J’s current favorite show is Paw patrol and if you have a toddler at home, I’m sure it’s theirs too. I wanted to come up with simple easy setup bins that J loves for each day of the week before he started preschool. J had so much fun with each bin and enacted some of the lines from the show,it was pretty cute to watch.
J already had his set of paw patrol toys that we got from Amazon.
ROCKY & Trash day Sensory bin
I always save the caps of the squeeze pouch snacks so I can use them for activities like these. I also occasionally save the egg cartons for J. I colored the holes of the egg cartons to match the colors of the pouch caps. I just asked J to dump the caps in the matching ‘bins’.
It was a great activity for color recognition and matching. It also gave him loads of imaginative free play.
ZUMA & Water beads Sensory bin
I wanted to create something with water for Zuma. The water beads gave the required effect, you can use these instead if you are looking for just blue and white beads. I just added Zuma and some sensory tools I found here. Add in some cups and boats and the bin is all set for play!
RUBBLE & Construction site Sensory bin
I made the roads by gluing the black and yellow construction paper on cardboard. Put in some blocks for creating the illusion of a construction site. I also added his construction trucks for free play.
Any construction play is J’s favorite. He spent about an hour playing saying ‘Rubble on the double!’ more than a few times.
SKYE & Drop zone Sensory bin
For Skye I wanted to have some activity to use her flying capability. The drop activity came close to imitating Skye’s rescue operation. I used leftover paper towel tubes for the drop zone and stuck it using painter’s tape. For objects to drop I used squeeze pouch caps. I also added counting bears and counting mathlink cubes for some counting practice.
J loaded some objects on her helicopter and as he said “Let’s take to the sky!” he flew and dropped them in the drop tubes.
MARSHALL & Fire rescue Sensory bin
For Marshall, I wanted to include his ability to save people from fires. I saw this cute due rescue activity in Pinterest and wanted to modify it as Marshall’s sensory bin.
The setup is fairly simple – Print out a sheet with a couple of houses. I downloaded mine from Google images. Laminate the sheet. Now spray some foamy shaving cream on the sheet. Add a few drops of red, orange and yellow food coloring and give it a good mix. It will look like the first picture. Fill a small spray bottle with water. Set the bin outside for some unrestrained fun.
J enacted Marshall using his water cannon and slowly rescued all the houses from the fire. It is a great fine motor skills activity for toddlers and my little surprised me with how much he could do. Of course roll playing as Marshall gave him an additional boost to complete the activity!
CHASE & Magnatiles Sensory bin
Magnatiles are a current hit in our house and J always wants to create new structures with his dad and me. We feel this is a great outlet for his creative energy and keeps him occupied for a long time. So I thought we could create the iconic Adventure Bay Bridge that the paw patrol uses and include some kinetic sand for water.
We made the bridge together and J was fascinated and made the rescue trucks’ sounds as they pass over the bridge one by one. Later on, he went on filling the bridge with ‘water’ for more imaginative Sensory play.
Setting up these activities turned out to be something he looked forward to each day and he asked us which Puts park was going to ‘save the day’ that day. There is definitely something about us entering into their world that brightens their day!
