Activities & Events

Sand

Playing with sand enables the children to develop their motor skills, build hand-eye coordination and strengthen their muscles. Holding the wooden scoop develops their finger muscles and filling the little bucket builds their hand and arm muscles. It also encourages problem solving and the satisfaction and pride of creating something new. Playing with the sand is a very social experience which develops a child’s language skills as they chat with the other children and as they learn to share while they explore and create.

Plants and seeds

Digging, watering, planting seeds and plants stimulates a child’s senses as they touch, watch and smell the plants and seeds. It also encourages organisation, problem solving, pride and satisfaction.

Imaginative play

This provides the opportunity for the children to imagine being anywhere in the world. Whether it’s on one of the Arctic ice caps with ice everywhere and polar bears roaming around or whether its way back in time, deep in the forests with dinosaurs! It helps the children develop their critical thinking and problem solving, express their feelings and expand their language and social skills.  

Alongside imaginative play, playing cafe/home helps the children with their fine motor development and hand eye coordination; sorting and stacking cups, undoing lids, holding the tea pot, pretending to drink from the tea cup. This all helps the small muscles in the hand and wrist get stronger and gain more control for precision movements, providing a strong base for being able to hold a pencil later. This also helps their balance and gross motor muscle strength as they bend and stretch to put trays in the oven or open the microwave.

Playing with play dough helps the children develop their fine finger and hand muscles; rolling, moulding, flattening, pinching whilst providing lovely proprioceptive and tactile feedback. It gives the children opportunity to explore three dimensional shapes and develop their language skills as they chat with friends about what they are making. By pretending the play dough is something else, the children are using creative thinking to develop their cognitive pathways.