A sensory activities is any activity that involves a kid’s senses of touch, smell, taste, sight and hearing. Kids cannot read or study such things at this age. Besides these senses are natural and are obtained spontaneously through their surroundings and circumstances. Therefore, we should offer toddlers with an environment that encourages them to explore their sensory development.

The five senses and their sense organs are, 

• Sight – Eyes
• Scent – Nose
• Touch – Skin
• Taste – Tongue
• Sound – Ears

Children get frustrated when we don’t involve them in an activity, therefore we need to do our part to encourage their mental growth while also expressing our affection for them.

To have fun, kids don’t actually need the bulky toys that are sold in the market. 

Parents will have to set up simple but creative tasks that will keep them entertained for at least 30 minutes.

Sensory Activities:

It seems difficult to keep a one year old amused for a full day, but it is doable with these kinds of sensory activities.

• Prepare cornstarch paste

If given a chance, toddlers would choose to play with the sand, which is not healthy. Instead, we can let kids play with cornstarch, which is something we already have at home. Give them some time to play with dry flour along with spoons, and when they begin to get bored, add some water so that they can try to shape and mould the paste. This will help the flour hold together with the water.

Benefit: Their ability to touch, move their fingers, and to press things is improved by this action.

Senses: Touch, Sight

• Texture walk

Making your child experience varied textures at home can be done by gathering various items and sticking them to charts. Making your kid walk by putting these various textured charts side by side.

Set up a new path for your kid at home to walk along with stones, fluffy furnishings that can sink their feet into, a texture that resembles a garden, and a foam puzzle chart so they can feel the smoothness.

If you are unable to construct them, you can purchase them online. Here are our suggestions.

Purchase: Sensory Flower(0-1 year old), Sensory Mats – Amazon, Sensory Mini Mats 2 – Amazon

Benefit: This is a great activity because it sharpens their focus and concentration. This helps children develop their sense of touch while also enhancing their response time, physical coordination, and balance.

Senses: Touch

• Bubble bath

Kids will love foam baths or bubble baths, which are filled bathtubs with a surfactant foam layer floating on top of the water. Put a few toys in the bathtub.

Children will feel so delightful instead of taking their regular baths every day.

Note: Although entertaining, a bubble bath can hurt your kid’s delicate skin. So, use the best soap possible.

Benefits: Develops hand eye coordination 

Senses: Sight, Touch

• DIY Drums (DIY – Do it Yourself)

Place various tins and containers you have at your home and give them a stick. Then watch what happens, as they set them as drums and play to make a sound, which will aid in the development of auditory learning.

Senses: Sound

• Discovery Basket

Fill transparent jars with small items that the baby can explore. Put a lid on the jar and let the child open the lid to explore the items.

Benefits:There are many benefits of creating discovery baskets, as they will help kids in providing excellent guides to boost sense of adventure, mental focus and a sense of freedom, practise sitting, eye focus and brain development.

Idea: In a bag or basket, you can also place musical or light toys and give them. The kids will be shocked to see the lights and sound when they catch the items.

Senses: Sight, Touch, Sound (if musical items are present)

• Pom Pom Tube Drop Activity / Pom pom drop Activity

Pom pom drop is the simplest and most enjoyable toddler activity to make at home. This activity will undoubtedly keep them entertained. 

Homemade setup: There are so many ways to make this, but I will suggest the most basic one.

1. First, get a board.
2. Using tape, attach paper tubes to that board.
3. You can connect as many tubes as you want at various angles.
4. Once it’s ready, insert the pom pom balls into the tubes and train your kid to play in this way.
5. We can place containers on the floor in the direction that will catch the pom pom balls.

Note:A one-year-old kid may or may not be able to do this activity on their own; they will need our assistance to learn, but they will enjoy seeing this with curiosity.

If you are unable to construct them, you can purchase similar games online. Here is our suggestion.

Purchase: Pom pom Activity

Benefit: Hand eye coordination, Color Recognition

Senses: Sight, Touch

Note: You can make a ton of different activities using pom poms. Kids will love playing with pom poms even without engaging in any activities. Parents must be creative and develop pom pom activities to encourage learning and play in children.

• Cardboard Tunnel

Just save the cardboard boxes (like amazon boxes) and make a hole for the baby to move through. Toddlers will surely enjoy playing with cardboard. 

Benefits: The capacity for imagination grows.

Senses: Sight, Touch

• Pillow Mountain 

Create a “mountain” with sofa pillows for your child to climb. With your baby, take a seat on the floor so you can support him while he climbs.

Benefits: This activity helps babies who are waddling or crawling to build strong muscles and also to enhance their balance.

Note: Keep an eye on his tenacity. If your small challenge causes him pain, don’t be alarmed.

Senses: Sight

• Paint with yogurt

Put yogurt in little cups and add various food colors, and combine the colors with the yogurt.

Give your children a chart and a brush, and then show them how to paint. They will soon begin using colored yogurt as paint, and they will start to enjoy painting.

Senses: Scent, Sight, Taste.

• Fun with Magnets 

It will be enjoyable to play with magnets. They will be engaged in that activity for at least a short while. Instead, if we do, they will first try to grip and drag them away from the surface, before gradually trying to attach to it.

There are numerous magnets available in the market like fruits, vegetables and many more.

Purchase: Alphabets Magnets

Benefits: As your child places pieces of magnetic toys on various surfaces, they are improving their hand-eye coordination and spatial awareness in their hands and fingers.

Note: If magnets are placed on the refrigerator, they might not initially try to stick them.

Senses: Sight, Touch

• Posting, Sorting Tasks

Another exercise that kids enjoy is moving items in and out using their posting skills. If you give them two jars and a box of pebbles, they will automatically try to fill the jars with the pebbles.

There are numerous ways to create this activity utilising items from your house.

Give them a box or basket, some playing cards, and teach them how to put the cards in the box each one at a time.

If you can’t provide the materials for this activity from home, you can buy them online. Here are some ideas we have.

Purchase: Colourful shapes activity , Shape Sorter

Benefits: Hand Eye coordination, Colour Recognition

It aids kids in matching the objects and practising their identification abilities. Kids should undoubtedly learn this skill; they won’t be able to do it right away, but if they do, it will be beneficial to you. When children finish playing, this activity will teach them to put their toys back in their proper places.

Senses: Sight, Touch

• Playing with Balloons

Fill a room with balloons and take your child inside. Give them balloons to hold. They’ll have fun trying to catch the balloons as they fly out of their tiny hands. This will influence them to practice holding activity.

Benefit: Color Identification, Hand eye coordination.

Senses: Sight, Touch