Step-by-step tutorial
Step 1
Gather a few plastic animals or figurines from your toy area and play dough. Have your child help you roll 6 play dough balls and flatten them with your palm.
Step 2
I picked 3 dinosaurs. When he wasn't looking, I pushed them into the play dough to make footprints. I left the pink play dough without footprints so he could use it to experiment with. I set it all up and called him over and said, "Look dinosaurs were here. They left footprints! Can you figure out which dinosaur left which footprint?" There's nothing like a mystery to get a child's attention! He used the dinosaurs to make his own sets of footprints and then matched them up to solve the mystery.
Step 3
Right away he wanted to do it again, but he wanted me to make it harder for him by having 4 insects to choose from and only 3 sets of prints.
Step 4
The insects were more of a challenge and it was so neat to see the prints in the play dough.
Final result!
We did this activity over and over again. He even made a mystery for me to solve and one for his sister too. It was a fun, new way to play with play dough!
