Valentine’s Day Sensory Bins
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With a curious little one in the house, I’m always looking for fun ways to sneak in some literacy practice. Our favorite activities almost always revolve around our sensory bins! As a huge lover of the bins myself, I’m so excited when I see a chance to differentiate them for bigger kiddos. This free Valentine’s Day Sensory Bin Activity is a great way to have hands-on, interactive fun with literacy skills like beginning sounds and Valentine vocabulary in Kindergarten and 1st grade!
*Pair with our Valentine’s Day Centers and Activities for Pre-K & Kindergarten!
Valentine’s Day Sensory Bins
Putting together a Valentine’s Day-themed sensory bin is as easy as it gets!
First, choose a sensory bin filler that best fits your theme/time of year and your child’s abilities.
Our favorite fillers include dry black beans (the colors really POP!), shredded paper, dry oatmeal, cotton balls, etc.
To go with the Valentine’s Day theme of this bin, I chose to use red and white shredded paper that I found on sale at our local craft store. (Filler tip – check out your craft stores mid-month to catch fun, seasonal fillers on sale!)
Then, print off the image cards (at the end of this post). If I’m running the cards through my personal laminator, I use regular printer paper because the lamination is already nice and thick. If not, try printing the images on cardstock to make sure they’re sturdy for little hands to manipulate.
Finally, choose your matching mat. This freebie contains two versions of the matching mats – one for identifying beginning sounds, and one for identifying themed words.
Regardless of which matching mat you choose, the picture cards remain the same and stay in the bin as you switch out mats for your different groups of students!
Time to Play!
Playing with matching sensory bins is super easy! Once your image cards have been placed in the bin, children take turns pulling out an image card and finding their match on the mat.
To avoid the use of extra paper for recording sheets, I like to add velcro to my mats so that my little one can simply stick the match down and bring it to me to check!
Grab Your FREE Copy
Ready to prep your fun Valentine’s Day Sensory Bins? Grab your copy of these free printable pieces by clicking the large, yellow download button below!
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