Scooping and Sorting

E has been playing with beans. :)

I've seen these sensory tubs all over blog-land and figured it was about time I put one together for E. Although I love all the themed ones that people come up with, I wanted to use what we already had at home and put it together in a short time. So, no theme for us this time. Our tub was filled with dried kidney beans, pom-poms of different sizes and colours, pipe-cleaners curled into spirals, a little fabric heart and bow, a plastic shot-glass, two silicone cupcake liners and two different sized scoops. In the picture, E is scooping beans into the little cup. You may have noticed one of her mo-men there, too. A couple of them got in on the action.

Later, we took the pom-poms from the tub and E did some transferring and sorting. Using kitchen tongs, she moved pom-poms between different bowls and sorted them by size and then by colour. She also got out a wooden spoon and mixed them around, pretending to make a cake (one of the 'bowls' was actually a cake pan). She poured the 'ingredients' into the pan and put it into the 'oven' (a cardboard box). Then she served the pieces back into the bowls. I love watching her imaginary play. :)

A couple of days later, we got out the beans again. This time I set it up as a 'spooning' and transferring activity. All the beans were in one bowl and I gave E the task of using a spoon to transfer them to a second bowl. She was very careful not to spill any, but the roasting tray was perfect for catching any spilled beans and really easy for her to carry, too. When she'd transferred all the beans, she picked up the bowl and poured them back into the original bowl and started again. I guess 'spooning' in the other direction seemed backwards.

-Polly