Messy Play Still Beneficial for the Over 2s!

If you have children aged three or older, you may assume that messy play isn’t suitable anymore. By this stage many adults feel that their kids should be getting stuck into structured crafts, from which there is an end product. However, two isn’t the cut off for messy play, as sensory play still offers pre-schoolers a range of benefits. You might be surprised at the number of ways messy play can support learning and development in slightly older children.

Growing personally, emotionally and socially

Sensory play enables personal development. For instance, your little ones are in charge and take part in new experiences, which fosters independence and confidence. Kids also focus on tasks, aiding their concentration. They may loosely plan what they’re going to do with the materials and work out how they will achieve this, allowing your children to problem solve and see an activity through to its end. Youngsters can even use messy activities as an outlet for their emotions, letting your kids express their thoughts and feelings through this form of play. Additionally, messy play encourages social interaction, which helps children to understand the values of sharing, respecting others and working together.

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Enhancing communication and language

When sensory play occurs in a group setting, kids communicate with their peers through gestures and words, as well as observing and listening, which can make them more confident to interact with others. However, even when children engage in messy play in the home with their parents or carers, there are opportunities for conversation. For example, discussing what they are doing, what they might do next and their thoughts at the end. You might not realise it, but messy play also helps youngsters to develop fine finger movements and hand to eye co-ordination, which can aid writing.

Understanding the world

It’s in children’s nature to investigate the world around them and messy play provides them with the opportunity to do just that. Through messy activities kids use all their senses to observe, choose and manipulate materials that may be unfamiliar and have different properties to those that they are used to playing with. Sensory play also lets slightly older children to set themselves a challenge, solve it and learn about cause and effect along the way.

Developing physical skills

Image by Melodi2 via Morguefile

During messy play your little ones enhance their fine motor skills and co-ordination when they use tools, objects and materials. When they carry larger objects, sensory exploration helps with balance and body control.

Gaining creatively

Using their curiosity, children explore materials with their sight, hearing, smell and touch. They use their imagination and respond to experiences during sensory play. Messy activities additionally give kids the chance to express their thoughts and feelings as they get to grips with different colours, textures, shapes and space.Developing mathematical skills

Messy play helps with concepts such as numbers, size, shapes, space and patterns. Older children can count objects and get to grips with quantities by comparing the weight or volume of materials. Meanwhile, sorting and arranging objects can familiarise kids with shapes and space. Youngsters can additionally make patterns in clay, playdough, sand, soil and a range of edible materials, as well as with paints.

While Messy Play St Bees is only able to cater for the under 5s, your three and four year olds can come along and gain from the sessions too. This is ideal if they have younger siblings, as sensory play is an activity that children of various ages can experience and enjoy together.

What's Messy Play All About?

Learning takes many forms, but one of the most effective ways to learn is through experience. Getting stuck in is exactly what messy play is all about. Little ones need lots of hands-on experiences that stimulate multiple senses to learn about the world. Play with various materials is the perfect way for kids to get these sensory experiences.

Messy play lets young children get creative, allowing them to combine materials, play with them in different ways and make discoveries. Through this type of investigative play, children explore new textures, improve their hand-eye co-ordination and develop greater manual dexterity. Kids have real freedom with messy play, as there’s no right or wrong way to play, so they can use their imagination as they experiment. Choosing what they play with and what form their play takes means that sensory play helps to promote independence. With no set rules for messy play, it’s also very inclusive, so whatever their stage of development, children can join in.

Image via Wikimedia Commons by Miika Silfverberg

The possibilities for messy play are endless. A tray of cornflakes, custard and spaghetti offers three very different textures to explore and what happens when you mix them all together? Meanwhile, water play with jugs, cups and funnels gives kids the chance to measure and pour. When it comes to painting, why limit your little ones to a paint brush? Kitchen utensils like spatulas and whisks offer a different experience, as does printing with sponges, bubble wrap and vegetable cut outs.

