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Simple Sensory and Fine Motor Counting Bin

Simple Counting Sensory and Fine Motor BinI love sensory bins and am always impressed by all the fun ones I see on Pinterest.  The only problem is some of them would cost a fortune to make or are too hard to clean up (rice is such a pain to pick up off of the rug).  I am all for messy play but at times I just don’t have the time to clean it up.

For this simple sensory bin, I dyed some dried pasta with food coloring and a few drops of alcohol (put dried macaroni in plastic bag with a few drops of food coloring and rubbing alcohol, shake the bag and pour out onto paper towel to dry).  I added a few froggy erasers I got at the dollar section.  So for about $3 I had a great sensory bin that was easy to clean up.

For this activity, the child rolled the die.  She had to identify what number was rolled, find that many froggy erasers and count them.  I wrote the number, dots and written numeral on the paper for her to reinforce reading numbers.

When done counting, you could play with the sensory bin – sort the pasta by type or color.  

If you want to add in gross motor skills, you could move the sensory bin across the room, roll the die, perform a locomotor action to the counting page and place the erasers on the paper.  Repeat until all the numbers 1-6 have been rolled.

This activity encourages:

  1. tactile input
  2. fine motor skills
  3. gross motor skills
  4. visual perceptual skills
  5. counting skills – common core standards addressed with this activity:  CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.K.CC.A.3 – Write numbers from 0 to 20. Represent a number of objects with a written numeral 0-20 (with 0 representing a count of no objects).

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.K.CC.B.4 – Understand the relationship between numbers and quantities; connect counting to cardinality. 

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.1.NBT.A.1 – Count to 120, starting at any number less than 120. In this range, read and write numerals and represent a number of objects with a written numeral.

IEP Goals related to the common core for OT/PT

IEP Goals Related to the Common Core for OT/PT is a large goal bank for school based occupational and physical therapy that is aligned with the English Language Arts (ELA) and Mathematics common core standards for grades K-2. Find out more at https://www.yourtherapysource.com/commoncorek2.html

 

 

 

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