“Under the Sea” Sensory Fun!

Our little ones love to get their hands messy and they also love to find things! We decided to mix these two interests and have some “under the sea” sensory fun. In warmer weather, we love to set up different types of water-play provocations such as a blue themed “under the sea water” trough, or a green themed dinosaur pool. Now that temperatures are a wee bit cooler – we want to keep our little ones warm whilst still providing them with ample sensory play. One of our wonderful kaiako came up with the idea of creating a blue jelly themed “under the sea” sensory hunt and boy! did we have a lot of fun. 😊

In a long dish, we mixed some blue jelly crystals with water and pushed in some of our sea creatures to set in the fridge overnight. The following day, our little ones were eager to see how it had changed and as soon as the tray came out of the fridge, they could clearly see a tray of wobbly jelly. 💖

Squares of jelly were cut and placed on the table, ready for eager hands to explore. Our little ones were encouraged to find the sea animals that were ‘stuck’. As they broke apart the jelly using their fingers, they named and explored the different sea animals they uncovered. They noticed that the jelly smelt “yummy” and enjoyed exploring its transparency. Some of our little ones even had a cheeky taste!! 😋

During this experience, we also described how the jelly felt using words such as “cold, sticky, slimy, and gooey”. This helps support our little ones with developing their vocabulary in a meaningful context.

It was fair to say that this sensory experience provided hours of fun for our little ones, and although some of us had slightly blue hands after, we were thoroughly satisfied with all the different sea animals we were able to find and rescue!

This sensory experience is easy to do at home and can be altered to suit your little one’s interests. Perhaps next time we could have green jelly and insects? 🙌😊