Elizabeth Jarman, learning environments expert
Working in partnership with parents and carers supports consistency for the child, promoting their wellbeing, learning and development. Previous blogs in this series have explored the importance of tactile sensory experiences and considered engaging children in tactile sensory experiences. This blog will focus on working in partnership with parents and carers to engage them in supporting children’s tactile sensory experiences.
Many parents and carers will love the fact that their children have access to a variety of sensory play options with you and will understand why it’s so important in terms of their development.
If parents and carers don’t understand the benefits or are not on board with the tactile sensory experiences however, barriers might exist, preventing children from engaging in some of the opportunities on offer and possibly creating friction in their relationship with you.
Sharing the benefits of sensory play with parents and carers
Raising awareness of the benefits of sensory play should be seen and planned for as an ongoing process rather than a one-off event. The more you talk about this in the many ways that you share information and communicate with parents, the more likely they are to be on board with your approach to providing sensory play opportunities.
Start from day one. Make sure that publicity information about your setting reflects that you offer lots of sensory experiences. Talk about this when potential families visit so they know what to expect.
Share the importance of sensory play with parents and carers in imaginative ways. Use photos, videos, or quotes from their children to illustrate for example how engaged and enthusiastic they are and what rich new vocabulary can be triggered through sensory play. Chat or write about sensory experiences in individual child records such as daily diaries or journals.
Here are some further practical ideas to promote the benefits of sensory play with parents:
- Make sure that sensory play benefits feature in the policies and setting documents that you share.
- Offer practical opportunities for parents and carers to have a go and experience some sensory things they haven’t explored before!
- Share key research facts in a ‘jargon free’ way about benefits for children and their development.
- Check the PACEY resource on How sensory play benefits the development of language and communication can help explain some of the benefits to parents. BBC Tiny Happy People have a range of resources that you can share with parents including The parent manual: sensory play and as shared in What is sensory play? And what are the benefits of sensory play for babies and children?. There is also some more general information on the benefits of play from Kinderley at Play in early years: A matter of life and death?
Reflect and Consider: How do you currently share this sort of information with parents and carers. How accessible is it? Is information clear enough? Is it practical enough? Do you feel confident to explain the benefits?
Overcoming barriers
You might still have some parents and carers who don’t want their children to get involved in sensory play. It is really important to understand and find out why this is, so that you can respond and support appropriately, taking account of individual concerns or situations.
Some scenarios might include:
- The parent or carer’s perception that ‘messy play’ is ‘dirty’.
You could look to shift thinking by changing the words used to describe the activity or experience. Using sensory play or exploration might alter perception positively.
- That sensory play has no obvious outcome.
This could flag a need to re-visit your vision for learning with parents and carers to illustrate that exploration is valid in itself and the process is very important. Also, that an ‘end product’ might not be an outcome. Talking together about parents and carers expectations will hopefully open-up thinking about this point and indeed how children learn.
“I make it very clear to parents the ethos of my setting and things like the fact that we are very much process over product so their child will not be bringing home a pretty craft every day. What they will get is real-life, hands-on experiences in a place that is an extension of their home. They will get plenty of photos of their child engaged in meaningful, self-directed play. I share articles and blogs with parents so they can get a deeper understanding of why it’s important for their children to have these experiences” Amanda, Flintshire
- Children have been told to keep their clothes clean.
Do you have spare clothes in your setting for children to change into either provided by parents or aprons, overalls or wellies provided by the setting for children to use?
“'I do a lot of sensory play and have asked all the parents to provide a messy play outfit for their child. These clothes stay at my setting and are washed at the end of the day. Parents are very happy with this as they know their children have lots of fun, but they don’t have any extra washing or their child’s “nice” clothes being ruined. I also have all-in-one wetsuits and wellies in various sizes so all the children can enjoy the outdoors no matter what the weather. This is so important as then if a parent forgets a child’s coat or shoes it doesn’t prevent us all from going outdoors” Alison, Denbighshire
- Don’t get sand in your hair!
Elizabeth shares “I remember this well from my days working in a setting where some children had intricately braided hair. It was a real issue for parents to get the sand out, without undoing the many braids. So, we worked with parents and carers to find a solution and children had a sand hat available to wear. It helped a lot, but the issue wasn’t completely resolved. Working with parents to find culturally appropriate solutions was great and triggered lots of valuable conversations about why sand play was important.”
Reflect and Consider: Whilst keeping things manageable, how flexible are you to ensure that everyone can access the sensory options available? Is there anything more that you could do?
Encouraging parents and carers to offer sensory experiences at home
Whilst parents might not want to offer the more ‘messy materials’ at home for a variety of valid reasons, try to involve parents and carers in supporting their child to develop tactile confidence in manageable ways. Here are some ideas:
- Create and explain some parallel home/setting sensory care experiences, for example washing your hands before eating, or cleaning your teeth etc.
- Share ways that you could incorporate sensory experiences into home routines and everyday situations for example, washing fruit and vegetables, unpacking the shopping, watering plants, or washing the car etc.
- You could send small quantities of sensory resources home for the child to continue to explore there, for example a small collection of pinecones in a lidded box to combine with resources at home. The children could even make their own collections to take home while they are with you, for example if you go out on a walk.
- There are activity ideas for parents and carers on exploring texture from BBC Tiny Happy People which not only has ideas for creating a texture board or book but also explains why it is important for children to feel different textures.
Signposts
Inspiring Environments, including Sensory materials and experiences, Managing sensory input
Working in parentship with parents and partnership with parents (PACEY members)
PACEY members can access a range of CEY smart courses on a broad range of topics including creativity and the arts in the early years - malleable and modelling materials which can be found in the Let’s get creative theme, and supporting the development of self-regulation skills in the You, me and us theme. PACEY members also access a range of sensory activity ideas in our activities and downloads area of the website, including Winter sensory play.
Further resources
- BBC Tiny Happy People, exploring texture
- The Imagination Tree, exploring textures
- BBC Tiny Happy People What is sensory play? And what are the benefits of sensory play for babies and children?
- Kinderley, Play in early years: A matter of life and death?
- The British Psychological Society, Living with Touch
About the author - Elizabeth Jarman
Elizabeth is an internationally recognised learning environments expert. She is an award-winning author. Elizabeth developed The Communication Friendly Spaces™ Approach, which uses the environment to support communication skills, emotional well-being and physical development. Elizabeth’s work is widely recognised and respected and her thinking is professionally challenging the way that environments for children are viewed.
See www.elizabethjarman.com for more information.
