Let’s Make Pumpkin Pie Play Dough

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Sweet as pumpkin pie! Making pumpkin pie play dough with your child is a sensory experience filled with smells, textures, sounds, bright colors, and maybe even a taste or two. Plus, it’s always fun to make something together while your child learns new concepts and perhaps tries to poke, roll, or pat the dough.

Objectives

• Learn to engage all senses – touch, smell, taste, hearing, vision - during this activity.
• Interact with your child and others as you explore new sensations.
• Increase communication skills with your child while discussing topics such as your child’s likes and dislikes, the concept of “more” and “all-done,” and recipe directions.
• Teach concepts such as cold, warm, wet, dry, powdery, gooey.
• Use fine motor skills to help open the containers, and stir, mix, and play with the dough.
• Learn the importance of sequencing and measurement in following a recipe.
  

Expanded Core Curriculum Areas Supported

• Sensory Efficiency: Use senses to explore. Focus will be on smell, touch, vision, and hearing.
• Recreation and Leisure: Cooking and following a recipe is a popular leisure activity. Also, playing with play dough is a first step toward working with pottery and/or clay.
• Social Skills: Bonding and communicating with caregiver during the activity.
• Self-Determination: Choice making, decision making, and problem solving. Will your child help you stir, or will they stir by themselves? Will your child touch it with their hands, feet, or not at all?
• Orientation and Mobility: Travel to area in the home where the play dough will be made (walk, crawl, be carried) pointing out landmarks along the way. Learn where the ingredients and supplies are kept in the home.
• Independent Living Skills: Cooking for yourself and others is an important life skill.
• Compensatory Skills: Learning to use alternative techniques to cook and follow a recipe.
  

Everyday Routines Supported

This activity supports play time and family time, specifically skills associated with food preparation.

Suggested Next Steps to Use This Activity With Caregiver and Child

1. Discuss activity with caregiver to determine appropriateness and relevancy to family.
2. Forward the caregiver version of the activity to the caregiver.
3. Gather the materials to bring to the home or remind the primary caregiver one to two days before the home/virtual visit to gather the materials required.
4. Introduce the activity, discuss the objectives, and provide an overview of the possible steps.
5. Be prepared to break down the activities into a smaller subset as the child and family may not have the time or tolerance to complete all activities.
6. After completing this activity, consider extension activities that may be appropriate and relevant to the family.