How to Make a Salt Tray for Preschoolers
Bring sensory and prewriting skills together with a fun salt tray. They are straightforward to make and can be used again and again.
Benefits of a Salt Tray
Pre-Writing Skill Building
Learning to write letters, shapes, and numbers all start with pre-writing skills. Copying waves, lines, circles, and wiggles in the salt helps build up to writing letters, numbers, and shapes.
Hand-Eye Coordination
Salt tray writing encourages little ones to look at the flash card, letter tile, number, etc, to write what they see in the salt.
Seeing the shapes and lines and then using their hands to replicate these items requires some hand-eye coordination.
Problem-Solving Skills
What happens if a little one makes a mark they weren’t intending to make in the salt tray? See if they can come up with a solution to clear the tray.
Having an easy way to clear the tray helps little ones persist in the task because they know they can quickly start again.
Sensory Exploration
Salt provides a great tactile experience for little ones. Some kids enjoy letting the salt run through their fingers, which calms them.
Other kids enjoy running the back of a paintbrush back and forth through the salt.
Let your little one explore with the salt tray!
Easy and Inexpensive
The tutorial is written and shown using a cheap plastic pencil case. Don’t let not having one stop you from doing this fun activity.
Baking pans with raised edges, plates with raised edges, pie pans, or any other flat-bottomed item with raised sides should work.
Salt can usually be found relatively cheap for iodized salt. You don’t need fancy salt for this activity.
**After your little one is done with this salt tray activity, try keeping the salt in a labeled baggie so it can be reused in another activity. **
This article may contain affiliate links to products that may help you when homeschooling preschool.
Items Needed
*salt
*pencil case (or similar)
*paint brush
*index cards/ flashcards
*colored paper (optional if not using a colored case)
How to Make a Salt Tray
1. Find a container with a flat bottom and elevated sides. The sides should be tall enough that the salt won’t fly all over the table when your little one gently shakes it to ‘clear’ it.
*If using a tray that isn’t colored, cut a piece of colored paper to fit the bottom. Place it in the tray before step 2.
2. Add salt to your tray. Don’t fill it all the way, or you will have a mess. Let your little one try out the salt tray with a layer of salt barely covering the bottom. Then, try adding more and see which one they prefer.
3.Introduce pre-writing index cards and have your little one try replicating what is on the card in the salt tray by using the (not bristle) end of a paintbrush.
To make the pre-writing cards, write squiggles, curves, a circle, a zig zag, and a line across on different index cards.
4.Create a pile of the cards or items you want your little one to replicate in the salt tray. Let your little one grab one of the items (index cards, letter tile, etc). Set it in front of the tray.
5.Have your little one practice writing the shape, letter, number, etc. that is one the item.
6. Choose another item from the pile and repeat the process.
Ways To Use a Salt Tray
Pre-Writing Forms
Practice writing zig zags, curves, and lines to get little hands ready to write letters, numbers and shapes.
Draw these items on index cards to make it easier for your little one to replicate.
Letter and Number Practice
Place flash cards in a pile and flip over the top card. Write the letter or number in the salt tray.
Pair it With a Sensory Bin
Add wooden letters or letter (shape, number, etc.) tiles to a sensory bin filled with something dry like rice. Fish out a letter and write that letter in the salt tray that is next to the sensory bin.
Mazes
Draw a simple maze and have your little one try to get through the maze from one side of the salt tray to the other.
Animal Tracks
Use plastic animals and have them walk around in the salt tray to leave tracks.
Dyed Salt
Try coloring the salt by adding the salt to a bag and adding a few drops of food coloring. Shake the zipped bag to mix the color throughout. Dump the salt on a tray to dry before adding to a salt tray.
Sensory Play
Encourage your little one to try out the salt tray and play in it. They may choose to let the salt drip through their fingers, try to make a mountain, or to get all the salt to one side.
Let them take the lead with how they want to play, as long as it’s play time and they follow the boundaries you have set for the salt tray.
Sensory Writing Tray
Salt trays make a fantastic activity to pull out when you need a minute and want your little one entertained. They can be done fairly independently (as long as you set boundaries). As always, you know your little one best and decide if this is an independent activity (after some practice).
