Sensory Bins on a Budget: Your DIY Guide for Hands-On Play
Sensory play is an amazing developmental explorative activity. If you are anything like me, you have been all over the web searching for the latest and greatest of all things curated sensory bins. Checking out the monthly subscription options, dreaming of buying them all. Oh, so bummed that we can’t for whatever reason. For me, I have three children of my own plus another handful at my in-home childcare. They aren’t going to sit around and share one bin until a new one shows up next month for a monthly membership and I certainly am not going to go purchase 7 different curated bins at one time (as much as I would love to).
Whether your story is similar, you are a DIYer for everything, a penny pincher, or another reason completely, you’ve come to the right place! We’re going to curate our own sensory bins on a budget and guess what…they’re going to be AMAZING!
Join our Facebook Group for more printables, fun activities, and hands-on learning ideas for toddlers and preschoolers!
What Are Sensory Bins?
A sensory bin is a hands-on learning activity for children, filled with materials that stimulate their senses.
These bins typically include various textures, shapes, and colors—such as rice, sand, beans, cotton balls, or water—helping children explore through touch, sight, and even smell.
Sensory bins encourage learning through play, promoting fine motor skills, cognitive development, and creativity.
Why Are Sensory Bins Beneficial?
Sensory bins provide opportunities for children to explore and engage their senses in a hands-on way. These bins are amazing for younger children and older children alike.
Boosts Cognitive Development
Children use problem-solving skills and creativity when exploring different materials. Even with no instructions, they naturally create stories and games.
- Consider the very first time you set one of these containers in front of your child, no instructions, no objective. They have an ability to take some of the simplest things and turn it into a game, a scene, a story.
Strengthens Fine Motor Skills
Scooping, pouring, and sorting objects in the bin enhance hand-eye coordination and fine motor development.
- Adding large tweezers is a great way to get your littles working on those fine motor skills.
Encourages Calm & Focus
For many children, sensory play has a soothing effect, helping them regulate emotions and reduce anxiety.
- Try creating a pouring station with water, craft sand, or rice.
Adding coloring to water makes an extra fun water play activity
Sparks Curiosity & Exploration
Sensory bins provide an open-ended play experience where children can experiment and discover at their own pace.
- It’s okay to skip the theme, give your child a bin with random items tucked inside the filler and watch what they come up with.
Supports Social Interaction
When used in groups, sensory bins encourage cooperation, sharing, and communication.
- Try setting a large bin on the floor with cotton balls and some random household items like tongs and kitchen bowls. Allow the children to sit around the bin together and interact in this fun play time.
Enhances Early Learning
Themed sensory bins can introduce educational concepts like letters, numbers, science, and cultural topics in a hands-on way.
- Grab my flower alphabet matching cards for a fun game in your next bin.
Adaptable for All Children
Sensory bins can be easily customized with different materials, themes, and activities to suit the interests and developmental needs of individual children or groups.
- One of my favorite things about sensory materials is they can be changed out very easily for a new themed sensory bin each week. I love creating my activities around the interests in the kids in my care.
- You can offer individualized sensory bins tailored to each child’s specific preferences.
Inclusive Play
Sensory bins can be adapted to accommodate children with diverse abilities and sensory preferences, making them inclusive and accessible for all children to enjoy.
- Do you have a child in your care with sensitivities to certain textures? You can offer a variety of textures such as smooth, rough, soft, and crunchy. Fabric instead of beads. Rice instead of sand.
- For children with visual impairments consider adding items with auditory elements.
How to Make a Budget-Friendly Sensory Bin
You can make these as simple or extravagant as you would like but remember with most kids, you don’t need some big showy toy to make them excited. Sometimes less really is more. When making your sensory bin on a budget you only need a few things:
- Container with sides
- Filler
- Toys and tools
Sounds simple right? Doable!
Related Article: Check out my Easy Easter Sensory Bin post for more ideas
Choosing the Right Container
The first step to great sensory play is picking out the right container. You want something with sides. The reason for sides is pretty simple, where a child’s goal is play and exploration…ours is usually to try and contain the mess as much as possible.
