Nursery World - Enabling Environments: All about ... Sensory rooms

It doesn't require a large budget, just plenty of imagination and some careful forethought about how it's going to be used, to kit out your setting with a sensory room, as Annette Rawstrone explains.

'In order to grow and learn, the human brain needs to be stimulated by sensory experiences that take place within a rich and varied environment ... a child needs to see, touch, hear, taste and smell, to play, explore, and experiment, and above all, to feel loved.' Vea Vecchi, 'Children, spaces, relations' (1998) Reggio Children

More and more mainstream nurseries are discovering the learning potential of sensory rooms. The exciting environment offers endless opportunities for cross-curricular learning and is ideal for helping develop children's cognitive questioning and thinking skills. Stimulating sensory rooms not only allow children to experiment and experience many different situations and sensations; they are also great places to escape the hectic pace of the playroom, and unwind.

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