The History of Weavable Toys

Using Pool Noodles to Adapt Ring Stacks

I have been making a variety of different ring stacks over the years. I also use swimming noodles a lot when creating activities. The PT at work recently brought in some very nice old noodles while cleaning out her basement and I ended up making some rings to stack out of them.

They also work well when stringing them onto thick cord. I happened to have this plastic cane left over from some other activity. I wedged it inside the oatmeal container. The cane is very long and extends all the way to the bottom. Inside the container the cane is wedged inside a section of noodle that is wrapped up in a bag of sand. So this is now heavy enough to not easily topple over. I also added a bit of the red duct tape to make the tip of the candy cane softer.  

Below is a photo of a very simple noodle ring stack, obviously made by wedging the noodle inside a box. The rings can be cut out of various round cardboard containers such as the oatmeal box or  use round plastic cut out of detergent bottles or coffee can lids. 

One wonderful thing about these noodles is that you can push a motor from a pen or toothbrush inside it.Here is a picture of a vibrating ring stack with the blue noodle wedged inside an OJ bottle.  I had this pink spiral shaped object hanging around in the attic for years. It was originally part of a toy helicopter that involved pulling and shooting something into the sky.  There must be a lot of little toys like that around with such a spiral shape to use in a spiral ring stack like the one shown below. I wedged  and taped the pink spiral into a tube I had and then wedged that inside the noodle. Add tape to secure all in place and you can certainly adapt to the height and size that you need. 

Weighted Bottle Activities

I was very impressed to see the how the staff at my new adult day services program integrates movement and proprioceptive input into the day using plastic containers filled with sand.


Unfortunately , you will need to turn your head if on a computer or turn your tablet or phone to see the photo correctly. But as you can hopefully see, they used a lot of plastic coffee containers and some detergent bottles (not show in the photo).

The containers are lined up on the floor against the wall and the individuals pick them up to place onto the cart. Sometimes they walk across the room to do this. I have also put bands around the containers that they need to stretch to remove. These activities not only give sensory feedback, helps with sensory modulation and decreasing problematic behaviors, they also strengthen and increase physical endurance overall.