Texture Tubs, Touch Testing and a “T” Hunt: I Love Preschool Learning

My kids and I enjoyed learning about our sense of touch yesterday.   We started with a hunt for different feeling “items”.   We then tested them on our arms and practiced feeling vocabulary.   A letter hunt for “T” items to find in a tub of beans and playing with a variety of textures finished out our sensory learning morning.   Maybe this will give you some ideas of ways to interact with your kids and the sense of touch. …

Preschooler Texture Hunt:

We looked for a variety of textures in our house and compiled quite a pile: Scratchy, soft, slippery, squishy, scratchy, sticky, wet, dry, hard, pointy, dull, etc.   Some of the things we included were cotton balls, sandpaper, dish scrubby, tweezers, tape, toothbrush, feathers, q-tips, paintbrushes, a comb, ball of goop, and knitting needles.   Really, though, the possibilities are endless!

Once we had our pile of things we experimented with how they felt and made mini-piles, differentiating different feelings from the others.   Which ones are soft? Which ones are scratchy?   Which ones are hard and pointy?   My little man loved the toothbrush and the tape the best! …

Going on a Letter Hunt – “T”:

Sometime during our learning time, I realized that texture and touch both begin with T, as did several of the items we had collected.   We went around the house on another hunt and tried to find items that began with “T”.   We collected a tissue, toy truck, top, tweezers, tape and of course the letter “T”.   The kids enjoyed burying the items in the tub of lentils and digging them back out again.   I tried (with no luck) to get them to dig the items out with their eyes closed or blindfolded, no luck.   Maybe we’ll try that when they are a bit older. …

Exploratory Play with Texture Tubs:

This wasn’t a teaching time, I actually just set the tubs on the table and began the breakfast dishes (just in time for lunch – yikes).     I got five diffferent tubs and filled them with glass baubles, lentils, cornstarch, goop and tissues.   I let the kids have fun puttin their hands into the different tubs.   I removed the tub of lentils before they began mixing them.   There was cornstarch everywhere by the time they were done.   And we learned something unexpected – cornstarch can make surfaces very slippery. … All in all I think we had a fun morning playing with different textures.