Flower Sensory Bin
In our 7 Ways to Play with Flowers, one of my daycare kids’ favorite activities was our Flower Sensory Bin. A super simple sensory bin that allows kids to explore textures and pouring, as well as literacy and math concepts.
Easy Flower Sensory Bin
After dissecting flowers as part of our botany study, we were left with plenty of leftover flower pieces that were still fresh, beautiful and a shame to throw away.
You could simply place all of the flower pieces in a sensory bin and present it to the children, but I decided to add an additional element to our sensory bin with a bag of pearl barley. The barley allowed us to discuss the process of pollination (with the barley representing pollen) while also giving the children a perfect material to scoop, pour, funnel and dig their hands into.
What appears at first glance to be just a simple flower sensory bin is actually a fun way for the children to reenforce scientific, mathematical and linguistic concepts while engaging their senses, which encourages their brains to make connections to these concepts in deep, semantic ways.
The contrast of the barley with the flower pieces allowed the children to engage the senses in contrasting the two sensory bin materials and also use descriptive language in that comparison.
Playing with the flower parts after our flower dissection provided an additional opportunity for the children to label the parts of a flower, becoming more confident in those terms and their understandings of them.
By providing a variety of measuring cups (as well as scoops and spoons), we also were able to explore mathematical concepts, comparing the different measurements to each other. (For example, it takes two scoops of the 1/2 cup to fill a 1 cup measuring cup. The 1/4 cup measuring cup holds less barley than the 1/2 cup measuring cup. Etc.)
More Botany Activities for Kids:
- Flower Dissection
- Egg Planting Experiment
- Introduction to Botany for Kids
- 12+ Books About Botany for Kids
- Yoga for Kids: Flower Poses
- Flower Arranging with the Conjunction Game
- Painting with Flowers
- Montessori Practical Life Lesson: Flower Arranging
Materials for our Flower Sensory Bin
- Flower Parts (can provide intact flowers but we previously dissected ours to explore the different parts)
- Barley
- Measuring Cups
- Scoops
- Funnels
Tip: you can also provide kid-safe tweezers, plastic flowers, bee or other insect figurines, etc.
How We Played
I set up the flower sensory bin by pouring the barley into a large sensory bowl (it used to be a coffee table decor bowl in a previous life) and then arranged the various flower parts to look like a giant flower, with the barley as the “inside” of the flower, where the pistil and stamen would be located.
I allowed the children to explore the bin, as is, without any tools or additional implements for about 10 minutes. (If sensory bins are new to your crew, you might want to lay some ground rules down – ie, everything stays inside the bin, no throwing, etc.)
After the kids had a few minutes to explore the texture of the leaves, flower petals and barley, I introduced the measuring cups, funnels and scoops. I allowed them to show me what concepts they were interested in discussing about the flower sensory bin and asked questions based on their observations.
After playing together for about 20 minutes, the kids eventually decided they wanted two separate sensory bins – one with all of the flower parts and one with just barley. I provided a second bowl and the kids divided the materials up and continued playing.
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Flower Sensory Bin
How to make a super simple flower sensory bin for kids, great for reinforcing the parts of a flower while giving kids plenty of opportunity to scoop, pour and measure which are great early mathematics concepts
Materials
- Flower Parts (can provide intact flowers but we previously dissected ours to explore the different parts)
- Barley
Tools
- Large Sensory Bin or Bowl
- Measuring Cups
- Scoops
- Funnels
Instructions
- I set up the flower sensory bin by pouring the barley into a large sensory bowl (it used to be a coffee table decor bowl in a previous life) and then arranged the various flower parts to look like a giant flower, with the barley as the "inside" of the flower, where the pistil and stamen would be located.
- I allowed the children to explore the bin, as is, without any tools or additional implements for about 10 minutes. (If sensory bins are new to your crew, you might want to lay some ground rules down - ie, everything stays inside the bin, no throwing, etc.)
- After the kids had a few minutes to explore the texture of the leaves, flower petals and barley, I introduced the measuring cups, funnels and scoops. I allowed them to show me what concepts they were interested in discussing about the flower sensory bin and asked questions based on their observations.
Notes
The contrast of the barley with the flower pieces allowed the children to engage the senses in contrasting the two sensory bin materials and also use descriptive language in that comparison.
Playing with the flower parts after our flower dissection provided an additional opportunity for the children to label the parts of a flower, becoming more confident in those terms and their understandings of them.
By providing a variety of measuring cups (as well as scoops and spoons), we also were able to explore mathematical concepts, comparing the different measurements to each other. (For example, it takes two scoops of the 1/2 cup to fill a 1 cup measuring cup. The 1/4 cup measuring cup holds less barley than the 1/2 cup measuring cup. Etc.)
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I hope your kids love exploring this fun flower sensory bin as much as mine did!
For more fun sensory activities for kids, check out our collection of sensory play activities here: