Colourful Rice
This is a lovely easily adaptable activity for babies, toddlers and children. Perfect if you have siblings. Dyeing the rice and using black paper makes this activity visually very appealing for little minds. Rice is also a great sensory resource because it makes a great sound when it is moved and can also bounce when dropped. All the resources needed for this activity will be in your kitchen cupboard but the prep for this activity does need to be done a few days before hand.
Set Up
This activity does require some forward planning because it takes a few days for the rice to soak up all the food colouring. All I do is pour the rice into leftover take away boxes and use my best judgement as to how much food colouring is required. A little does go a long way. However if you are exuberant with the food colouring, ‘it’s no big thing’ the rice will just take a but longer to dry.
I used black paper against the coloured rice because I like the contrast of the black against the coloured rice.
When we were ready to play and explore I simply poured the rice from a height. The rice will bounce and makes a great sound as it lands on the paper. Oliver was quite young when we did this activity the first time. He got stuck in and explored the rice by moving it and picking some up and sprinkling, then I copied what he did with the rice. He quickly noticed that I was copying and he found it hilarious. This approach is called ‘Intensive Interaction’ and promotes those early communication skills.
If you have a smaller baby this would be a lovely activity to do in a high chair or a bumbo style seat. For older children this activity can teach colours and adjectives and verbs as you commentate what is happening to the rice.
As a teacher I have used coloured rice to create multi-sensory art work. Basically any dried food can be dyed using food colouring; pasta, beans, noodles and stuck down using PVA glue.
As my son and I were playing the rice it did create some mess but the hoover had no issue tackling it when we had finished. If you want to create less mess, I would suggest using a tray which can high sides on.
You may notice when you have finished the activity that some of the food colouring has transferred onto skin. This is easily washed off using soap and water.
For similar activities delivered to your door