Engaging in sensory play is a way for children and their families to spend time experiencing new things together. Developing your child’s gross motor skills and sensory processing can be challenging if there is no structure for them to practice. Luckily, there are endless sensory activities for children that are easy and fun.
In this guide to keeping sensory stimulation constructive and enjoyable, we’ll cover the following:
- What is sensory for autism?
- How to help overstimulation in autism.
- What are sensory activities for children?
- Sensory activities in ABA therapy.
- Why is sensory learning important for Autistic kids?
- 14 fun sensory activities for Autistic children.
What Is Sensory for Autism?
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can make children hypersensitive to their environment. While trying to process sensory information, the child may decide that there is too much or too little. Too much sensory input may make your child anxious, irritable, or experience physical pain/discomfort.
With too little sensory input, your child may use stimming (such as rocking or making loud noises) to stimulate the area around them. To help regulate this, you can create a sensory workspace for your child to play in and enjoy comfortably.
How To Help Overstimulation in Autism
Too many sounds. Too many people. Too much information. Sensory overload can quickly lead to overstimulation for autistic children. Paying attention to deep pressure and deep breathing can help ground your child and destimulate their senses.
Using a weighted blanket as a pressure tool can create a more enjoyable sensory experience, as your child can be soothed by the pressure being equally distributed across their body. Additionally, focus on creating a calming environment and box of tactile objects to play with whenever needed.
What Are Sensory Activities for Children?
Sensory activities (or sensory play) are when we can create interactive methods of learning that encourage growth in sensory processing. Often, these activities focus on the following:
- Tasting
- Hearing
- Stimulating touch
- Sight
- Smell
In addition to these basic senses, activities can help your child learn complex topics and compound movements- all while having fun. Most importantly, for autistic children, sensory play can be a great addition to an ABA framework focused on specific behavioral skills or daily life applications.
Sensory Activities in ABA Therapy
Sensory play is an incredibly effective and dynamic way for an autistic child to learn new skills and develop existing ones. Even better, sensory activities are a common and integral portion of many ABA frameworks that licensed therapists provide.
When looking for potential ABA therapy for your child, ask about sensory play and how they integrate it into programming. This will allow you and your child’s therapist to plan for sensory play across multiple environments. You can educate caregivers, teachers, and family members on incorporating sensory play into the time spent with your child. There are endless benefits of sensory activities!
Why is Sensory Learning Important for Autistic Kids?
Sensory learning benefits all children, but developing specific skills within an ABA framework for autism can be incredibly effective.
These types of targeted developments can include:
- Language development
- Cognitive growth
- Motor skills
- Balance abilities
- Social interaction
- Peer engagement
- Observational skills
- Social interaction
In addition to these complex behavioral troughs, sensory play and associated activities can be great for relieving anxiety, helping with depression, or creating healthy routines. Talk to your ABA therapist or clinician about generalizing these activities across environments for long-term success.
14 Fun Sensory Activities For Autistic Children
One of the most rewarding aspects of sensory activities is that they are supposed to be fun, dynamic, and accessible for parents, teachers, and educators to enjoy alongside their child. These activities can be enjoyed across many environments.
Here are fourteen great sensory play activities:
- Mud Kitchen: One of our favorite outdoor sensory activities, making a mud kitchen is perfect for creativity and getting messy. Make mud using water, bowls, dirt, or clay, and shape it into ovens, dishes, foods, or any shapes your child pleases.
- Water Beads: Water beads are non-toxic toys that allow children to squish them around in their hands. They can be refrigerated to create temperature contrast, and counting them or making designs is a significant cognitive addition to the activity.
- Finger Painting: Finger painting is an excellent way for your child to express themselves. It also helps teach colors and combines organization with manual dexterity skill-building. This can be taken both indoors and outdoors!
- Homemade Scented Playdough: Taking existing playdough and adding homemade scents such as lemon, cinnamon, vanilla, or any other natural flavoring can be incredibly fun for the whole family. Bonus points if you make the base playdough yourself!
- Pouring Station: A pouring station is a fantastic way to practice fine motor skills and teach special awareness to autistic children. Set up different-sized jugs and containers outdoors and let them pour one into the other to see how they fit and how water moves, and enjoy the sensation and sounds of rushing water.
- Food Play: Many autistic children have issues with the textures, tastes, and colors of certain foods, which leads them to be wary of new dishes. Playing and interacting with food can help eliminate these picky eating habits, turning eating time into a fun, interactive experience. We recommend you do this in the yard when the weather is nice for minimal mess.
- Rainbow Sensory Glitter: Glitter is a great sensory activity, but we also know glitter indoors is a recipe for disaster. This is why when the weather is nice, you can put down cardboard and let your child create color-coded glitter sections or draw with glitter to learn about shapes and different textures while having fun in the sun.
- Ice Smash: Freeze marbles, toys, or even food inside ice cubes, and then let your child deconstruct the cubes outside. They can crush them, let them melt, or run water over them – the ways to play are nearly limitless in this temperature and touch-based activity!
- Yoga Flashcards: The outdoors, exercise, and organized learning combine with yoga flashcards. Furthermore, this is an activity that parents and caretakers can join in on and get benefits, making it a win/win for the entire family!
- Freeze Dance Painting: A modern take on freeze tag, this sensory-based skill builder is so much fun! Have your child choose their favorite paint and lay a canvas or cardboard down. Apply the paint to the bottoms of their feet and create different patterns by dancing until the music stops.
- Glitter “Calm Down” Bottles: If you don’t want to take on the mess of loose glitter, make a glitter bottle! With your bottle size of choice, combine equal parts distilled water and glue, add in your glitter, and fill the rest of the bottle with water. Add small toys such as beads or small buttons if you want extra pizazz. Remember- hot glue the cap of the bottle shut! This way, the contents of the bottle can’t be spilled.
- Bubble Wrap Stomp Painting: Bubble wrap is always fun! Take a spin on this simple packing, and use it to paint. Wrap it around your child’s foot, lay out a large strip of paper, step in some paint, and create! If bubble wrap causes sensory troubles, paper towels are a great alternative.
- Slime: You can never go wrong with this ooey-gooey fun. Whether you make it at home or buy it from a local store, your child can explore textures and object manipulation.
- Foam Fireworks: With shaving cream and some drops of food coloring, your child can create firework-looking explosions on their plate. If your child struggles with loud noises, this is a way to bring fireworks home without the boom.
These are just fourteen of our favorite sensory play ideas, but there are many more creative ones that you and your family can invent. That’s part of the joy of sensory learning – once you see the best way your child can connect and grow while playing, it is a reward to add to the experience.
Published On: July 25, 2022
Updated On: July 14, 2023
