Fruits and Vegetables Theme Water Play Activity

Inside: Work on fine motor skills with this fruits and vegetables theme water play activity. Toddlers love using small scrub brushes, sponges, and washcloths with warm soapy water!

A fruits and vegetables theme water play activity is perfect for toddlers (and preschoolers!).

Water in the sensory table is always a favorite, especially when it’s warm with some bubbles.

This hands-on activity is perfect while learning about healthy foods, and we had fun connecting it with our dramatic play farmers market.

All that scrubbing is a fun way to work on fine motor skills, too!

Adding water to our classroom sensory table is a favorite.

Some previous water play activities we’ve enjoyed:

• Farm Animal Washing
• Color Sorting Fish Ocean Bin
• Rainy Weather Sensory Bin
• Ten Rubber Ducks Water Play

No matter what time of year, our students are always drawn to anything with water.

So it’s not a surprise that this activity was a huge hit!

Make sure to check out:  15 Favorite Water Play Activities

Fruits and Vegetables Theme Water Play Activity

What you will need:

• Sensory bin (or a large tub)
• Plastic fruits and vegetables
• Warm water
• Liquid soap
• Small brushes, sponges and/or washcloths
• Droppers (optional)

Setting Up This Water Play Activity

It’s really quite easy.

Fill your bin (or bins, as in our case) with warm water and add liquid soap.

Then, include some scrub brushes, sponges, and washcloths. You can also add droppers for extra fine motor strengthening, as we did.

That’s it!

Fine Motor Fun

One of the benefits of water play is hand strengthening.

Think of the back and forth motions of using the scrub brushes and the squeezing of the sponges and washcloths.

These types of activities get the hands and fingers stronger for holding writing utensils.

By the way, those little brushes are actually cosmetic brushes that I found at the dollar store. We’ve used them with many different activities, including our toddler color mixing activity.

I love how they fit in small hands!

Connecting This Activity With a Farmers Market

Scrubbing fruits and vegetables with soapy water is a perfect connection with a dramatic play farmers market!

Before introducing the children to the water activity, we had fun pretending we were buying produce (and other items) in our dramatic play area.

The children weighed the food with scales and used cash registers for purchases.

We had a variety of printable signs, coupons, receipts, and picture cards from our farmers market printable set:

While we did this during the month of November, while learning about healthy foods, it would also be fun during the spring with a gardening theme.

What do you like to put in your water table?