Ocean Spaghetti Small World Sensory Play

Ocean taste-safe spaghetti play tray is designed for toddlers, preschoolers and kindergarteners to promote sensory play and fine motor skills through fun hands-on small world play with toy sea animal figurines.

Ocean spaghetti small world is a fun invitation to play with ocean inhabitants while developing hand-eye coordination, fine motor control, and scissor skills. Besides, the set up should be minimal since you will be using items around the house. Most importantly, this invitation to play is easily modified by using the toys you already have! See my tips below!

WHAT You’ll need for this Sensory Play:

• a large serving tray (we are using this one)
• spaghetti or fettuccine
• blue food coloring
• ocean animals (buy the blue whale here and an octopus here)
• tongs
• scissors

HOW TO make this Ocean Spaghetti Small World Sensory Play:

To resemble the ocean water, I am using cooked spaghetti. (Please, note that I generally use EXPIRED food or one that fell on the floor, or if it is otherwise not suitable for eating. So, I am VERY reluctant to use a LOT of edible food! Thus, open your cupboard and look for food that has passed its expiration date!)

How to color your pasta: add about five squirts of blue food coloring to the water WHILE cooking your pasta according to the instructions. (Thanks to Mother Could for the awesome tip!) On the other hand, if you add food coloring to a ziplock bag AFTER the pasta is cooked, you might use less of coloring and get deeper shade, however, I purposely wanted the color to resemble the light blue water, and the major benefit of staining paste WHILE cooking it is that pasta does NOT stain the hands!

TIPS:

Once the pasta is cooked according to the instructions, rinse it with cold water and dry it with a paper towel. Store in a ziplock in a fridge for a few days before tossing. (Or, you can add green food coloring and make this Baby Animals Invitation to Play.) You might also want to offer tongs to transfer pasta and scissors to cut it, both of which are awesome fine motor tools!

Adult supervision is required.

Ways to Adapt:

You can easily modify this invitation by using toys you already have, for example by setting up a farm small world, baby animals – see here Baby Animals Small World Kmart Tray Spaghetti and Hydrogels Sensory Play, or even transportation vehicles invitations. Let your resources be your limit!

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WHY Sensory Pay?

In terms of Sensor Play, my motto is: they TOUCH it, they GET it! They MANIPULATE, and it goes directly to their BRAIN! Did you know that triggering sensory stimulation fires multiple signals between neurons, which strengthens its connectivity and spurs neuroplasticity? Neuroplasticity is the production of new connections and NEW neurons themselves, which increases brain agility. And, you get all that from mere tactile stimulation!

♡ Enriching the Mind one Heart at a time ♡

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