When a child is born, they use their senses to discover our world. These senses mature over time as babies, toddlers, and preschoolers explore the world around them. Each new experience they have with a different sense builds nerve connections that grow the architecture of their brain and helps them to understand and learn.
This happens mostly through sensory play.
But what is sensory play?
Sensory play is any activity that stimulates at least one of your child's senses
– touch, sight, hearing, smell or taste. It helps children to interact with and make sense of the world that surrounds them. In order to encourage them to use a variety of senses, their play environment should be enriched with elements that invite sensorial discovery through various textures, sounds, movements etc.
Why is sensory play so important?
Sensorial play encourages learning through exploration, curiosity and creativity and supports a healthy brain and language development enhancing memory, complex tasks and problem solving
It also nourishes fine and gross motor skills through active movement and tactile play. Especially the movements of rocking (with a rocking animal), jumping, like with a jumping ball or rolling around for example with our rolling elephant, stimulate the vestibular sensory system
In addition to that sensory play encourages creative and independent interactions and stimulates their emotional intelligence and overall wellbeing.
How we as parents can contribute to a healthy development
As parents, we want to raise emotionally, socially and psychologically resilient kids. Sensory play and movement are key to this healthy development.
The good news is that we as parents can support our kids finding this sensory integration that helps them to be emotionally and physically grounded by creating a surrounding that promotes physical activity as well as sensorial-rich interaction. We can for example define different areas in the kids room: for free creative play, for movement and action and also for relaxation.
Both in active play or deep relaxation, our sensory companions help children to feel focused and grounded, to be creative and curious, to move and challenge their physical capacities through play.
Within current challenges of our time this balance is fundamental to us - combined with our overall goal to create long-lasting sustainable play furniture that your child can grow up with.