What can be better than snow dough to mold with, you can make snowballs, scoop it and dig around in it! We’ve made snowmen with kitchen supplies and added manipulatives to find and decorate with.
Here in Ecuador (where we live) there is no snow and the kids often see snow in their favorite TV shows and want to experience it too. This snow dough recipe is perfect and I think represents snow perfectly. It has a crunchy feel when pressed together and if you put it in the fridge for about 10 minutes before play it will have a cool feel to it too.
This snow dough recipe is part of our 12 months of awesome sensory doughs, where I make each of the recipes taste safe. My 2-year-old is still tasting everything!
This month we are playing with snow dough.
To make this snow dough I modified my cloud dough recipe (Oh how I LOVE that cloud dough recipe!)
How to make snow dough:
I used 8 cups of cornstarch and 1 cup of olive oil.
To mix I use a large (gallon) plastic zip bag and split the mix in half. Meaning I added 4 cups cornstarch and 1/2 cup oil then mixed well.
To get a good amount of snow dough you are going to need a minimum of 8 cups. All the better to dig in!
I was also feeling brave and added 2 drops of peppermint essential oil, for some reason that smell makes me think of snow. It’s so fresh smelling. Add the essential oil to the vegetable oil before you mix it in with the cornstarch.
Once mixed in the bag I poured it out into the sensory bin. Then gave it one more mix up with my hands just to make sure that it was evenly mixed. It smelled SO nice!
Cleaning tip: IF this snow dough gets on the floor, because it has oils in it, it is easy to sweep up. No stickiness here!
Use a shower curtain under the sensory bin for easier pickup and clean.
I then added some glass color rocks and a penguin or two.
I also supplied the kids with the tongs from this fine motor set for picking up the rocks and moving them around. This kept them busy with a little fine motor exercise for a while.
THEN I showed them that they could actually make snowballs! Oh, the JOY.
This snow dough feels just like snow (minus the cold!) it also makes that crunchy sound when you squeeze it.
I love an engaged sensory bin. Also, take a look at how we used this same bin of snow dough for our exploration of penguins last week in playful preschool.
Pin this snow dough recipe for later!
Min says
May I use any vegetable oil instead of olive oil?
Ashley says
It should work fine as long as you flows like veg oil. If not, do let know and I can share that information 🙂
Nyesha Jetaun says
Hey guys! Use some water!! That does the trick! It will be much easier to form snowballs!
Sarah says
I’m having no success with this forming a dough… should I add more oil?
Nicolette Roux says
yes, if it comes out too dry for you please add a bit more oil
Heather says
So excited to make this for my charges! Would you suggest storing the dough in the sensory bin or ziplock? How long is it good for??
Nicolette Roux says
i like ziplocks. As it has no preservatives I would only use it for a week and keep it in the fridge
Megan says
Tried this with my 3 year old and one year old. I was very excited that this was made with all edible items since my one year old puts everything in his mouth. This did not form any sort of dough. It was just corn starch with a few chunks of oil in it. We could not use it to form balls. They did have fun making a big mess though!
Nicolette Roux says
if there were still chunks of oil you needed to mix it in with your fingers some more. I am glad they had fun regardless!
Monica says
My boys will love this! Pinned!
Angela Gilmore says
I love the idea of taste safe! My sons school does snow in the sensory table and they use baking soda and shampoo. The class he was in used coconut shampoo which smelled amazing!