Iam looking at updating our baby room planning..just wondering has anyone got any good examples
of activities that the babies have really enjoyed? or a list of different types of activities for children aged 3 months to two years!!

There's always the treasure basket - there was a thread on here recently - a day or so ago - that had a really good list of things you could put in one.

I'll keep thinking. We don't have a baby room, but I've seen lots of stuff during my recent Foundation Degree work.

Music


Australian this one's nice

Yep we have a treasure basket...i was thinking more messy activities or things that could be put in the
builders tray etc! Look forward to reading your ideas!!

When i worked in a baby room we use to include lots of natural resources. cones, scrunchies, empty boxes, lids etc

well if you are looking for messy! Put foam in a paddling pool and strip them down to nappy. You can make foam with a whisk and johnsons if you are worried about eyes, ingestion etc. Mine played in that for ages in a nice warm room - it's slippery though, so be a bit careful.

Then there's the use of paint with a stripped off crawler - use lots of wallpaper lining paper (B&Q) and floor mirrors

If you don't fancy paint you could use flour and water paste.

Gloop is always fun, as is jelly. I make up 3 pints in a washing up bowl and it's great to play with - doesn't matter if they eat it!

Our babies like cooked pasta, a tray full of corks is also nice, do you have heuristic play thats always popular, we often use one or two item such as ping pong balls and tins. Baked beans is another good one, jelly, cornflour, foam, leaves, sand, water, ez snow, paint, feathers,

i made some lovely baby face/body paints with organic lavender baby lotion (on offer in my local shop) mixed with a sprinkle of powder paint or cocoa powder and a squirt of washing up liquid. smells lovely and just rubs in.
also they loved flour in the builders tray, add sparkly glitter, sieves, pots and spoons or cars for making tracks in.
shredded paper or collage materials to explore
feathers
baskets of balls in different sizes, cardboard tubes for rolling them down - I put these in a tuff spot for babies to crawl in and explore with bits of drainpipe too.
silks, soft fabrics, mirrors for peekaboo games - extend with hats, bags, sunglasses and shoes
what about a sensory den, use drapes or cardboard boxes, add lights, and a few props to explore and hide
hope that gives you a few ideas - i love this age group

our sensory bottles were always popular - we found empty lucozade bottles were a good size and shape for this, but any bottle works! we filled them with different materials such as rice, pasta, marbles... anything really! we made bottles of different sizes, weights and colours... For some we made small holes in the lid and added cotton wool balls with a few drops of different essences (shampoo worked too!) on them... I have also seen them made with photos in too, which could be a nice way of involving families - we had a basket of 'photos from home' on the floor for the babies to look at.

C

Oh what great ideas...cant wait to feed back to my staff in the baby room!!
Can anyone share their ideas of how they actually plan in the baby room, now the Eyfs is in place?

Hi Bubbles,

I'm going to move this post out of Reception and Year 1 discussions.

I like that idea our babies really like the sensory bottles bet these would go down a treat

our babies love hand painting on the mirror or windows! siting in trays of custard or spaghetti (not tinned!!!) the little ones love playing peek a boo with differnt fabrics i.e silk chiffon , velvet
have you read the Sally Featherstone birth to three books -they have loads of ideas that can be easily converted to meet eyfs planning( i did a sheet that translated the old B23 aspects into EYFS if its any help)

Im due to set up planning for under twos , a bit confused about where to start havent had to do it before! Cant seem to access any training catering for babies either! Have ordered some books

So do most people plan activities each day for whole group rather than planning for indiviudal children like 2+ years?

Please excuse my ignorance!

Does any1 have any examples of planning for under 2's they could start me off with or even some guidance

thanks

x

the best thing is to start with observing the babies to see their intersts and stages of development, an holistic observation works best- then from this plan to include their interests in your weekly continiuos provision add ing enhanced resourses that meet babies needs/interests, we also do adult focused activities i,e 1 per day for small or whole groups eg activiies as stated in previous posts

ill try to send an example of blank proforma but not sure how to!!!

I am an EYPS student in placement and the Room Leader and Practitioners in my present setting provide great gloop play in the builder's tray - mainly edible stuff for the 0 - 3s - tinned tomatoes and pasta, beans, oats etc. A beach was set up in a builders tray near the low mirror and the little ones had lots of fun with porridge and rice as sand substitute and organic treasure basket - shells, rafia boxes, mats, coconut shells, loafahs, fishing net as insitu objects to investigate.