Recommended Age:
3 and ½ years and on
Level of Parent Involvement: High to create the smelling jars, low once the activity has been made
Prerequisites
- Child must be able to open and close a screw top jar
Materials
- 3-6 pairs of jars (The Reject Shop and most $2 shops have packets of small jars perfect for this exercise)
- Box for the jars
- Cotton balls or cotton
- Familiar substances with distinctive smells wrapped in the cotton for example soap, coffee, vinegar, garlic, lavender, basil (herbs), cinnamon etc
- Coloured dot stickers or a permanent marker
Preparation
- Gather 3 familiar substances for example vinegar, soap and lavender
- Put a few drops of vinegar to scent 4 cotton balls, rub soap into 4 cotton balls, rub lavender or use drops of lavender oil for the other 4 cotton balls
- Place 2 cotton balls with each scent in each of the jars, creating 3 pairs of jars with matching scents
- Place a dot sticker on the lids of one set or use a permanent marker to make a mark on the lids of one set
Steps
- Invite the child to the activity, naming the activity “these are smelling jars”, the child may bring the box to the table
- Sit to the right of the child and remove a jar from the box
- Remove the lid and lift the jar up to your nose, use your other hand to fan the scent towards your nostrils a few times
- Place the jar on the table and put the lid on
- Invite the child to smell, once the child has smelt place the jar in a column on the left hand side
- Repeat for the other 2 jars, each time asking the child “do they smell the same or different
- Tell the child that the jars have matching pairs
- Remove the second set from the box (the set with the coloured sticker/permanent marker on the lid) and place in a line to the right of the first set
- Take the first jar from the first set on the left and smell as before, placing the bottle in the middle of the 2 sets
- Take the first bottle from the second set on the right (marked set) and smell as before
- If the scents match, place the matching pair to the top left corner of the table
- Once a pair has been matched, invite the child to smell asking them “do they smell the same?”
- Repeat until the remaining 2 pairs have been matched
- Mix the pairs and invite the child to have a turn matching the scents independently
Variations
- The activity may be made using smells from one category (floral for example)
- When the child can match 3 scents you may make a set of 6 smelling jars
- On another day the names of the substances may be given
Notes:
- Mustard powder may be used to clean the jars to remove any lingering scents in order to put new scents into the jars
- If using glass/opaque jars, ensure the child can’t see any traces of the scent used so they are not visually matching the scents, the purpose of the exercise is for the child to refine their sense of smell
