Fun with Rocks — While Encouraging Learning
My kids love rocks. 🪨 They love looking at them, collecting them, touching them, throwing them, my youngest has licked them, they love stacking them, rolling them… I could go on. I find them in their pockets when I do laundry. I find them in my purse, in their bed, in their carseats, in closets, and on our stairs. For awhile I just tossed them back into nature but then I realized — there must be a way to incorporate their interest into some kind of activity. 🤔
Rocks Can Be Toys
I know that the instinct is to give your child an expensive toy. I too have been a victim of a well-worded ad on a mobile site. I have purchased that expensive toy that has promised to promote STEM and development. Some of these toys are well loved additions to their daily play. Others, while my children enjoyed them, it was short lived or the toy was so complicated that they were frustrated.
Toddlers love to take apart, put back together, pull out, put in, add on, and build up. Choose toys that are “open-ended” in the sense that your child can play many different games with them. — By Rebecca Parlakian for ZerotoThree.Org
The best toys for children are those that can be played with multiple ways and promote problem solving. Toys should spark the imagination of the child by encouraging exploration and emerging pretend play. Toys and games that are able to achieve these expectations while the child is active are even better. Reading this, I hope you too can see that a rock collection is a pretty perfect fit AND it's much less expensive than the noisemaking monstrous toy that requires 6 AA batteries.
Activities
I curated a list of activities that I have tested with my own kids and that I have implemented while working as a speech therapist. These are all enjoyable, promote developmental play and that incorporate a child’s love of nature. These are all pretty easy to implement activities but, as always, make sure to supervise your child while they explore. My youngest has definitely tasted a rock or two that I needed to fish out of his mouth.
All of these activities encourage attention, problem solving, fine motor skills, gross motor skills (if you go to collect them), playskills and language. They can be done inside or outside and can be enjoyed by all toddlers and kids.
Note: All activities need to be done with adult supervision :)
Decorate the Rocks
It is exactly as simple as it sounds but is a HUGE hit. We go on a rock hunt and find rocks that we want to decorate. This activity is great because it incorporates a gross motor component of walking and squatting and a fine motor component of picking up and holding. These decorated rocks make great gifts for teachers and family members and allow children to explore and experiment with colors. This one pairs especially well with the “Rock Bath” activity as the rocks are all clean before you start to decorate.
Materials needed: Rocks, Paint, Markers, Stickers, And Glitter (if you are feeling adventurous/dangerous)
Fun vocabulary to target:
Verbs — touch, paint, dip, color, peel, find, collect, mix
Prepositions — on, under, next to, in
Adjectives — sticky, red/blue/green/purple (whichever color your choose), wet, dry, shiny
Rock Bath
This activity is exactly what you think — you take a rock and give it a bath. It is a great outdoor activity in the summer but can also be a great indoor activity in the sink or a basin. Playing with the water is a great sensory activity for children who like to experience their play tactilely and can be a fun way to play with tub-time tools. It is a great way to model vocabulary often reserved for tubby time or hand washing in a new environment. The novelty of this activity is always a big hit.
Materials needed: Rocks, Soap, Washcloth or Scrub Brush, Towel to dry, Water, Bucket or Basin
Fun vocabulary to target:
Verbs — wash, dry, scrub, clean, sink, float
Prepositions — on, under, next to, in
Adjectives — wet, dry, clean, dirty, muddy, slippery, bumpy, smooth
Sort The Rocks
This activity really encourages observation and works best for children 2 years old and up. Grab a bunch of rocks, either from their “collection” or from a walk around the neighborhood and let them separate them into piles. My kids like to sort by size, color, shape, how dirty/clean they are, or which ones they like/don’t like. It is especially fun to sort them into egg cartons or cups. They will sort, and dump, and fill the containers while making all kinds of observations along the way. This activity pairs well with match skills such as counting and quantity concepts.
Materials needed: Rocks, Egg Carton or Small Cups
Fun vocabulary to target:
Verbs — drop, pick, like, count, put, dump, like, see
Prepositions — on, in, out
Adjectives — big, small, bumpy, smooth, clean, dirty, colorful, same, different, more, less
There is a great article on rock collecting that I found on the The Smithsonian Early Enrichment Center (SEEC)’s website about sorting rocks and rock collections.I will link the article here and also at the end of the article. I especially liked this quote:
As children collect, they will start to sort their objects into different categories: Big, medium, small rocks, Rough, smooth, and spiky rocks etc. Categorizing and sorting are important early math skills and build the foundation for understanding more complicated patterns in the future. Encourage your child to continue to re-sort their collection in different ways. — Alexandra Francis for The Smithsonian Early Enrichment Center (SEEC)
Summary
Encouraging your child’s love of rocks and nature is a great way to encourage development. There are a variety of ways to play with rocks and learn at the same time. When playing with rocks, a variety of speech, language, and other developmental skills can be addressed simultaneously with very little preparation. Just remember, all activities should be done with adult supervision. Some young children like to explore things by tasting them so make sure to watch that no rocks go into their mouth.
I hope you enjoyed these fun ideas that let kids explore while promoting language and development!
TLC Speech Therapy is a speech pathology private practice, headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, that specializes in feeding, swallowing, and communication skills in infants, children, teens, and adults.
For more information check out our website at tlcspeechtherapy.com or contact us at hello@tlcspeechtherapy.com
