Water play is always a win in the preschool classroom and the perfect addition to add to your Valentine’s Day to do list.
It may sound contradictory to add water play to a day already filled with so much excitement but it is actually the perfect addition. Why? Because water play helps young children to relax, it relieves their anxiety, it invites critical thinking and conversation, and it promotes a sense of community.
You don’t need to overcomplicate your water play experience. In fact, keeping it simple will allow you to feel more relaxed and will allow the children more opportunity to use their own ideas and imagination in the process of play.
Here are a few tips to make your water play experience successful…
- Don’t put too much water in your water table tub but do put enough so that the children can easily pour and scoop up water or transfer water from one container to another.
- Don’t forget to keep some towels for quick drying available. Chances are that water will get splashed or spilled but keeping towels handy will keep you confident and prepared!
- Add tools for play such as tongs, tweezers, heart-shaped sponges, and a few additional small heart-shaped containers for pouring and squeezing.
- Remember that the bigger the container for pouring and scooping, the bigger the spills will be. So keep the containers on the smaller side.
Combine common sense with creative thinking and your Valentine water play experience will be fabulous!
Water Transfer
As a side note, you will notice that we had one tub with a little pink liquid water color added and one tub that started off empty. This gave the children the chance to transfer water using their heart shaped sponges (which I cut out myself) from one tub to another.
Check out these Valentine’s Day ideas!
Making your own Valentine Tube paint stamps
