Soap

I know, the most recent practice guide for early learning and childcare states that ‘Sensory play must not be used at this time. Children should not use or handle play dough, sand and sensory tables, as these items cannot be easily disinfected.’

Yes, I understand the importance of that directive during this pandemic and I’m not really a rebel but play dough is one of our popular quiet time activities. I only have one non-napper here at this time so there isn’t any issue with multiple children handling the materials. Besides, there are many sensory play activities that I consider one time use only so why not…

I decided that microwaving Ivory soap would be the perfect quiet time activity – seriously – playing with soap – how could that be bad?

I had all the necessary supplies – I buy Ivory soap in bulk because I use it often but maybe that was the problem because this time there was an issue. I placed the soap in the bowl and put it in the microwave for 90 seconds like I usually do but when I took it out the soap had barely puffed up at all.
I poked it with a knife to see if it had at least softened a little and in doing so exposed the molten lava with actual flames! I quickly tossed it outside on a foil pan to cool off.

Wow, that was unexpected. I suspect that even though this bar of soap had still been in it’s wrapper the plastic from the bulk package had been removed and maybe this bar was too old and possibly dried out.

On to sensory soap activity two – making Clean Mud – first grate the soap;

Then mix it with the shredded…roll of toilet paper. Hmmm, I do have enough of that but just in case…we will use shredded tissue paper instead. Add some food colouring and mix. Yeah! Clean sensory play fun for one.

Rate this: