Playdough Activities for Toddlers:
Simple Ideas To Boost Skills And Keep Little Hands Busy

Looking for simple playdough activities for toddlers and preschoolers? This classic childhood favorite can help your little one develop motor skills, engage their senses and strengthen their hands, all while exploring and having fun!

Key Takeaways For Busy Parents:

  • Play Builds Skills: Playing with playdough helps with fine motor development, sensory processing and coordination skills.
  • Simply Superb: Your child does not need fancy resources - their hands are the best tools!
  • Use Household Items: Let your child explore cause and effect with everyday objects like forks, cookie cutters and textured items. 
  • Safety First: Always supervise playtime to prevent choking, use non-toxic playdough, and be aware of potential allergens like wheat, especially in homemade recipes. 

Start with a lovely big batch of homemade playdough (my simple homemade cooked playdough recipe lasts for ages), and then try some of the simple ideas below.

playdough fun for toddlers and preschoolers

Sensory Benefits of Playdough

Using the hands to poke, pound, squash and stretch playdough can give lots of tactile (touch) feedback to the hands, as well as proprioceptive feedback (when the muscles are working hard).

Engaging in playdough activities for toddlers and preschoolers can be a calming and focused time for them.

playdough is a great sensory experience!A great sensory experience!
  • Encourage your toddler or preschool child to explore the tactile experience of playdough by hiding small objects like coins in a big ball of playdough and having them find the items and pull them out.

(With younger children, it's always a good idea to supervise closely to avoid any choking hazards.)

preschool sensory activities with playdough - hide objects in playdough and find themHiding objects in playdough
  • The sensory experience of playdough can be enhanced by adding a drop of an appropriate essential oil such as lavender to add an aroma (first make sure that your child is not sensitive to any of the oils you use).
  • If your child dislikes the stickiness of shop-bought playdough, then try a well-cooked, non-sticky homemade playdough.
    Cooking the dough for a minute or two longer than the recipe suggests, can reduce potential stickiness even more.
make your own homemade playdough for hours of fun!Make your own homemade playdough!
  • Doing the Get The Playdough Ready" exercise below gives good proprioceptive input to the hands and arms.

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“Get The Playdough Ready!” Exercise

This simple playdough exercise can be done every time you bring out the playdough!

It is a great way to help your toddler and preschooler get some gross motor movements and hand strengthening into their playdough time.

  • Show your child how to pound the playdough flat and then squash it up again. Repeat a couple of times to "get the playdough ready".
  • The pounding movement helps develop coordinated movement and squashing it up helps to strengthen little hands.
Pounding playdough is a great preschool playdough exercise to work on motor skillsPounding playdough
preschool child squashing playdough into a blob ballSquashing playdough

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Make Impressions In Playdough

Have your child experiment with pressing different objects into the playdough – what impression does a fork leave, what impression does a piece of textured fabric make?

toddler pressing objects into playdoughPressing a small round container into playdough
toddler making impressions in playdough with forkPressing the prongs of a fork into playdough

Seeing how objects leave impressions can help build a sense of spatial awareness and develops form constancy skills as little ones explore cause and effect. Encourage them to make impressions with different parts of the same object, eg the side of the fork as well the prongs.

This beautiful wooden playdough set from Kookaroo#Ad has gorgeous stampers and other wooden objects for making patterns, impressions and tracks. Perfect playdough activities for toddlers and preschoolers, and ideal for those parents wanting their kids to play with natural materials!

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Press Out Shapes

Kids love pressing out neat shapes with cutters – this helps develop visual motor skills and spatial awareness as they work out where to place the cutter.

Choose cutters that match your theme of the week – eg shapes, animals, colors etc. This can help with language skills as you talk about what you are cutting out.

Tip:

  • Use plastic or wooden cutters to press out shapes, as metal ones may be too sharp.
  • Toddlers may struggle to get the dough out of the cutter, so you may need to help with that.
using cookie cutters with playdough - playdough activities for toddlers and preschoolersUsing cookie cutters



Roll Balls, Snakes and Sausages

Older toddlers and preschoolers should be able to start rolling round balls of playdough and to roll out long sausages and snakes.

Rolling balls, sausages and snakes involves using both hands together in a coordinated way, so this is great for developing bilateral coordination skills.

  • You can use the rolled balls to make snowmen, caterpillars and other simple creations.

  • Or simply help your child roll all the playdough into a big ball to pack it away at the end of the activity time!
preschool child rolling a ball of playdough with the handsRolling a ball of playdough
  • Show your child how to roll snakes and sausages of various lengths and thicknesses.

  • You can use the balls, snakes and sausages to decorate a pretend cake or pizza, or create a critter.
preschool child learning to roll out a playdough snake with both handsLearning to roll playdough

If your child struggles with rolling balls or rolling snakes, put your hands over the top of their hands and guide the movements.

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Tips for Playdough Activities for Toddlers

  • Little ones often have short attention spans - which is perfectly normal! One trick I use to expand the length of time they engage with playdough is to first let them play with only the playdough, and then gradually introduce one or two playdough toys or tools when they start to lose interest.
  • As you can see in my photos, my own kids were given a huge playdough playset, which they loved, but they were also equally happy with just a ball of playdough and their imagination.
    It's also a lot less cleaning when they have only one or two objects to play with!
toddler fine motor playdough activityExploring playdough possibilities
  • Keep mess to a minimum by providing a designated area for the playdough play - be it a kitchen counter, kiddie table, a tray or even just a laminated plastic mat at the table.


Cleaning and Storage of Playdough

  • To clean most playdough toys, you can either loosen dry playdough with a skewer, or soak it in warm soapy water and use a scrubbing brush to get it out.
  • Store playdough in an airtight container between uses, or in a sturdy ziploc bag.
  • Playdough lasts longer if it does not get wet - so don't mix water and playdough, and don't let your kiddo lick the dough!


Playdough Safety Considerations

  • If your child has allergies, please choose your playdough carefully – most homemade playdough is made with wheat flour, for example.
  • It's a good idea to cover any cuts or scrapes before playing with playdough, just to keep things clean.
  • Homemade playdough is often made with salt, so it may sting if your child has a open cut on the hands.
  • Always ensure that the playdough used is non-toxic and that children are supervised during play.
  • Small pieces of playdough and the small toys used can be a choking hazard for younger children, so they need to be carefully supervised.
  • Ensure your kids wash their hands before and after using playdough!



Never underestimate the power of playdough! That simple ball of playdough not only provides hours of screen-free fun, but also gives your child a rich sensory experience that strengthens hands, reinforces spatial skills and promotes imaginative play. 

Rope an older sibling in to help entertain your little one with these ideas. And if they need to work on fine motor skills, themselves, have them try these playdough fine motor activities.

fun playdough ideas for toddlers and preschoolers

Did you enjoy these playdough activities for toddlers and preschoolers? Looking for more activities to help develop your child's fine motor skills with everyday resources?

My Fine Motor Activities E-Book contains lots of helpful information as well as dozens of photographed activities with instructions to help support your child's fine motor skills from preschool onwards.

Yes, I Want More Fine Motor Activities!
For the price of a couple of coffees, get dozens of fine motor activities in an accessible, printable format - use them over and over again!Dozens of photographed fine motor activities!

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