Exploring through touch

These activities are for children aged 27-36 months and align with stage 5 of the Developmental Journal Babies Visual Impairment (DJVI).

Safety first

What you'll need

Two boxes, rough and smooth paper, or fabric cut into squares. 

Tips

• Introduce exploring using touch to your child by creating different games. Use the language like ‘rough’ and ‘smooth’ when you and your child are handling everyday objects. Try to widen their experience and allow them to associate the words and textures. 
• Always support your child to explore new textures; they may be unsure about touching new, unfamiliar things. Placing your hand under theirs and exploring together promotes confidence and shared experience. As your child grows in confidence, begin to withdraw your support a little at a time.

Activity

• In the bottom of your boxes, completely cover one box with rough fabric or paper and the other with smooth. 
• Cut out your squares of different textured fabric or paper.
• Introduce your child to the boxes and give them lots of time to explore the whole box. When they find the area you have created as rough or smooth, use the right word to describe the texture. Keep language simple and direct so that your child understands ‘rough’ applies to this particular texture.
• Hand one piece of your fabric to your child and give time to explore, then help them to match it to the inside of the box – smooth with smooth and so on.
• After a little practice, you can jumble up the pieces in another bag or box and take turns to choose and match. 
• Extend the matching to other textures.