‘Tis the season for cranberries! They are so bright and colorful that I love incorporating them into learning activities. A lot of stores are having them on sale right now, too. Bonus! I decided it would be fun and EASY to make a Cranberry Sensory Bin. It was a big hit!
This sensory activity is ridiculously easy to make. It allowed us to work on hand strengthening and measuring.
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Here’s what you need to make a Cranberry Sensory Bin:
- Plastic Sensory Bin filled with water
- Measuring Cups
- Fine Motor Tool Set
- Cranberries
- Recording Sheet
What to Do:
1: Use the recording sheet throughout the sensory bin to record what you think will happen, what actually happened, and what you learned. Ask your children what they think will happen once the cranberries are added. Do they think they will sink or float? Will they absorb the water and get bigger or stay the same? Then, they can record what they saw happened as you do step 2 and then what they learned.
2: Add the water to the sensory bin. Fill up the bin about halfway. You want to make sure it’s not too full for when you add the cranberries. Plus, kids splash so if the water is a bit lower it’s less messy.
3: Add the cranberries and enjoy!
Building Fine Motor Skills
Have you tried the Helping Hands Fine Motor Tool Set? It is amazing!!! We absolutely love all of the tools included. They work so well with this sensory bin. My favorite are the double sided spoons. Children use them similar to scissors while they scoop the cranberries. This is perfect for hand strengthening, which then helps with their fine motor skills.
Learning about Measuring
We used measuring cups in this activity to learn about measuring and math. We talked about how many cranberries could fit in a 1 cup measuring cup. How heavy did it feel? When you put just water in a 1 cup measuring cup, does it feel heavier than 1 cup of cranberries?
We used the fine motor spoons to see how many spoonfuls it took to fill different size measuring cups. It was so much fun talking about measuring tools, weight, volume, mass and more!
We will continue to do this sensory bin every year! It was so easy to make and so much fun! Some additional ideas for using the cranberries when you’re done with this bin are to string them together and decorate a tree or make cranberry play dough. So many possibilities! 🙂
