Feed the Animal

Date: June 21, 2022
Time: Work Time
Facilitators: Jasmine & Simran J (Helped by Raveena)

PROPS USED

Cardboard boxes, Printout pictures of crow and hippo (pasted over the boxes), Plastic trays, Small spoons, tongs, beans, leaves were used as props to encourage sensory play in toddlers. 

What was the activity?

Feed the animal is a fun and easy toddler activity wherein the toddlers were shown how to feed the animal either using tongs/spoons or with their hands. Pictures of crow’s and hippo’s faces were pasted on the cardboard boxes. The mouth area was cut out from the face and the cardboard, so that the kids can put the food in the mouth.

Why did we plan this activity?

  • Sensory skills: The beans and the leaves (food of crow and hippo respectively) stimulated the touch senses in the toddlers. 

  • Fine and gross motor skills: This sensory play involved picking up the spoons (for beans) and tongs (for leaves) and putting the food into the animal’s mouth, leading to fine and gross motor skills development. 

  • Food literacy: The toddlers got a chance to learn about different ways that animals eat their food. For example, they learnt that crows eat pulses/beans while a hippo may prefer eating grass/leaves.

  • Social skills were directly inculcated in the toddlers since it involved arthlings to share and wait for their turns to get spoons/tongs and feed the animal. 

The Series of Steps engaged in?

Mouth hole was cut out from the faces (crow and hippo) of the animals and pasted on the cardboard boxes (the cardboard acted like the body of the animal). One tray included the leaves and tongs for the hippo while the other tray had beans and spoons for the crow. The trays were placed on each table, where the kids sat and started feeding the animals. This activity was followed by clean-up time where kids helped in picking up the spoons, beans and leaves spilled either on the table or the floor and placing them inside the tray.

How did it go? (Finally!)

Feeding the animal started around quarter past nine and many kids participated in the activity. Initially the toddlers were introduced with the crow and the hippo and subsequently with their food (beans and leaves). They were taught to hold  the spoons/tongs, pick up the food and place it in the animal’s mouth. Kaira, Krishay, Daksh, Aaradhya, Saanvi, Atharv Gupta, Atharv Goel, Taksh, Advaith, Ratujit and Shivansh feeded the crow and Athrav Gupta, Radhya, Swastika and Aradhya feeded the hippo.
On the crow’s table (facilitated by jasmine), the kids were given the option to either use the spoons or feed the crow with their hands. Most kids preferred using their hands while Advaith, Ratujit and Krishay tried feeding with spoons. They were given prompts such as, “the crow is hungry, can you feed him the beans?”, “The crow says thankyou for the food”. The kids had a smile on their faces whenever the facilitator said, “Yum-Yum” in response to the food put inside the animal’s mouth.
On the hippo table (facilitated by Simran J), the kids were shown different types of tongs placed in the tray. Tongs were tough to hold for this age group kids. They were motivated in the beginning to use them to hold the leaves. Aaradhya preferred using the wooden tongs that were small in size and Saanvi preferred using the bigger aluminum tongs to feed. Jasvi found the activity a little difficult in the beginning but was subsequently helped by the facilitator, owing to which she seemed to take interest in the feeding by the end. 










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