You'll find lots of sensory bins below. These are fantastic for toddlers because they encourage fine motor development and hand-eye coordination. But you'll also find small-world ideas, sorting activities, threading practice, games, and much more.
With more than 25 ideas, you'll have activities to keep your toddler busy for weeks. If you're staying indoors right now, this couldn't have come at a better time. Let's get started on fun activities for your toddler right away!
If you are looking for themed toddler ideas check out our toddler activity plans. These are carefully designed plans full of fun hands-on activities for toddlers which have been grouped into popular themes.
Related posts:
- Activities for Babies
- Activities for Preschoolers
- Toddler lesson plans
- Fine Motor Activities
- Dramatic Play Ideas
- Messy Play Activities
Messy Little Monster's Activities for Toddlers
Rainbow Sensory Bag
If you love providing sensory activities for the kids but don't exactly enjoy the messy cleanup after, try sensory bags instead! Our Rainbow Sensory Bag for Toddlers is colourful and squishy, thanks to lots of shaving cream and water beads.
Pom Pom Drop
Keep toddlers busy and work on fine motor skills at the same time with this simple and fun Pom Pom Fine Motor Activity for Toddlers. It's a terrific quiet time activity with the added benefit of helping tots work on their hand-eye coordination, amongst other skills.
Pasta Threading Activity
You probably have everything you need to set up this Pasta Threading Activity for your toddler. Using playdough, dried spaghetti, and Cheerios, your toddler can practice her threading skills again and again.
Woodland Playdough Activity
Gather some leaves, flowers, rocks, and sticks from the outdoors. Then, add them to a tray along with some playdough for this Woodland Playdough Activity. It'll be great fun for kids to create a small world for their woodland animal figures.
Construction Sensory Bin
Use toy trucks, dozers, cups, and other things to scoop with to make this super fun Construction Sensory Bin for Toddlers. Boys will love it, and girls will, too. Use any cereal or dried pasta that you have on hand.
Edible Farm Small World Play
Gather your child's farm animal toys, and build an Edible Farm Sensory Bin with snacks that your kiddo loves. Everything except the animal figures is edible. Coco pops, Frosties, and Weetabix all look like dirt, stacks of hay, and other things you'd find around a farm.
Nature Tray Activity
Though this particular post is geared towards autumn, you can make a Nature Tray for any season. It's so easy to do, and kids have a blast gathering the items. Go on a nature walk with your toddler, and allow him to explore, observe, and select the things to add to the tray. Objects can be grouped and sorted according to size, colour, or texture—or your child just may enjoy simply playing with the objects he's found.
Oobleck Sensory Play
If you don't mind a mess, Oobleck Sensory Play is great fun for toddlers and preschoolers. Oobleck is easy to make using only two ingredients, and it makes the perfect indoor activity. You'll be surprised at how long the kids will play with this messy, gooey material. When summer comes round, try this Frozen Oobleck Sensory Play as well. It feels so nice and cool on their hands on a hot day.
Tape Rescue Game
Have fun rescuing the animals! Simply tape animals to a hard surface and then invite your toddler to work on their fine motor skills as they remove the tape to rescue the animals. This tape rescue activity is so simple to set up but the kids love it!
Colour Mixing Water Play
Toddlers love playing with water! Make water play even more fun by adding some colour with this colour mixing activity for toddlers. Toddlers can work on fine motor skills as they use pipettes to mix colours together.
More Fun Activities for Toddlers
Feed the Ducks Sensory Bin
You'll need lots of rubber ducks, some wine corks, foam sheets to make lilypads, and spoons and scoops to make this Feed the Ducks Sensory Bin from Toot's Mom is Tired. The corks serve as pretend food, so if you don't have any, you could even grab some small sticks from the yard for the same purpose.
Sensory Play with Shaving Cream and Mirrors
Your toddler will enjoy studying her reflection and then watching it disappear with this engaging activity focused on Sensory Play with Shaving Cream and Mirrors by Danya Banya. Kids can use paintbrushes or their hands to paint over the mirror.
