Ep. 33: Molding Minds: The Creative Power of Playdough in Early Education with Sarah Scrivens

Today's guest is Sarah Scrivens. Sarah has over 15 years of diverse experience in the education field. She has served as an early childhood consultant, preschool director, and classroom teacher. For the past several years, Sarah has provided educators across the nation with professional development and instructional coaching through Building Brains. Sarah is passionate about spreading the importance of early childhood education.  She's also mommy to 2 littles – ages 1 and 3 - so she is in the trenches with young children on the daily! In this episode, we discuss the many benefits and uses of play-dough in early childhood education! Playdough is a versatile tool that can be used for various age groups and across different subjects. Sarah shares with us the importance of oral language development and how playdough can be used to encourage conversation and build brain connections. We also provide ideas on playdough for fine motor skill development, social-emotional skills, math, literacy, and science. Today Sarah provides tips and ideas for incorporating playdough into different activities and themes, as well as the importance of environmental print and labeling in the classroom. Together, we find just how important it is for educators and parents to engage with children through the creativity of playdough. Sarah mentions several resources that we have linked below for you, and we've created a fun one-page PDF with the playdough recipe and lots of ideas for add-ins or tools to use in your classroom! How many ways can you think of to use playdough to reinforce a story you're reading to your class this week? I hope you're inspired to try something new!   Connect with Sarah via her website or social media!    As always, we would love to connect with you on Instagram HERE, and on Facebook HERE.   Episode Resources:  Playdough Recipes and tools download Plastic Cutting Mats 30 Million Words: Building a Child's Brain CLI Infant-Toddler Classroom Environment Checklist Texas PreK Guidelines