A summer sensory bin is a great way to introduce your child to new ideas or encourage them to explore a theme with their senses.
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Preschoolers and young kids explore their world through their senses. You can help them learn by putting together a sensory bin filled with fun and interesting items.
A sensory bin is an open container that’s filled with a variety of items that stimulate your child’s senses. You can purchase items to create a unique experience, but you can also make a sensory bin with items you have around the house.
You can also make a smaller sensory toy that’s contained like this simple glitter sensory bottle.
Sensory bin basics
Start with an empty plastic tub or container. Choose a base material, like dry beans, rice, water beads, or sand. Add a few extra items to play with, such as toy animals or cups and spoons to dig.
- Feel: textures, sizes, and temperatures
- See: shapes and colors
- Hear: items bumping together, crinkling, or rattling
- Smell: nature, items scented with laundry soap, essential oils, food
- Taste: anything edible (Just be sure kids know what can or cannot go in their mouths.)
Setting up a sensory bin is a good way to introduce a new subject or to let kids explore and play. In addition to using their senses, kids can practice language, social skills, and fine motor skills.
Sensory bins can be beneficial for a wide age range, but it’s important that young children are supervised, especially if they’re at an age where they still put anything in their mouths.
A summer sensory bin doesn’t have to be elaborate. It can be as simple as a plastic tub filled with sand and a few kitchen tools, like a cup, spoon, and funnel.
If you want some inspiration, we’ve collected the best themed summer sensory bin ideas that are perfect for warm weather days.
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Ocean
This ocean-themed sensory bin from Simple Everyday Mom includes sand and water as a base for water and beach playtime with lots of extras.
Garden
Set up this garden-themed sensory bin to practice planting flowers or vegetables. Mess For Less uses silk flowers, but you could also include plastic play food or other toys.
Space
This space-themed sensory bin from The Afternoon Connection is really cool. It’s a creative way to use stars and planets for all kinds of educational play ideas. You could even include a toy rocket.
Safari
If your child has a collection of plastic animals, they are perfect for this safari sensory bin at Toddler At Play. They used rice as the base and even include a recipe to dye the rice any color.
Ice cream
Set up a little ice cream stand where kids can measure and scoop. Pom poms make perfect scoopable ice cream balls in this idea from Learning Resources.
Duck pond
It would be cute to set up this duck pond sensory play idea in a kiddie pool. Our Five Ring Circus shares a couple of different ways to set it up, plus how to make all the accessories.
Sandbox
A sandbox is basically a big sensory bin, but even if you don’t have one in your backyard, you can make a small version with this idea from My Bored Toddler. This is perfect for an alphabet letter hunt.
Beach
If you’re planning a trip to the beach, collect a few seashells to make this beach-themed sensory box from Natural Beach Living. Every shell is different, so they all have a unique texture too.
Birds
Fireflies and Mud Pies shares the cutest bird feeder sensory play idea. Kids will love scooping and pouring the birdseed and playing with the birds.
Lemonade
It’s not summer without a refreshing glass of lemonade. Set up a lemonade sensory bin like The Chaos and The Clutter with plenty of tools for the kids to scoop and mix ingredients. You can even add ice!
Sensory play is tons of fun and with these summer sensory bin ideas, your kids can explore a variety of things that they can see, hear, taste, touch, and smell. Include one of these ideas in your summer schedule or save them for a day when you need an easy activity.
