An open teal The Play Way box with the Body Clues Play Kit contents arranged above it: the yellow Slimy Surgeons science kit, the Interoception Learning Snapshot booklet, the green Body Clues workbook, the mierEdu All About Body and Emotions magnetic body board with its organ pieces and cards, a box of modelling dough, sticker sheets, Body Clues cards and the program booklet.

An adult and a boy stand at a kitchen bench mixing blue powder into a glass jug with a wooden stick, with orange dough pieces in a moulding tray and the open Slimy Surgeons box beside them.

A child reads the Ways to Play booklet next to the yellow Slimy Surgeons box, with the open box tray showing sealed sachets of blue and yellow powder.

A boy stirs orange slime in a glass jug at a bench, with a sachet of powder and the open Slimy Surgeons box in front.

A boy and an adult lean over a low table with the mierEdu magnetic body board open between them, both holding organ fact cards, and the Human Body Manual booklet alongside.

A boy kneels on a rug and presses magnetic organ pieces onto the mierEdu body board, with sheets of body part magnets spread out in front.

A white drink bottle on a kitchen bench covered in My Body Needs stickers reading I need water, stay hydrated and time to drink some water.

Body Clues Play Kit

Name: Body Clues Play Kit
Brand: The Play Way
SKU: EMOTIONS-02
Price: 97.0 AUD
Availability: InStock

The Play Way

$97.00

$97.00 ~~$0.00~~

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Support your child to catch what their body is doing and read the signals it is sending them. We want children to understand what’s going on in their body - a racing heart, a tight chest, a growling stomach - so that they can catch those signals before they turn into the underlying cause of big feelings or big behaviours.

This play kit was curated by our therapy team for the child who isn’t yet making the connection between their body sending a signal that something needs attention, and that big overwhelming feeling that turns up when they ignore it. Children who learn to read their own body clues often get a chance to say something before it gets too big to handle.

We have two emotions play kits and this is the one to start with if your child can tell you how they were feeling after-the-fact, but can’t seem to ‘catch it’ before it gets too big.

The Body Clues Play Kit, previously named the Emotions Part 2: Discovering our Body's Clues Program, is a children's interoception and body awareness kit made in Australia by our therapy team, for children learning to notice what is happening inside their body, connect those physical sensations to feelings and needs, and say something about it earlier.

It includes eight tools: a sixty card Body Clues activity set, the Body Clues: Learning About My Body workbook, the Slimy Surgeons science kit with three organ making experiments, six colours of soft modelling dough, the mierEdu All About Body and Emotions magnetic body board with fact cards and a Human Body Manual, more than five hundred My Body Needs stickers, an Interoception Learning Snapshot booklet for the adult, and a parent guide. The workbook covers six body parts: the heart, the lungs, the brain, the stomach, the bladder and the muscles. Ways to play booklets come with the body board and the science kit.

Every kit also comes with supporting video in The Play Way Hub, included: twenty five sessions covering the contents of the box, a page by page walk through of the workbook, and a set for the adult on interoception and the interoceptive sense, on how body signals link to emotional regulation, self-regulation and the nervous system, and on how to model noticing a signal out loud at home. Most families using this kit have a child somewhere between 5 and 12, the stretch where descriptive words for a sensation arrive first and the more precise ones follow. That is a guide rather than a rule. Children build these skills at their own pace, so choose by what is getting in the way rather than by a birthday.

Which of the two emotions play kits to choose: Naming Feelings is for the child who has no words for what is happening to them. Body Clues is for the child who can name it afterwards and never sees it coming.

From The Play Way, built by an OT who has worked with children for nearly 20 years. