Who can resist the appeal of playdough? It comes in a variety of colours, with a wealth of different cutters, rollers and other equipment to press, shape and mould it into a endless array of possibilities. You can even make your own playdough using a few simple store cupboard ingredients. You can then add various colours or flavours to enhance the whole experience or to make it more seasonal. For example we made Cinammon spiced play dough at Christmas time last year. I must confess though we do mainly use the shop bought versions as they are so handy to have in the cupboard for the inevitable rainy days and “I’m bored” moments.
My 4 year old would be the biggest fan of playdough in our house so we will get it out of the cupboard on a fairly regular basis for him. My 6 year old does still enjoy it but I d say he s in need of a bit more of a challenge with it and my 2 year old is just starting out with it really. She’s past the stage now of putting everything into her mouth so it’s fairly safe for her to be around but she does get bored pretty easily.
During the Feb mid-term break I was thinking through a list of activites for the kids to enjoy together and I had an idea on how to get all of the kids involved in a playdough session. I decided we d have a go at creating a picture out of playdough. I thought this would be a great way for the older two to use and develop their imaginations and to challenge them to make different shapes and objects, whilst giving me the opportunity to help the littlest one with developing skills in rolling and cutting out and it would give them all part ownership in the project so hopefully making them all more respectful of each others work.
We decided to make a Spring themed picture to begin with. My 4 and 6 year olds got very excited about making rainbows and sunshines and rain clouds to add to the picture and I helped my 2 year old to roll out and use cutters to make flowers and animals to add to the picture. All in all we spent a very enjoyable 30 mins or so creating our picture…
The kids took great pride in showing off their picture to Daddy when he came home. They were a little sad we had to take it all to pieces, as the playdough inevitably began to dry out but this was soon fixed with a promise of repeating this activity again.
We ve decided we will do a picture at the start of each season but other good themes could be centred around other holidays such as Easter, Halloween, Christmas or even a trip to the beach, a visit to the farm whatever insterests your kids really.