In ChildFriendly Pro's July 2025 Lunch & Learn, child care operator Krystal Churcher and guest operator Kathryn Babowal recommended keeping sensory supports such as water play, bubbles, play dough, heavy work, rocking and a calm down corner open to all children every day, with Churcher estimating that a basic kit of measuring cups, bins, ladles, whisks and loose parts costs about $50 at a dollar store.
What the session covered
Sensory processing describes how the brain receives, organizes and responds to sensory input. In this Director Lunch & Learn, host Krystal Churcher cited estimates that 5 to 16% of children experience sensory processing difficulties and that about one in six may show sensory sensitivities affecting daily function, seen as hyperactivity or low activity, difficulty with transitions, overstimulation or withdrawal, and frequent meltdowns. She linked unmet sensory needs to the behaviour management challenges many centers, especially newer ones, report, and to staff stress and burnout. The session covered tactile, visual, auditory and movement input for children aged 12 months to four years, who may spend 8 to 10 hours a day in care. Guest Kathryn Babowal, a child care operator and Association of Child Care Entrepreneurs board member known for an inclusive program, described daily sensory routines, emotional regulation tools and her approach to executive function. Both speakers presented the strategies as operator practice rather than clinical intervention, and the session did not provide a deep dive into sensory processing disorders.
Which low-cost sensory activities help regulate children in child care?
Churcher described five budget activities. Water play needs no dedicated water table: shallow storage totes on the floor or a table, buckets, ice cube trays, measuring cups and funnels support pouring, motor skills, language and early science such as sinking and floating. She advised washable paint rather than food coloring to avoid stained hands. She said bubble play, including a low-cost bubble machine, strengthens visual tracking and hand-eye coordination and redirects hyperactivity. Play dough, she said, builds the hand strength children need for pencil grip; Churcher adds rolling pins, cookie cutters, rice, beans, dried lavender or non-toxic scents, and freezes rolled tubes for children to cut with plastic scissors. Heavy work, such as carrying buckets of blocks or water across a room or yard, wearing a loaded backpack or pushing against a wall, provides calming input she compared to a weighted blanket. Rocking and swinging, using sensory swings, rocking toys or balance boards, calms the body but requires closer supervision and mats. Churcher also suggested plug-in light-up drawing pads as a lower-cost alternative to light tables.
How do educators build sensory routines and emotional regulation into the day?
Babowal described daily routines for kinesthetic children: a sensory table at arrival, yoga with twisting and stretching at the start of the day, and a visualized meditation after lunch for four and five year olds, who lie still to classical music and then describe what they imagined. Her classroom has a calm down corner children may enter without permission, stocked with tools rather than toys that everyone is taught to use. She uses the zones of regulation, green for calm, yellow for becoming triggered, red for angry and blue for sad, along with visual step-by-step cues for hallway transitions, lunch routines and dress-up clean-up, so children rely less on teacher prompts. Babowal stressed that adults must model regulation, for example by swaying when the group seems unsettled, and that a child rolling on the carpet may be signalling a need for more stimulation rather than inattention. Her CREATE FLOW approach covers connection over correction, reducing demands during a meltdown before discussing accountability, flexible routines, assuming developmental lag, and staff owning their own reactions and repairing after hard moments.
How do centers address staff concerns about mess, workload and play dough rules?
Both speakers said sensory supports should be available to every child, not reserved as a special item for children already dysregulated, so that children learn to access them independently. A participating preschool operator reported offering five to six sensory options every class; staff first saw this as extra work, but she said it reduced educator workload because children now leave conflicts on the carpet, regulate at a sensory bin and return on their own. Churcher identified work and mess as the two usual objections from new staff. The speakers recommended building clean-up time into the schedule, teaching children to pour low and keep materials in the bin, and supplying child-sized brooms and dustpans so children clean up their own mess. On food products such as rice or cornmeal in sensory bins, Churcher said each center should decide based on age group, philosophy and families. Regarding Alberta health requirements for play dough, speakers understood the concern to be bacterial risk from raw flour and that heat-treated, ready-to-eat flour addresses it, but declined to give definitive guidance.
Sensory strategies and setup tips from the session
| Time | Key point | What centers should do |
|---|---|---|
| 03:46 | Churcher cited estimates that 5 to 16% of children experience sensory processing difficulties. | Plan sensory supports for the whole group, not only for identified children. |
| 07:45 | Churcher: about one in six children may show sensory sensitivities: hyperactivity, transition difficulty, overstimulation, withdrawal or meltdowns. | Watch for these patterns, especially in late afternoon, and offer sensory input early. |
| 09:06 | Water play does not require an expensive water table. | Use storage totes, buckets, measuring cups and funnels, and washable paint instead of food coloring. |
| 13:41 | Churcher: play dough builds hand strength for pencil grip and offers calming tactile input. | Add textures or non-toxic scents, and freeze rolled tubes for children to cut with plastic scissors. |
| 15:51 | Churcher: heavy work provides calming input similar to a weighted blanket. | Have children carry buckets of blocks or water, wear a loaded backpack or push against a wall. |
| 18:58 | Rocking and swinging calm the body but need closer supervision. | Place mats and supervise sensory swings, rocking toys and balance boards. |
| 21:52 | A calm down corner holds tools, not toys, and children may enter without permission. | Teach every child how and why to use each calming tool. |
| 22:49 | Zones of regulation give children a shared language: green, yellow, red and blue. | Post zone visuals and step-by-step routine cues where children can see them. |
| 34:54 | CREATE FLOW: connection, reduce demands, flexible routines, assume lag, own your reactions. | Help a dysregulated child calm down before asking for an apology or accountability. |
| 40:59 | Churcher estimated that a basic sensory kit costs about $50 at a dollar store. | Buy measuring cups, bins, ladles, whisks and loose parts, plus child-sized brooms for clean-up. |
How ChildFriendly Pro automates this
Churcher noted that this topic did not map to a specific administration feature, and no demo was shown. Where centers record how children respond to sensory activities, ChildFriendly Pro's classroom and learning tools store observations in child portfolios linked to learning frameworks, in place of paper notes.
Next steps
- Register for the next Director Lunch & Learn for child care operators
- Classroom and learning tools for observations and child portfolios
- Free Sensory Bin Safety Checklist and preschool sensory bin planner
- Free Emotion Zones Chart for kids
