Rose Rice Recipe for Play

With Valentine's Day quickly approaching we are having lots of fun adding the scent of rose into our play activities.  This rose scented rice smells glorious, has therapeutic attributes, and there are lots of fun ways for kids to play and explore.

Rose Scented Rice

Recipe for Play


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We love rice for sensory play.  It is a lot like play sand but cheaper, and it makes a fun sound when it is poured or shaken.  It keeps indefinitely, can easily be stored, and vacuums up easily.  We have made sensory rice in tons of ways; visit our play recipes collection for more ideas.

Rose Rice Recipe (affiliate links provided)

• Rice
• Red/pink food coloring or washable watercolors
• 1-5 tsp of water
• Rose oil
• A zip seal bag

Sensory rice is really easy to make.  All you have to do is place the desired amount of rice into a large zip seal bag along with the coloring and scented oil.  We used several drops of pink food coloring and added a few teaspoons of water to help coat the rice in color.  This worked great!  I also added a few drops of rose oil.  Once the ingredients are added seal the bag and mix it well until all the rice is coated in color.  Once the rice is colored open the bag and allow the rice to dry overnight.  The rice may clump together during the drying process but breaks apart easily once it is handled.  Pour it into a sensory bin or container and PLAY can begin

To extend the fun I added a few bowls, heart scoopers, artificial roses, and heart gems to the bin.  Rosie and Jewel had lots of fun and found lots of ways to explore.

The girls especially loved hunting for the heart gems in the rice.  I would hide them, and they would delight in finding them.  While hunting and collecting the hearts we worked on counting, simple addition and subtraction, and other early learning concepts

Sensory rice is so fun and lends itself to all sorts of play possibilities.  How many scoops does it take to fill the bowl?  Which scooper fills the bowl faster and why?  

These are just some examples of the learning that I was able to sneak into Rosie and Jewel's sensory rice play.  This bin is perfect for play leading up to Valentine's Day, and I know we will be playing with our sensory rice often until then......and probably long after.

A Few Tips:  I found all of the materials used in this activity at the Dollar Tree except for the rice.  We buy our rice in bulk at Walmart for very cheap.  Pink food coloring comes in the neon food coloring pack which can be found in the baking aisle of most major stores or online here.  You can read more on the benefits of rose oil here.  To get the fullest benefit you will want 100% rose essential oil.  For this activity we used a more inexpensive rose oil.

Click the photos below for more Valentines FUN for Kids

   

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