Kids love splashing around and playing with water when the temperature rises. Better still, water play activities offer a huge range of sensory benefits, especially when it comes to facilitating exploratory play.
From demonstrating floatation and exploring the different forms of water, through to jumping over waves and even painting with water, there are lots of easy water play ideas which will provide hours of fun.
We’ve rounded up some of our favourite water sensory play ideas!
Water Wall
Now that spring is here, kids love to be outdoors as much as possible.
Building a home made water wall with your children is not only a great way to spark their imagination and facilitate problem solving, but it will also keep them entertained for hours on end.
A water wall is also incredibly easy to create - you can use a whole host of everyday items to create funnel-like structures that lead the water into one container at the bottom.
All you need is a piece of fencing or board, and everyday items such as plastic pipes, water bottles and other tunnel like items.
Create a Beach
Creating a mini sand pit and paddling pool in your garden is a great way to facilitate imaginative play and encourage your littles one to play independently.
Fill the area with buckets, spades, funnels, and even some of their favourite toys (dolls, dinosaurs, cars) to instantly stimulate their imagination.
Bottle Cap Fine Motor Play
This is a great activity to encourage fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination!
Simply collect an assortment of bottle caps (different colours and sizes if you can) and ask your little ones to fill each bottle cap with water without spilling it. Medicine droppers or none medical syringes are ideal!
This challenging game will keep them entertained for hours.
Block Scooping
Playing with water is a great way to enhance your little one’s learning and problem-solving skills.
And block scooping is always great fun! Simply fill a bucket with water, pop in lots of blocks or Duplo and using a small net or kitchen sieve, encourage your little ones to scoop out the blocks.
Bath Time Play
Bath time is not only a great opportunity to bond with your little one but it’s also a great way to encourage sensory play and learning.
There are a whole host of sensory water play toys for bath time that will make tub time super fun. From bath animals and sprinklers through to jugs and funnels, the possibilities are endless when it comes to bathtime fun!
Bubble Game
This one is a firm favourite amongst kids and big kids too! Simply fill the bath tub or paddling pool with bubbles and get your kids to search for hidden toys or simply let them enjoy the bubbles.
Sensory Play Mats
Sensory play mats can be incorporated into any sensory play with water. Add them into the paddling pool to create different textures, or use them to help create your beach scene. Explore our range of water-friendly sensory play mats here.
Remember, when your little ones are playing with any sort of water, they should always be supervised at all times.
