Childcare Activities

Noisy Basket

Table of Contents

We have a fantastic game to share with you – Noisy basket! It is simple to set up. It is an indoor activity that will (hopefully) not involve breaking anything

Learning Objective

Identifies different baritones of sound such as loudness (or lack of)
Distinguishes between sounds made by different objects
Listens for sustained period of time without getting distracted
Differentiates between syllable and phoneme sounds
Learns to blend and segment words

Age Group

1.5 year and above

Materials required

A transparent bottle containing buttons
Another transparent bottle containing uncooked pasta
A plastic canister with uncooked rice
Another plastic canister with sand
A spoon
A wooden stick with which you beat drums
A plastic lid
A metal lid
A seashell
Two stones of different sizes
Curtain rings of no fixed number
Ribbon
Tiny bells

Activity guide

Before starting the activity, take the curtain rings and tie the tiny bells to it using ribbon.
After settling in the children, ask the children to pick up the bottle containing buttons and shake it, first gently and then vigorously. Now, ask them to do the same with the bottle containing uncooked pasta. Make sure that the caps of the bottles are fastened securely to avoid any choking hazards.
Let the children examine the curtain ring toys you made and give them a shake to distinguish the sound it makes.
Give the child a spoon and bang the pot and bottle with it. The child can then pick up a wooden stick with which you beat drums and enthusiastically bang on the objects.
Watch the children compare the noises that the items make and introduce the class to the concept of loud and soft sounds.
Let the children explore other ways to combine the objects to make different sounds.
For closure, discuss among yourselves which sounds were loud and which were soft.
Recapitulate the concepts of loudness and softness at the end.

Relevance of the activity

For fun, hands-on learning, add any object you like to the noisy basket and see how the kids combine the items to make noise. They will learn to differentiate between a bang, a pop, a tap, and a squeal which will help set the foundation of sounds for them.

You can even take the students to a garden and ask them to sit in solitude and identify the sounds of nature. It is a great way to support communication and promote outstanding learning, indoors or outdoors

Observation Checklist

Cognitive Skill	Yes	No
Can the student filter out background noise?
Can the student break down my sentences and understand their meaning?
Did the student learn to discriminate between different sounds?
Did the student develop the ability to identify sounds?
Was the student attentive throughout the activity?
Is the student able to distinguish sound in words?
Did the student participate in activity closure and/or recapitulation?

Share the knowledge

‘Empty vessels make the most noise’ is so outdated. Hyper-enthusiastic kids with drum sticks could easily beat them.

If you want to surround yourself with people who genuinely enjoy learning new things, look no further than kids in daycare. They are full of curiosity, have hyperactive imagination and never want to slow down.

It can be hard to keep up with the activities they engage in daycares day in and day out, which is why we came up with Illumine. Our daycare app shares detailed reports of each child’s daily schedules and tracks their lessons using a hi-tech lesson planning software.

If you’re a daycare owner who wants to save money and time by going digital, take a free 11-day trial of Illumine and document the children’s progress with a tap of a button.

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