this post at my Look What We Did link up.
Looks like they had so much fun! I love the rice and the way they used different utensils to pick things up. Great for motor skills! Thanks for sharing your Easter Sensory bin at Mom’s Library!
Just the last few weeks I’ve been struggling with the idea of sensory bins. I didn’t really understand the educational aspect and was very distracted by how messy they can be! Thank you for sharing all the different ways your kids learned through this activity! Maybe I’ll try another bin 🙂
Glad I could be of help! And I hope your kid(s) enjoy them as much as mine do!
Thanks for linking up to The Weekly Kids Co-Op. I have selected your post as one of the features for tomorrow’s Kid’s Co-Op post over on Triple T Mum and I have pinned this to The Weekly Kid’s Co-Op Pinterest Board. Looking forward to seeing your next linked up post 🙂
So much fun! The rice is beautiful. He climbed in the box:) I love the big tongs!
Oh, how fun!! Thank you for sharing at Sharing Saturday!
The colored rice looks like fun! Thanks for sharing with us at Eco-Kids Tuesday!