Oobleck Recipe and Playtime Tips - Fantastic Fun & Learning (2024)

The first time I ever played with this ooey, gooey, and cool substance was back in my childhood days, and even as an adult, it still hasn’t lost its sense of wonder and fun! If your children are looking for a fun messy play activity, you can’t go wrong with this easy oobleck recipe! But if you’re like me you also want to make the mess worthwhile. In this post I’ve outlined how I slowly introduce new items to get the most out of our messy play time and even get kids to help in the clean up process.

MORE MESSY PLAY FUN WITH OUR PRINTABLE WORM THEME LESSON PLANS

When it comes to messy play activities, my rule is that the messy play is worth it if your kids play longer than it takes us to clean it up! This oobleck recipe and playtime is no exception to this rule and has been well worth every second of cleanup. Plus, you can even get your kids involved in the cleanup process to make it go faster! If your kids love messy play, then our Worms and Mud theme lesson plans will be tons of fun for them!

This super easy oobleck recipe and helpful tips for extending playtime is worth every bit of mess! It’s cheap to make, quick and easy to put together, and can provide your little ones with hours of sensory play fun!

HOW TO MAKE OOBLECK

Making this oobleck recipe is super easy and uses ingredients that you probably have at home already!

You need just two ingredients, and the recipe is very easy to adapt, so you can have as little or as much of this oobleck as you need for your family.

The “recipe” is loosely two parts cornstarch (available with your next grocery delivery!) to 1 part water.

For example, if you add 1 cup of cornstarch, you’ll want to add 1/2 cup of water slowly.

Expert tip: You’ll want a fair amount of cornstarch. I find that the more cornstarch we have, the longer the children will play.

When creating our oobleck, I let the kids experiment and play as they mix their own oobleck instead of using exact measurements. We view it as a process of finding the consistency each kid likes. Make sure that your kids add water a little bit at a time so that the oobleck doesn’t get too runny too soon. You can give them smaller containers for pouring water or a container with a spout to avoid adding too much water at one time.

USING OOBLECK IN THE CLASSROOM

Making your own oobleck can help teach your children to use observation and prediction and start to develop their science skills. You can also use oobleck to teach your children about the concepts of matter.

Oobleck will alternate between solid and liquid as you continue to roll, stretch, splat, and watch it drip, which makes it the perfect hands-on activity for learning about the scientific method or states of matter.

MORE WAYS TO PLAY WITH OOBLECK

• Wiggly Worm Sensory Play
• Fluffy Oobleck Slime Recipe
• Pigs in the Mud Sensory Play and Song

TIPS FOR EXTENDING PLAYTIME

When you go through all the effort of putting together a fun activity like this for your kids, you want to make sure it can last as long as possible. Here’s the key part for extending playtime! This is how you make sure kids play for hours instead of just a few minutes.

Make sure you slowly layer in the new elements a small amount at a time to extend your playtime! I keep the “next” items tucked away, so kids don’t instantly look for what’s coming next, and then as I see play slowing, I subtly place a new item out.

1) First, let kids add only water and cornstarch in individual bins for each kid. We used squirt bottles here to make sure they only added a little water at a time.

2) Then, we added coloring. We used liquid watercolors (washable), but food coloring also works (not washable, may stain hands temporarily).

3) Next, we added small toy figures for pretend play and such. These can be anything small and washable. We have a surplus of Safari Ltd Toob figures, so we used those.

4) When pretend play started winding down, we experimented with a magnetic set we have.

5) We played with different tools like funnels and slotted spoons.

6) Then, we mixed colors between friends to see what new colors we could make.

7)…and we finished up by sticking our feet in it! This is a fantastic sensory exploration, and it leads nicely into getting kids involved in cleanup time.

Expert tip: Keep a large empty bin of water next to kids so they can put items in it and rinse them as they finish.

A towel nearby is also great for setting things out to dry once they’ve been rinsed. When you’re finished both the materials and your kids will be clean!

Get a full week of playful wormtheme ideas and try a fun twist on oobleck playtime!

If your kids are fascinated by this sensory experience, then try a fun twist on it with our worm theme sensory play and preschool lesson plans. Save time and get right to the playful learning with our printable lesson plan sets. Each set includes over 30 playful learning activities related to the theme, and we’ve provided different versions for home preschool families and classroom teachers so all activities are geared directly toward your needs.

GET YOUR LESSON PLANS

Preschool Worm Theme Lesson Plans

Also available onTeachers Pay Teachers.