Shapes sensory tubs

We have a shape sorter toy and only last month, he took more interest in the toy. Initially he was just interested in getting the blocks into the holes but he didn't know the different shapes, so he ended up so frustrated for trying to force a circular block into a square hole most of the time. A week later, he seemed to be 'enlightened' and learnt that the blocks are of different shapes. The first shape he recognised was a star and he even picked up our sign language for star. When we sang twinkle twinkle little star to him, we would close and open our palms like stars flickering in the night sky and he would do exactly that whenever he sees a star now.

When it comes to picking themes or activities for Xue, I like to adopt the 'one-step-ahead' method. During his playtime, I observe what he like to do or what he is trying to learn, be 'one-step-ahead' and provide him with more opportunities to practise the skill or build up the new knowledge. I feel that Xue is ready to learn more about shapes and so we declared an All About Shapes week at home.

I rummaged through all his toys and my craft stuffs for all the stars and circles to make two shapes sensory tubs. Only when everything is put together that I realised we have a lot of stars and circles stuffs around the house.

Here's the stars sensory tub:

And, here's the circles sensory tub! I think because Xue saw so many circles in that tray, there is no way not to recognise one after that. lol.

He's usually quite cautious when exploring any new stuffs, ok, at least for the first five minutes. How to tell that he's warmed up? See, everything will be on the floor. Anyway, the mess is easy to clear up and totally worth it because, learning objectives are achieved! Now, he can point out all the circles and will proudly draw a circle in the air with his little finger whenever he sees one.