- 15 - 25 mins
- Fine motor, sensory awareness, cause & effect principles, creative
- Messy!
Goop is a fantastic sensory experience that has an unusual texture that will keep your child fascinated. Goop holds two forms, a solid and a liquid; pick it up as a solid and watch it ooze down your fingers again.
This experience will nurture curiosity, and build upon a number of skills and processes, such as experimentation, investigation, cause and effect principles, and fine motor skills. Prepare for mess and pure entertainment!
What you will need
- 1 cup corn flour
- 1/3 cup water
- Bowl or container
- Food colouring
- Spoon or spatula
- Bucket with warm soap water for clean up!
Activity steps
- Place one cup of corn flour in your bowl.
- Next, in your bowl put a few drops of food colouring in the centre, and then slowly pour in the water. You may need a little more water depending on how you like the consistency, but I found these measurements to work well.
- Mix your ingredients- it will take some time to mix together, you can use your hands or a spoon. I find using your hands is more effective! You will know the goop is ready when you can slowly mix the mixture together and it flows gently, but if you try to stir quickly it will be solid.
- Now play, explore and discover!
Things to ask your child
- What does it feel like?
- What do you notice about the goop? Does it stay the same or is it different? Now would be a good time to introduce the concepts of solids and liquids. What is a solid? What is a liquid?
- Ask your child to explore the mixture, can they stop it from oozing? What if they do it slowly? Quickly?
Variation ideas
For more exploration, learning and play you could try adding spoons, measuring cups or some objects to find in your goop such as magnetic letters or small animals.
To find out more about how corn flour goop scientifically works, click here.
Don’t forget to comment below and let us know what you thought of this experience. Did you like it? What learning opportunities came up?
Learning Outcomes
- Hand eye co-ordination
- Fine motor
- Sensory awareness
- Creative expression
- Experimentation & investigation
- Cause & effect principles
Reference sites
We would like to acknowledge these amazing sites that have inspired us to create this activity. Thank you!
Goop is so much fun. Looks like a blast!
Such a fun afternoon playing with goop. Thank you for the inspiration!