Oh what lovely mud! Our tamariki thoroughly enjoyed a sensory mud experience set up by our wonderful student teacher recently. What appears to be mud is actually a mixture of cocoa, cornflour and water! Sounds good enough to eat doesn’t it? But much to our surprise none of it was consumed! 😊

The mud was made in the trough lid and our little ones very quickly rolled up their sleeves, ready to dive in. Our tamariki absolutely love sensory experiences like these! Each child spent time sliding their hands through the mud, smelling it on their fingers, squeezing the mud in their palms, watching it trickle down and patting it so that it splattered. The texture and smell was really interesting for our tamariki and they just couldn’t get enough! 💖

At one point, more cornflour was added. “Wow!”, “Let’s mix it”, “Look at this”, our tamariki could be heard saying. There was a lot of chatter amongst the children about what they were doing. They mixed it around with their hands until it was eventually all combined and all one colour... brown. Adding more cornflour made the mixture thicker which many of the children noticed!

In experiences like these we integrate and focus on oral language and literacy by modelling descriptive vocabulary associated with the experience such as, “Mixing”, “Combining”, “Adding”, and “Squeezing” as well as naming the ingredients used in the mixture. We also invited our little ones to write their names or the beginning letter of their name in the mud, which they were eager to do.

Towards the end of the experience, one of our little ones wanted to bring out the farm animals. What a great idea! They spent time covering the animals in mud and sliding them through it, like a very enjoyable mud bath. 😊

To end this very pleasing (and messy) experience, our little ones helped to clean the animals in some soapy water, as well as the trough lid – leaving the play space tidy and ready for the next sensory experience. I wonder what that will be....? 😍😊