However, children don’t need to get covered from head to toe in paint, sticky goo or soil, as relatively clean activities still come under the umbrella of messy play. Fun with bubbles and play dough creates little mess, but offers sensory stimulation. Dry materials, such as shredded paper and uncooked oats, rice or pasta shapes, can still be poured and mixed without the level of cleaning up that wet and sticky materials need.

Image via Wikimedia Commons by fir0002 flagstaffotos.com.au

Although you might have an idea about how messy you want your tot to get and provide an activity accordingly, with messy play it’s best to let your youngsters lead the way. If you go with a child-led approach, your baby, toddler or preschooler will soon show you how messy they like to get. Some kids relish squishing barefoot through jelly and getting up to their elbows in edible slime, while others like to proceed more cautiously. Whatever their preference, embrace it and let them get the most out of sensory play!

For messy play in West Cumbria, why not try out a session of Messy Play St Bees? We’re aiming to offer five different sensory experiences each month, based around a theme where possible. The first session begins on Tuesday 7^th June, so book your place for messy play near Whitehaven now via our facebook page.

Why Start a Blog About Messy Play?

I remember getting messy as a child. Painting, sticking, baking, playing with water, messing around with playdough and clay, helping in the garden, and there were many more messy activities besides. I'm sure most of you enjoyed similar activities.

Image via Wikimedia Commons by Ingvar Kjollesdal

If a 2014 Persil survey is anything to go by, it seems that kids don't take part in so much messy play now. The survey that polled 2000 parents of 7 to 11 year olds about messy activities revealed that two-thirds don't like their kids getting messy, preferring them to take part in clean activities. While most little ones jump at the chance to get messy, the survey also showed that parents' views may have a negative influence on their children's preferences for play. One-third of kids said that they didn't like getting dirty and more than half gave TV as their favourite pastime.

Ideally, messy play should be a regular activity for children, as this form of play is about more than just the fun that messy activities bring. Everything from feeling the squish of gloop and hearing the crinkle of paper to seeing a rainbow of brightly coloured objects and tasting while baking gives kids the chance to explore with their senses. This exploration then aids development, with children gaining physically, intellectually, creatively, socially and emotionally from messy play. Who would have thought giving kids the chance to get messy could offer so many benefits?

Messy play should come naturally. You don't really need classes for messy play, as there are plenty of opportunities for exploring a wide range of materials around the home and when you're out. However, as Persil's survey shows, parents often aren't keen on mess. Even if you don't mind your kids getting dirty, there are still the spills to mop up, the strewn bits and pieces to pick up, and the paint splatters to wipe away. If you take your children along to a messy play group, you don't need to worry about the mess. Taking part in a messy play session is also a great opportunity for tots to interact with other little ones, and you may even get to make some new social connections too.

Image via Wikimedia Commons by Bobjgalindo

If you live in a large town or city, there are probably a handful of messy play groups for you to choose from. However, living in a more rural area, organised messy play is more limited. While there are a small number of groups offering messy play in Cumbria, they are more dispersed, and when accessible sessions run, they don't necessarily fit in with when parents are available. For the activities they offer, messy play franchises can also seem expensive, and asking parents to sign up their kids for a block of sessions isn't particularly realistic when children are so young. That's what gave me the idea to set up a group for messy play near Whitehaven. After successfully trialling a "swamp" (green jelly, brown cornflour gloop and spaghetti snakes) with a few little ones we know from St Bees toddler group, and checking there was enough interest from families in the village, here I am, setting up a group for messy play near Egremont.

Sessions will run on the 1st Tuesday of the month from 2-3pm in St Bees Village Hall, located on Finkle Street. They are aimed at little ones aged 6 months to 4 years. While there is a charge, this group for messy play in West Cumbria is run as not for profit, helping to keep the cost down for parents and carers. With 15 children attending, the cost is £2 per child, and with 10 children, it's £3 per child.

We have a facebook page - https://www.facebook.com/messyplaystbeeswestcumbria/ - which you might be interested in. If you like what you see, please "like" and "share" to help spread the word about our group. The more people that know about our messy play in Cumbria and tell their friend about it, the greater the chance of we have of making our group a success. Thanks for your help!