Importance of sensory play

Children are programmed to receive and utilize sensory inputs from day 1. Children need to have their senses (touch, sight, smell, taste and hearing) engaged to create a meaning for their experiences. It primarily helps in brain development by creating classifications and associations, thus leading to cause and effect. Moreover, it is all the more important for toddlers and preschoolers whose language is just beginning to develop. Because, sensory experiences will also pave way for language expression and development. As parents and caregivers, it is our job to help them explore their senses by providing appropriate activities for sensory play. Below, we will discuss some of the ideas for sensory play.


1. Touch – We all have a lot of ideas about how we can use touch as part of sensory play. It mainly helps in developing fine motor skills for toddlers. Sand, Water and Play-doh are popular among kids. But we can also explore on other day-to-day items. The challenge is how out-of-the-box our thinking is in order to create an interesting sensory play experience for the kid. Some of them are rice, sugar, shaving foam or cream, ice cubes, leaves, jelly or jams, different textured papers, cloth materials etc.. (please feel free to add anything that you can think of which I’ve missed)

Sensory play with colored rice

Playing with shaving foam

Pal playing with soap bubbles; In case you're wondering what's that below his nose, its my kajal that he's wearing like a mush

2. Sight – Sight constitutes anything the child sees. But don’t just stop with pointing out things. Get into the details. For e.g. if you are showing the child birds that are flying, also point out how different birds fly at different speed and how they use their wings to fly etc. Take kids for nature walks and help them notice different things. Even a small insect or an ant is an observation worth it for the kids. But please don’t confuse this with watching TV. :-)

3. Smell – This particular sensory activity is not given much of an importance to kids as much as we do with touch and sight. If you think about it, a lot of our childhood memories would be associated with a particular smell. A visit to a relative’s house, a special snack made by your grandma etc. Kitchen is one of the best places to start with for younger kids. Make them smell coffee, turmeric and other items and you can explain how certain things have a strong smell while others don’t. Nature walk can help here too. Make them smell different flowers. The smell of sand during the first showers of monsoon. You can find plenty of ideas. But when it comes to smell, the children will not be as eager as touching or tasting. So we have to first initiate and explain how we feel when we smell those flowers or a favorite dish etc.

4. Taste – Children have an urge to taste things right from when they were babies. It is their natural instinct to put those things in their mouth, which their hands can pick. They try to understand the nature of a particular stuff by putting it into their mouth. We can give kids different kinds of food stuff so that they try to understand how they taste. The flip side could be that some kids might start disliking a few of them. But nevertheless, this is a fun exercise to do. And if you have an older kid, why not let him/her make a dish and have a tasting session? Also if you have curious kids surrounding you when you are working in the kitchen, why not let them experience the raw taste of certain items like tamarind, salt, ginger etc. (definitely not chilies, please)

5. Hearing – This is also one particular sense I’d not underestimate, especially with my boy telling me which reverse sound belongs to which car in our apartment. Music plays a very important role in terms of hearing sensory. Expose your kids to different kinds of music. Thankfully our country is so diverse that we listen to classical to film songs to hip hop. Have a dancing session where you can sing and dance along with your kid. Another fun game is to have a quiz on identifying the birds chirping and animal noises.

Sensory play has lifelong benefits of learning for kids. It’s up to us to provide them the right kind of materials and environment that is both safe and fun. Please feel free to share your ideas and what you’ve done with your kids.