We use aluminum foil all the time with toddlers in the studio, but why we’ve never covered our WALL with it, I do not know! It is definitely not a one-man-job to get it situated on the wall, but it was well worth the effort! And we got to invent some new words in the process too! You might want to stop by a restaurant supply store and pick up a 3 foot wide roll of industrial size foil! This toddler sensory foil wall was a huge hit!
Foil makes a great sensory surface for little ones – it’s smooth and shiny and slick and crinkly and slippery. We often cover entire tables with it and go to town – with fingers and all sorts of fun tools that make marks. We sometimes read the book Lines that Wiggle and then draw lines and letters and shapes in the surface of the foil. In addition to all the benefits their little fingers get out of it, you can imagine the vocabulary building opportunities as well!
We kicked off this sensory wall project with a little light drizzle of yellow BioColor, which we love for it’s creamy texture, blend-ability (it’s almost impossible to make brown) & opacity! Not to mention the way it literally disappears like magic when washing up – no pink cuticles for me that day! Once you start using BioColor you will be reluctant to ever go back to using just regular tempera paint!
Anyhoos! So after letting the kids play with the yellow for a few, we drizzled fluorescent pink on top and then walked around offering little handfuls of shaving cream to those who were feeling especially daring that morning. As my mother used to say, “A good time was had by all.”
Enjoy these photos of our toddler sensory foil wall!
This little girl is always the last one to leave class. I think she enjoys the peace and quiet of playing after all the others have washed up. Usually our hands are too messy to take many pics up until this point, so she makes a nice little model for us!
Here are some pics from the vault from a “paint-cicle” table last year. Pour layers of color of BioColor into popcicle molds. Add “cold” to all the above descriptions about this sensory experience!
Before
During
After
