Easter Eggs

Easter is right around the corner and with the Easter School holidays and the long weekend, it’s a great opportunity for you and your Child/Children to have lots of fun together in a sensory-friendly way.

We’ve put together five of suggestions to make this Easter a calming, relaxing and fun time for any child who benefits from sensory friendly activities.

Sensory friendly activities can be a mix of relaxation techniques and tactile stimulation. It’s a good idea to mix things up but also be mindful of how your child responds to each one. Being creative in the activities you do may lead on to positive outcomes that can be then passed on to the School learning environment or routines at home.

Easter is also a great time for families to get together, presenting a perfect opportunity for everyone to get involved and understand a bit more the kinds of things someone who benefits from sensory friendly activities enjoys.

Here are our five suggestions for sensory friendly activities:

1. Create Easter Inspired Masks!

Creating face masks in great activity to get the creative tactile juices flowing! Using masks that you have cut out from card yourself or download and printed off versions (such as these here.) You can create fun Easter masks whilst using a variety of tactile arts and crafts.

As well as using different colours from pens and pencils why not use things such as felt, wallpaper samples and even sand to create your masks? You can use sand by gluing onto the cardboard mask then adding the sand, simply shake it off and your glue shape will now be perfectly aligned with sand. Using different textures can also be a fun tactile sensory experience for you and your Children.

TOP TIP! Why not use colour to express different moods for your masks and get your kids to stage a play! That way they can learn all about emotions whilst expressing themselves creatively. Use blue colours for sad colours, yellow for happy and so on.

Easter cakes

2. Make your own Easter cakes!

The kitchen is the perfect place to get sensory benefits in lots of different ways. Explore touch, hearing, sight, smell and of course taste! And create unique Easter themed cakes and baked goods. Hot cross buns, cupcakes, chocolate eggs, even an Easter based fruit pizza! (yes, of course that’s a thing: click here )

Get your child involved in every aspect of the cooking, determine clear objectives and most importantly get their creative senses flowing.

3. Design and make Easter cards for loved ones

Get your arts and crafts out and have fun creating Easter cards for all the family. A personalised Easter card is a great sentimental gift for a loved one and being handmade allows your child to express themselves in a fun way. Similar to making your own masks from our above point, you can use all sorts of different textures and textiles to create your cards.

Easter egg hunt

4. Easter Egg hunt!

No Easter day is complete without the tradition of an Easter egg hunt. We suggest creating a sensory friendly Easter egg hunt, making it more accessible for Children with special needs. When creating the Easter egg hunt why not place the eggs in areas such as a sand pit? That way you can have fun whilst keeping everyone in a safe space. Or let the Children hide their own eggs and get everyone to find each other’s!

Llama sensory therapy

5. Head to an autistic friendly farm

If there is a spell of good weather (being in the UK it’s wise to cross your fingers!) then why not head to an autistic friendly farm. Farms across the UK open their doors to the public mainly through the Spring and Summer. It is a great way to get a hand on sensory experience with farm animals and be on the lookout for lambs during the Springtime. Some farms in the UK offer autistic friendly sessions, we’ve listed a few here:

Care Farming UK – Sites across the UK

North Hayne Farm Cottages – North Hayne Farm, Bishops Nympton, South Molton, Devon, EX36 3QR

Red House Farm – Red House Lane, Dunham Massey, Altrincham, Cheshire, WA14 5RL

Also, be on the lookout for Llama farms and walks, there is a growing interest particularly from people with autism to experience good benefits from Llamas as they are friendly and easy to handle.

Nidderdale Llamas  – Kiln Farm, Wilsill, Pateley Bridge, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, HG3 5EE

We hope that these top 5 activities inspire you to do something great over Easter!

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