Bathtime Floating and Sinking Activity
You Will Need:
- Sponge
- Shampoo bottle
- Metal spoon
- Plastic toys such as boats
- Bowls and cups
The Activity:
- During bath time add objects to the water that either float or sink.
- Encourage your child to explore how the objects react by trying to push floating objects down and stopping the sinking objects.
- Talk to your child about what is happening.
- Expect your child to be repetitive as they experience how each of objects react in the water
Extending The Activity:
- Add objects that you can fill up such as cups and jugs
- Add objects that will let water flow through such as sieves and colanders
How this supports your child's learning:
Playing with water gives many opportunities to develop fine and gross motor skills as well as language skills. Children will increase their fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination through actions such as pouring, squeezing and pushing. Introducing new language whilst playing and will help children link a new word to what it means.
Words to introduce during the activity to support language development
- Float
- Sink
- Holes
- Watch
- Above
- Below
- Heavy
- Light
- Full
- Empty
- Bottom
- Splash
Top Tip
Use everyday household objects you don’t to buy anything special and it helps children understand the world around them.
