Goldilocks and the Three Bears

Using the classic story as inspiration, this is a great activity to start exploring the world of imaginative play by feeding the bears their porridge. For older toddlers there are also links to Maths by using different sized bears, spoons and bowls.

Set Up

Using what we had in the kitchen cupboards and the toy bag, I placed porridge oats into three bowls and used three different sized spoons and teddies to represent the bears from the story.

Previous to the activity I had used the teddies and a puppet of Goldilocks to tell my son the story.

I could have made this activity messier by making porridge or adding a jug of milk but I didn’t want to wash the teddies afterwards.

I placed the activity in a black tray to contain some of the mess.

The first time I did the activity with my son he was quite young and had never attempted to pretend to feed a teddy or dolly. So I initially modelled feeding the bears using the spoons and made lots of yummy sounds. I then supported holding the teddies so my son could feed the bears himself.

Like many of the activities I left this out so that my little one could revisit it. Whilst I was making dinner he begun feeding the bears and then used the porridge oats for messy play.

This was a relatively easy ‘messy’ activity to tidy up. The oats were quickly cleaned up using a dustpan and brush and the bowls and spoons went in the dishwasher.