Stress is often thought of as a grown-up condition, but children can also experience stress. Stress in children can result from school, homework, friends, family disruptions, changes in routines, and now a days from the pandemic.
Mindfulness gives kids space and time to calm down and pay attention to what is going on in their body and environment. Regularly practicing mindfulness reduces stress and increases wellness and self-control. We will be sharing a few activities that would work well in school and home environment (also great for adults).
Activity 1: Sensory Stress Ball
Best for (3 yrs and above) sensory play, practicing mindfulness, reducing stress and creating a calm environment
Material Needed: Water Beads, Plastic Bottle/Funnel, Clear Latex Balloon
Water Beads are wonderful for sensory play. These Orbeez stress balls are squishy balls of addictiveness. We can’t get enough of them, and while you’re enjoying squeezing and squishing these, your body and mind are relaxing. Yay for that. So today I’m going to share how to make stress balls everyone will love.
Put 1tsp of water beads into a bowl. Fill the bowl with 5 cups of water and let it sit for 6 hours. Drain any excess water out of bowl.
Use a plastic bottle and cut out its base to turn it into a funnel. Pull the top of the balloon over the opening of the water bottle and fill the beads into the bottle and ultimately into the balloon. Pull the balloon carefully off of the water bottle. Before using a balloon, I always like to blow it up once and release the air to see if it has any defects or holes that could deflate the balloon.
Let out the excess air and tie the balloon. Your sensory stress ball is ready for you to enjoy!
Activity 2: Color Changing Slime
Best for (3 yrs and above) sensory play, creativity, practicing mindfulness, reducing stress and creating a calm environment
Material Needed: Elmer’s Color Changing Glue, Baking Soda, Water, RENU Contact Lens Solution, Bowl and Spoon
So Slime has been all the rage since a couple years now, but I hadn’t experimented with it until today. It’s something to do with the texture of the slime that pushes me away from even trying it. But my son like most kids, absolutely loves it!
As we continue our activities around Mindfulness, Slime is yet another way kids (even adults who don’t mind the texture) can reduce their anxiety. What’s amazing about this Slime? Well, it changes color and we had a blast playing with it.!
There are two types of Elmer’s Color Changing Glue; temperature dependent and sunlight dependent. We decided to pick the one that changed with temperature. Pour the 5oz Elmer’s Color Changing Glue in a bowl. Add 1/2tsp Baking Soda and 1/4cup water to the glue and stir well. Now add 1.5tsp Contact Lens Solution (little at a time) to the mix and keep stirring.
By now the mixture should start to pull away from the bowl easily. Take it out of the bowl and knead on a flat surface. The kneading is similar to kneading a dough for bread. If the Slime sticks to your hand, just use some baby oil on your hands.
Note: The less water you add, the less stretchy and sticky it will become. Add Lens Solution slowly. Renu Fresh contains Boric Acid and Sodium Borate. Do not substitute for other brands. If it’s not the desirable consistency keep kneading. Only add a little more contact solution a teaspoon at a time to prevent the slime from becoming too hard.
How to Play? We did a lot of stretching and squishing the Slime. We used ice to paint it and change the color from pink to purple. I had even frozen some of my kids toys, like stencils, alphabets, toy cars to play with. As these interacted with the Slime, it changed color. We even kept it near a vent with the Air Conditioner on. All these made the pink Slime change to purple. It goes back to pink pretty soon as it warms up with your hands.
Give this a try and your kids will be amazed! Can’t wait to try the Sunlight based Color Change Glue.
Safety Tip: Adults only should make the slime and handle all chemicals. Kids can play with it Slime once it’s ready.
Activity 3: Color Changing Calm Jar
Best for (3 yrs and above) simple science, color mixing, practicing mindfulness, reducing stress and creating a calm environment
Material Needed: Water, Water based Food Color, Baby Oil (or clear vegetable oil), Oil Based Food Color, Jar, Measuring cup and Toothpick
Calm Jars have been the rage for a few years now. It’s easy and fun to make with kids. It’s a lovely project for kids who are learning about emotions and mindfulness. Also we are going to add a twist to this Calm Jar, by making this a simple science activity as well.
This activity is effective for teaching the science concepts of color (for younger children) and density (for older children. By using different densities, the two colors are able to mix to form a new color and then separate again. What a fun way to learn!
If you want to make this portable, pick a small jar. I found our tiny jars in Target from the $1.00 section as I plan to keep one in our car as well (its really handy when kids stress over being strapped in the car seat).
Fill half the jar with water. Add a few drops of water based food color to the water and close the lid to shake the jar. When choosing colors I tried to stick to primary colors, but you can choose any colors for mixing. I usually try to avoid colors that when mixed turn to brown (like purple and yellow; blue and orange; or red and green).
Now pour oil in a measuring cup approximately the same volume as the water you used. Use a toothpick to take some oil based food color and mix it with the oil. You will need just a tiny bit of the color. Once thoroughly mixed, pour this into the same jar. See how the oil floats on water and won’t mix.
To see the calm jar in action, give the jar a good shake. As water and oil mix, they will form a different color. If you used primary colors, you should get a secondary color. But soon enough these two elements will start separating going back to its original colors as oil and water don’t mix. Try turning the jar upside down. You will see how the oil travels back up and always stays on top.
Feel free to add some glitter to your calm jars (always fun watching glitter float). Kids are going to be amazed with this color changing sensory jar.