Sensory Tea Time - using real ingredients

Hartley loves playing with his tea set at the moment. He spends hours pretending to serve his teddies tea and loves pouring water from his tea pot in the bath.
I decided to add a sensory element to his play and make it even more fun.

I put together a tray with his plastic tea set. I put water in one tea pot and filled a small jug with milk (I mixed a bit of milk with water) I then added pots of sugar, coffee granules and tea bags. I then left out the tray ready for Hartley and his friend to play and explore.

 Hartley loved scooping coffee and sugar and mixing it together.

They both enjoyed pouring the milk and water, sometimes they even poured it into the cups! I had to refill the pots many of times.

I then got a bowl so they could reuse the water and milk and it contained it better.  In the end this contained an amazing mixture of coffee, tea and milky water.

The great thing about using real ingredients was they got to feel the different textures and experienced the different smells.

The children played and explored all morning. We talked about the colours, textures, smells. The noises that the tea bags made when dropped into the water.

This was a great activity that I will be doing again soon. You could also use different types of coffee, hot chocolate or anything else you want. You could also use real tea pots if you wanted to.