Half term is the perfect time to get creative at home! Whether you’re looking for some quick sensory play ideas or longer activities to keep little ones engaged, we’ve gathered five of our favourites. Each one uses simple materials you probably already have at home — perfect for rainy day setups in your PlayTRAY.  

1. Rain Cloud Experiment 

If your child loves science experiments, they’ll love this!  It uses shaving foam to mimic a cloud and show what happens when it gets saturated with water droplets and eventually falls as rain. 

What you’ll need: 

• A clear jar or vase  
• Water  Shaving foam (supermarket own-brand works perfectly!)  
• Food colouring 
• Droppers (check out our Dropper Set on our website)   
  

How to do it: 

1. Fill a jar or vase about three-quarters full with water.  
2. Add a generous layer of shaving foam on top to create your “cloud.”  
3. Use droppers to drip coloured water onto the foam and watch as the “rain” falls through!    
   

We tried lots of different colour combinations, as well as just using blue. The more colours you let them play with, the quicker the water will become murky — but it’s so much fun to see all the colours seeping through.    

Top Tip: It’s definitely worth having a few jars ready, as they’re bound to want several tries. We use the cheap, own-brand shaving foam from the supermarket. It's such a handy resource to have in the cupboard!    

2. Frozen Penguin Eggs 

This is a fun twist on frozen dinosaur eggs, which you can find in our blog, Dinosaur Activities for Pre-Schoolers! If you don’t have little penguins, anything can be frozen, and it’s guaranteed to keep the kids entertained. I love this activity because it keeps them busy for a long time and appeals to children of all ages!   

Here’s how to make them: 

1. Blow up a few balloons and then let the air out again to stretch them.  
2. Place your penguins (or other small toys) inside the balloons.  
3. Fill the balloons with water from the tap, tie them up, and pop them in the freezer overnight.  
4. Once frozen, snip off the balloon top and peel it away to reveal your ice eggs! 
   

I made a bit of Oobleck to put in the bottom of our tray (1 cup of cornflour, 1 cup of water, and a drop of food colouring). It’s not necessary, but it adds another sensory element to the activity, and the girls loved playing with the penguins in it afterwards. 

Fill spray bottles with warm water and provide droppers. The best part of this activity is definitely how long it keeps them engaged — we got a solid 45 minutes of play!    

3. Taste-Safe Foam

Chickpea water, also known as Aquafaba, whizzes up into the most amazing foam, making it a brilliant early sensory play experience. It’s also an excellent taste-safe alternative to bubble foam! You can use it for lots of different themes, or simply give children some scoops, funnels and bowls to explore it with.

What you’ll need: 

• Water drained from 2 tins of chickpeas  
• 1 tsp cream of tartar (optional, but helps it stay foamy for longer)  
• A drop of food colouring    
  

How to make it:

Whizz everything together until it forms a thick, bubbly foam. It’s best made just before playtime as it does start to turn back to liquid after a while — but you can easily rewhip it!

Top Tip: You can keep chickpea water in the fridge until you’re ready to play.    

This activity features in our Sensory Play Activity Card Set, which contains 30 fun recipes to inspire sensory-rich experiences that nurture your little one’s curiosity and development!

4. Farm Small World 

We absolutely love a farm-themed small world! It’s such a fun way for children to explore imaginative play and learn about animals, habitats, and daily life on the farm.    

Small world play isn’t just fun — it brings many benefits to children, like sparking creativity and imagination and improving language and communication skills.

Small worlds don’t need to take long to set up, and as you build up a collection of resources, it gets even quicker. Eventually children will learn to set these up on their own, in fact, they’ll love the opportunity to do this!

In this PlayTRAY, we used: 

• Dyed green rice for the grassy fields  
• Chocolate cloud dough to make a muddy farmyard
• Hay and straw for texture
• Toy animals 
• Our Mini Blocks and toothpicks to create fences
  

Children can feed the animals, build pens, and act out little farm stories — there’s so much imaginative play packed into one tray! Over time, they’ll even start to design and build their own setups.    

Animal figures are 100% worth investing in for small world play. Start building a collection and add to it over time.            

For more small world setups, check out our blog, 10 Sensory Bases for Small World Play.     

5. Fizzy Coloured Reactions 

This is a great rainy day activity combining colourful sensory play with a little chemistry magic. It’s brilliant for fine motor development too. 

What you’ll need: 

• Bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)  
• Vinegar  Food colouring
• Droppers
• PlayTRAY 

How to do it: 

1. Spread a layer of bicarbonate of soda in your tray or small bowls.
2. Mix vinegar with a few drops of food colouring in separate cups.
3. Use droppers to squeeze the coloured vinegar onto the bicarbonate of soda, then watch the fizzing, bubbling reaction! 
   

Kids will love experimenting with colour mixing and seeing the science happen right in front of their eyes. Plus, squeezing droppers/pipettes is an excellent fine motor workout for little hands! 

Half term is the perfect opportunity for some creative, sensory fun at home — rain or shine! The great thing about these five activities is that they inspire creativity and encourage learning through play, without children even realising it!

If you give any of them a try, don’t forget to tag us @inspiremyplay. We love seeing all the fun you get up to!