Start simple

I recently did a session on play at the sensory table for the Free to Play Summit curated by Sally Haughey.  It was an hour session that seemed to inspire ece professionals to see the sensory table as a place for new possibilities for play and exploration.   The question is: where to start?

Whenever I talk to people about building at the sensory table, I encourage them to start simple.  Heck, that is how I started.  My first sand table was a yellow square metal box on legs.  It measured two feet by two feet and stood twelve inches off the floor.  For one of my very first builds, I taped a box inside the table.  I added a PVC chute on an incline from the box to the other end of the table.

That was a very simple apparatus that offered multiple entries for the children's play and exploration.  I taped the box in the middle of one side so the children had access to the sand in the table on three sides. They could take the sand from the table and put it in the box; they could dig the sand out of the box; they could transport the sand into the bucket next to the table; they could dump the sand down the chute. A nice feature of this apparatus was: the sand that missed the chute fell into the box and not onto the floor.

Back then, I worked in an infant/toddler room that later became a birth-to-five room.  A simple apparatus like this provided enough novelty to the sand table that the children found multiple ways to scoop, pour and transport the sand.  Even an older infant or young toddler could sidle up next to the little sand table to play in the sand.

Since my sand table was so small, I sometimes expanded it by taping a relatively large box next to the table.  I cut a tab in one side of the box to make a connecting ramp between the box and the sand table.  The big box not only expanded the play area at the sand table, but also added another level for the children's operations.

 

Well, maybe this was not so simple because I had to create a false bottom to lift the bottom of the large box several inches off the floor.  To do that, I cut a sheet of cardboard the size of the box and set it on top of a couple of other boxes to hold it in place and provide strength so the weight of the sand would not make the cardboard sheet sag.  (It is important to understand that there are two boxes underneath the cardboard sheet that created the elevated bottom of the large box.) I then used duct tape to seal the edges and to hold the cardboard sheet in place.

Even when I inherited a larger sensory table, I experimented with rather simple setups.  For one setup, I found two planter trays that fit snugly in the sensory table. The lips of the trays rested on the lips of the sensory tables; that held the two trays above the bottom of the sensory table which provided space underneath each tray for children to explore.  The children happily scooped sand from underneath the trays, often times crossing their midlines to do so.

I also built a very simple tray from scrap wood that spanned the width of the table.  Again, this offered spaces over, under and around for the children's chosen operations.

The tray in this instance also offered a platform on which the children could display their work.  Imagine if there was no tray.  The play in this instance would not have been so rich.

My first water table was also very simple.  Again, this was in an infant/toddler room so the water table was small. 

To make it more inviting for the children, I added a couple of incline PVC pipes, one emptying into the table from a bucket elevated by crates and one emptying into a bucket on the floor from the table.

I know and have observed that adding apparatus to the sensory table enriches and expands children's play and exploration  exponentially.  Give it a try, but keep it simple to begin with.  My journey started with very simple apparatus.  As I watched how children queried each new apparatus, I was able to hone my own craft for building.