I promise you, some (a lot) of that rice is going to be on the floor.
A great option would be a cakepan or cookie sheet. This is a great size for little hands, the sides of the container are sturdy, and it’s something most people have available at their homes.
If you are hoping to use this over and over, consider using a bin with a cover. When you’re done, simply put on the lid and tuck away until your little is ready to play again.
Affordable Filler Ideas
For the sake of our budget friendly sensory bin, we are going to keep it simple. We’re going to raid our cabinet. Rice, dry beans, or dry pasta make a great filler for sensory bins. They’re all awesome textural items, they pour great and feel fun on little hands. Bonus, they’re all reusable for future sensory fun.
Not feeling the food sensory items, that’s okay! Try using items like cotton balls, shaving cream, or collect items from outside like flowers or twigs.
Check out this quick list of 25 food and non-food fillers you can use.
| Rice | Dry Pasta | Dry Black Beans | Sand | Shredded Paper |
| Pom poms | Feathers | Cotton Balls | Jello Cubes | Shaving Cream |
| Kinetic Sand | Bubble Wrap | Flowers and Twigs | Water | Soapy Water |
| Chocolate Pudding | Plastic Straws Cut into Pieces | Shells | Fabric Scraps | Packing Peanuts |
| Snow | Buttons | Nuts and Bolts | Cereal | Craft Sticks |
DIY Colored Rice or Pasta
If you feel like taking it one step farther, how about making some rainbow rice!
- Place dry rice or pasta in a sealed plastic bag.
- Add a few drops of acrylic paint.
- Shake the bag until fully coated.
My kids love this process.
4. Spread on parchment paper to dry.
That’s it…for real.
Budget-Friendly Toys & Tools
One thing I like to do when coming up with our next sensory bins is consider all the toys we have laying around. Collect small little figurines or tractors. Fake flowers and creepy crawly bugs. Foam number or letter pieces. Keep the items small and remember you don’t need a lot. Heck, they could be completely random…Your kids will know what to do!
Feel free to omit the toy portion all together, grab out some little cups and measuring spoons.
Or have a mixture of both.
Where to Find Supplies for your Sensory Bins on a Budget
If you absolutely need to run to a store to pick up some items for your sensory bin, your local dollar store is a goldmine for sensory bin materials! I love utilizing the Dollar Tree for all my childcare needs when I need many items or am trying to stick to a budget.
These items were all found at the Target dollar spot
Items to Watch for at Your Local Dollar Store
- Pans
- Containers with lids
- Zip lock bags (used for coloring filler or storing items for later)
- Filler
- Rice
- Dry beans
- Pasta
- Fish bowl rocks
- Cotton balls
- Small toys
- Bugs
- Trucks
- Farm animals
- Small seasonal items
- Gemstones
- Puzzels
- Foam shapes, letters, numbers
- Fake flowers
- Pots
- Small shovels
- Gardening gloves
- Tools
- Measuring cupsTongsTweezers (large chunky tweezers in the kids section)funnels
- Magnets (they often have large horseshoe shaped ones that are awesome!)
- Fun shaped Egg containers during Easter time
Pro Tips for Mess-Free Sensory Play
- Don’t get stuck on looking at all the perfect Instagram or Pinterest pictures. They’re beautiful, but they only show you the before pictures.
- Try taking your bin to the floor, lay out a towel or tablecloth to catch the mess.
- Make sure everyone washes their hands prior to exploring, your filler will last longer.
- Store dry fillers in a sealed container, dispose of wet or edible fillers.
- Build your bins around the interests of your littles.
- The children in your care will love what you create for them.
Time to Play!!
The goal with sensory bins is to let your child use their imagination. Let them explore. Let them figure out the objective. Maybe there is none, maybe they don’t do things the way you would expect them to as you were creating this container of amazingness for them. It’s okay! It’s out of your hands now and into theirs, they know what to do even if we don’t tell them. Let them explore while you watch. It’s kind of magical.
