The Power of Play Dough!

Sometimes, as adults, we forget that the simple things are the best. Society and social media, even SCHOOLS stress the importance of academics, early and often. Guess what? Earlier is NOT better! There are things we can provide our children that will BUILD THE FOUNDATION for learning! Before a child can hold a crayon or pencil, they need to be able to control their hand movements by developing the muscles in their hands.

Here’s a blog I wrote several years ago discussing the change in children’s upper body strength over the years. https://www.rhcns.org/2022/04/24/handwriting-in-preschool/

Play dough is one simple resource that has so many learning opportunities!

1. Hand strength. The simple act of removing play dough from a container requires children to coordinate their hand movements, have enough strength to “unstick” it from the sides, and plan how they will remove all of it. Squeezing it develops muscles for handwriting. Rolling “snakes” develops upper body strength. Poking holes, pinching, and manipulating are all an important part of the process.

2. Creativity. This is a BROAD topic. What will a child DO with the play dough? When I first introduce it in class, I give it to them without any tools. I encourage squeezing, rolling, exploring. Many children need to be taught HOW to roll a snake. This requires them to apply pressure all along the strip of dough. (Technically bi-lateral coordination of the upper extremities.) Rolling a ball? Many ask us to make it for them! Again, we teach them how to roll it between their palms.
Then I slowly introduce simple tools such as swizzle sticks, craft sticks, or rolling pins. I teach them HOW to roll, not WHAT to create! It really bothers me know that so many teachers create activities that require only one correct answer. “Make a circle. Make a square.” Don’t get me wrong, play dough is a much better way to create those shapes than drawing! But that’s not creativity. That’s following directions. Sometimes we need to step back and let children explore and learn to develop their own ideas!

3. Math. When the children help to make play dough in the classroom, I have a written recipe for them to see. How many cups of flour do we need? I point to the 4. We go around the table, the first four children measuring one FULL cup of flour. Sometimes they don’t realize that it needs to be filled to the top! We continue around the group, reading our recipe as we go. (Numeral recognition, one to one correspondence, counting, ordinal numbers) We predetermine how many times each child will stir the mixture in the pot, counting out loud together.

4. Science. We add separate powders and liquids and stir. We have a liquid substance. After an adult cooks it on a hotplate, it ends up being a solid! Sometimes we add food coloring. We observe how the color of our mixture changes. Children can blend colors of dough.

5. Social skills. Conversations are lively while we’re making play dough. Inevitably, a child may try to change places in order to be first, or get a second turn. Children practice taking turns, encouraging others, having patience. They work together to create a product everyone can enjoy. When they sit together to create, they often share ideas, and tell stories about what they’re making.

6. Academics. I always use play dough as the first step in letter and numeral formation. Children need to FEEL and manipulate things themselves in order to create neural pathways in the brain. The motions of creating a “snake” the appropriate length, manipulating it to the correct size, and placing it to form a letter are essential to a child’s learning.

This is my favorite recipe, one that I had gotten years ago from Lisa Murphy’s site, www.ooeygooey.com. I’ve quadrupled the recipe for my class, you can cut it down as needed.

4 cups FLOUR
2 cups SALT
8 teaspoons CREAM OF TARTAR
4 cups of WATER
8 tablespoons of OIL
food coloring
Combine ingredients in a pot, cook slowly on stove, stirring constantly until desired texture is reached. Cool completely before using.

You can also add vanilla extract, cinnamon, cocoa powder, etc.

Store in an air tight container.

Since the pandemic, I’ve provided the children with individual containers to store their play dough.I really like the photo boxes we started using this year. They provide storage, as well as a possible “tray” for the children to use.

We have a play dough cart that children can access anytime during “Children’s Choice.” It is typically a self-chosen, self-directed activity. There are times that I may ask them to get it during a teacher directed activity as well.

In Early Childhood Education, our job is to build your child’s foundation. Can steps be skipped and your child be rushed into writing early? They CAN, of course, but would you want your builder to skip steps on your home’s foundation? Do you want your child to have a STRONG foundation, or quick, forced results? Play dough is fun. Learning should be joyful!

*Don’t want to cook? Go ahead and buy some!