Spider Light Table With Loose Parts

Inside: Invite your preschoolers to have fun with this spider light table and loose parts. A fun way to work on fine motor skills while sorting and stacking!

Do you love to add spiders to your fall theme?

We sure do!

We’ve had lots of fun exploring spiders in recent years:

• Spider Science
• Spider Props with Music
• Spider Sensory Bin
• Spider Web Art
• Egg Carton Spiders
• Spider Puppets
• Spider Counting Snack

So how about adding spiders to the light table with loose parts?

That’s exactly what we did this year, and our preschoolers loved it!

At the very start of the school year we love to sing favorite finger plays during circle time, including The Itsy Bitsy Spider.

We add our own verses, such as the bitty baby spider and the great big spider.

So when I was putting together our Halloween theme, I found a bunch of small spiders and a rubber spider web.

Aha! I could put together a spider light table!

In all my years of teaching, I had not done this yet.

This was so easy to set up and provided hours of hands-on play for two weeks!

We love using the light table every day during our free-choice centers time.

I’m often asked the brand of our current light table, and sadly I can no longer find it. However, we have used one similar to this and loved it.

While I have varied what we’ve placed on this table, I’ve found that my preschoolers prefer loose parts for more open play.

They love to move the pieces around, sorting and stacking. Open play allows for more imagination, too!

Spider Light Table With Loose Parts

What we used:

• Spiders
• Spider Web
• Translucent Blocks

You can easily alter this using what you already have!

Fine Motor

Moving the blocks and spiders around strengthens important fine motor skills, getting the hands ready for writing, as well as other day to day tasks.

Our preschoolers enjoyed placing one spider on each block (1:1 correspondence).

Sorting

After moving the blocks and spiders on and around the web, the blocks can be sorted by color. Since our spiders differed in color, those were sorted as well!

Related: The Best Block Play Activities

Stacking Blocks

Stacking blocks is always a favorite.

It’s a fun challenge to see how tall the blocks can be stacked before they fall over!

A good lesson on balance while also developing hand-eye coordination.

Social Skills

When more than one friend is at the light table, conversations take place and the concept of sharing is reinforced while sharing space.

Related: Easy Ways to Develop Preschool Communication Skills

A fun, hands-on fall activity!

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