Take me back to this gorgeous hour spent with my son the day before he started school, before all the little worries on both of our parts crept in, when the next steps of growing up (on both our parts!!!) were highlighted. Goodness me, for something so simple, it had magic effects, a truly relaxing, inspiring hour of concentration, discussion and exploring. One to remember when you just want a moment, a calm moment, a peaceful moment, when nothing else matters but you, your child and a tray full of gloopy cornflour/water mixture.
what you need…
- tray
- water
- cornflour
- music optional
- food colouring optional
what to do…
- pour the cornfour into the tray
- pour some water into the cornflour to create a gloopy consistency
- with fingers mixing the mixture together
- as its mixed the texture will become solid but then give way, this feeling of resistance in a wet runny consistency is incredible to little fingers, and shapes and movements are explored
- this activity works beautifully when accompanied by music as the children’s movements mirror that to the rhythm of the music
- we added a drop of food colouring to the mixture to see what happened, and watched as it blended through with the movements of little fingers
into a little dream adventure…
- open ended conversations with your child – how does it feel? what does it feel like? what does it remind them of? do you like the feel? how does it make you feel? I find it really interesting how different textures can make your child feel, whether they find it relaxing, and almost mesmerising, or the idea of getting there hands messy is just too much…and the descriptive words they come out with are incredible, write a list with them and talk about the words with them later…
- add a variety of food colouring’s and see how they blend together in the mixture, what colours do they make
- find some favourite toy vehicles to push through the mixture
