My Go-To Playdough Recipe

If you're in a junior classroom you know the fantastic benefits of having Playdough on hand. It's not only great for fine-motor tasks but it can also easily be used for a number of learning activities and the kids absolutely love it! 

I've been through my fair share of playdough recipes but this has to be my go-to. 

It's fast, easy, you most likely have the ingredients in your pantry, it's non-toxic and can last for ages!

You will need: 

• 1 cup of flour
• 1 cup of water
• 1/2 cup of salt
• 1 tbs oil
• 2 tbs cream of tartar 
• Food colouring 

Use a small saucepan over a low heat and add all ingredients except the food colouring. Stir until you find the dough has taken shape and come away from the sides of the saucepan. Remove from heat and allow to cool. 

Once the dough has cooled, turn out onto your bench and knead until smooth. 

Now comes the fun part! 

Add 5-6 drops of your chosen food colouring to the dough and knead until the dye has mixed in. Continue to add dye to your dough until you get your ideal colour. 

Here are my three finished doughs. To get the orange I added 3 drops of yellow dye and 2 drops of red. 

I keep mine in old plastic containers or jars. I find that they last ages in airtight containers. You will get over 6 months use of your playdough if you store it correctly. I have some that have been going for a year! 

Here is one of my favourite activities with my little preps. Using the alphabet stampers I get my students to write our CVC or sight words. It gets them practising their reading and writing plus with the added fine-motor aspect. 

Win Win! 



I also LOVE using Playdough to practice their sight words. It's a great way to get them engaged in reading and writing different high-frequency words. 
The pictures above and below are of an activity I have created with the top 100 most used sight words. My students love it. 


Click the link below to grab your copy of the activity. 

Sight Word Playdough Mats & Print and Go sheets!

Let me know if you've had success with this playdough recipe. Add any tips or tricks you have below!

All About Germs!

Teaching your students about germs is an absolute must with the little ones. Opening their eyes up to how easily germs are transferred can help in stopping those germs traveling around your classroom. There's really nothing like talking to one of your students when suddenly you feel the cool spray of a sneeze across your face. Not to mention, no teacher has any time to take days out of the classroom because of sickness. Teaching my students about hygiene and the spread of germs can also help in keeping them at school too. Having days off don't only affect us as teachers but it affects them too! Depending on the child, they can feel panicked when they have missed lessons and are having to play catch up.  

So, what does a fun and hands-on initial germ lesson look like? Well, here is one I did with a year 1 class a few years ago.

First, we brainstormed what we already knew about germs, I like to Think, Pair, Share for discussion time.  If you're unsure what that means, I give my students individual thinking time, they then turn to the person next to them and make a pair to discuss what they think and finally we share back to the class. I always find that this thinking strategy gives those students who may struggle an opportunity to get ideas from others and it sets them up for success. 

After brainstorming what we know, I like to give them a visual lesson about how easily germs can be transferred. I take my students outside with two different colours of glitter. In these photos, I used silver and gold. 

Here is my hand and my teaching partners hand. I like to do an example for the students so they can observe first. The students predict what they think will happen when we touch hands.

When it was the students turn, I let them dip one finger into the glitter. This saves us from a glitter bomb exploding everywhere and it still does the trick! Make sure you divide the students in half, give one half silver glitter and the other half gold. This is how they are going to see the germ transfer.

Get your students to go and find someone with the opposite coloured glitter. It's time to germ transfer!

After they have had a good play around with swapping germs. We went back into the classroom to discuss what happened and what we observed. Here was one beautiful child's response. 

There you have it! My initial hands-on lesson about germs. It's a fantastic way to jump into learning and the kids love it! Let me know in the comments if you gave it a go!