Cutting a Banana Montessori Practical Life Activity
Use this Cutting a Banana Montessori Activity from Rhythms of Play to offer your toddler an introductory lesson to food prep, helping him boost independence, self-confidence, and self-sufficiency.
Colour Discovery Basket
Kids begin to recognise and differentiate colours during their toddler years, so activities like this Colour Discovery Basket from Finding Myself Young can help you start teaching and reinforcing colours with your little one.
No Paint Road Blocks
These No-Paint Road Blocks from Taming Little Monsters are perfect for creating roads for toy cars and trucks all over your home. And they're easy for Mom to make—all you need is black cardboard or poster board and correction tape.
Seek and Find Sensory Bin
This Seek and Find Sensory Bin from The Chaos and the Clutter is so simple, yet so fun! Hide some of your child's favourite toys in a bin of shredded paper. They'll get a kick out of finding them. If you don't have a paper shredder handy, torn paper, ribbons, or Easter grass will work just as well.
Water Activity for Toddlers
This Water Activity from Teaching 2 and 3-Year-Olds helps kids strengthen fine motor skills by squeezing water into basters and pouring water from one container to the next.
Ocean Shadow Matching Activity
Strengthen your toddler's visual perception skills with this fun printable Ocean Shadow Matching activity from Fun with Mama. You can laminate the sheets and attach velcro if you find that your toddler wants to do this activity again and again.
Five Green Frogs Puppets
Sing all the frog songs you can think of while playing with these fun Five Green Frogs Puppets from Picklebums. Singing together is a terrific activity for the whole family to do together. Besides, toddlers never seem to tire of hearing their favourite songs. The Five Little Speckled Frogs song would be a nice change of pace from Baby Shark.
Toy Car Sorting
This easy Toy Car Sorting activity from My Bored Toddler will entertain your toddlers, and it makes a terrific play-based math activity. Sort cars by colour, size, or type, and then count them!
Gross Motor Dinosaur Action Cube
Work on gross motor movements and help kids get their wiggles out with this Gross Motor Dinosaur Action Cube from The Chaos and the Clutter. The great thing about this activity is that you can do it anywhere—inside or out.
Pipe Cleaner Fishing Game
Put this Pipe Cleaner Fishing Game by Best Toys 4 Toddlers together in just minutes! Toddlers will use their fine motor skills while engaging in pretend play and sensory play; it'll keep them entertained for quite some time.
Threading Activity
Practice threading with your toddler to work on fine motor skills and enjoy some quiet time. This Threading Activity from Picklebums offers plenty of suggestions for different items that toddlers can thread, such as pieces of straw, cut-up cardboard tubes, wooden blocks with holes drilled in them, and more.
Germy Hands Experiment
Now, more than ever, it's important to teach kids from an early age about the importance of handwashing to prevent the spread of germs. Toddlers will enjoy this Germy Hands Experiment from The Soccer Mom Blog that uses glitter to depict germs.
Jello Alphabet Sensory Bin
Get ready for more squishy, messy fun with this Jello Alphabet Sensory Bin from Kids in the Kitchen. Kids can learn their letters as they play! If you're worried about your kids putting this in their mouths, you can always use alphabet pasta in place of the alphabet beads.
Playdough Dinosaur Eggs
Enjoy an afternoon of Excavating Playdough Dinosaur Eggs with the kids. Toddlers will enjoy digging their dinosaurs out of the playdough, and then they can sort them according to colour. Add even more playtime to this activity from School Time Snippets by letting the kiddos wash off the toys after they're excavated.
Taste Safe Mud
Making mud pies is always good fun, but if you want to try this indoors with toddlers, this Taste-Safe Mud from A Little Pinch of Perfect is the way to go. Add toy bugs, flowers, or dinosaurs to the mud!
Which of these activities for toddlers do you think your kids will enjoy most?
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