12 FUN WAYS TO PLAY WITH KINETIC SAND YOUR KIDS WILL LOVE

Kinetic sand is one of the best sensory-rich materials to encourage play and we've collect 12 of the best ways to play with kinetic sand your children will find hard to resist. 

As soon as we opened the box, kinetic sand quickly became one of our favourite sensory rich materials for play.

It made our list of favourite non-food items for sensory play back in 2014. 

It truly is amazing stuff and so versatile! Recently we found a new way to play with our kinetic sand.

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CRACK THE CODE TO READING AND SPELLING

Helping young children crack the code to reading and spelling with the help of these Crack The Code word cards.

Every year I've taught I've had children who are able to learn the individual sounds letters make in words but can't then recognise the same sounds even in short words without difficulty when reading or trying to spell them.

You often hear of teachers referring to cracking the phonics code. The above is a perfect example of how hard learning to read and spell is - something we can forget as adults.

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FAIRY GARDEN PLAY

We love our small world or imaginative play here and my children have enjoyed many hours this way. But it's summer time here in Australia and they have spent more time inside than out so during one break in the hot weather I created a simple fairy garden invitation to play in a shady spot outside for them.

BEGINNING SOUNDS MATCH CARDS

Ready to print, these beginning sounds match cards are ideal for preschoolers and primary aged children learning their initial letters sounds.

Learning the beginning sounds letters make is one of the early keys to a solid phonological awareness. Children start learning this skill in preschool and continue to consolidate their knowledge of phonemes when they start school.

But it's not always the easiest skill for young children to master so providing lots of hands-on ways to practice this is key in the early years.

For me, a simple way to allow children this time to learn is to use literacy centres in class. 

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LEGO PEOPLE CHALLENGE

Create this simple LEGO fine motor invitation at school to help build visual discrimination skills and provide a calm-down space in your classroom! 

It's the start of a new school year here in Australia which means a new school and a new class for me. 

Two classrooms in fact which means even more space to set up invitations for play! 

Not knowing the children yet, I've create some simple prompts for play to get us started including this simple LEGO people challenge - a great one for developing fine motor control and strength, build problem solving and decision making skills in young children in a playful way.

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