In Our Tuff Spot: Sand Foam

As you may know, we absolutely love sensory play, I feel like Emily gains so much from doing sensory activities and it is a great way to get her talking. Sand Foam is super easy to make as it requires just two ingredients. Sand foam makes a smooth, but grainy texture, and is great for sensory play. It is very inexpensive and easy to make, we used one tin of shaving foam which we picked up for just 40p.

So how do you make Sand Foam? 

We used mini bags of coloured sand, and a tin of shaving foam to put together this activity. I Simply added 250g of sand, and a tin of shaving foam, to our tuff spot and mixed it to create the fluffy, textured mixture. There is no set amount of sand or shaving foam to add, you can simply add as much or as little of each ingredient to create a consistency you want.

Emily absolutely loved this activity, at first she was a little unsure of the texture, but she soon got used to it. The Sand foam encouraged Emily to manipulate and mould the material. Emily did this by trying to fit handfuls of the Sand foam into various containers and try to pour it out again. I also provided Emily with spoons as she doesn't like to get her hands messy, but over time she put the spoons down and then enjoyed exploring the mixture with her hands. 

Some ideas to further the activity:

1. Add fake pirates treasure to create a hide and seek game.
2. Draw and write in the Sand foam tray, I taught Emily to draw circles and lines in the foam. For older children you could teach your child various letters of the alphabet or their names. 

3. Add items to extend the play, and encourage imaginative play stories. We added dinosaurs to create a sandy dinosaur world. You could also add shells to create a beach scene.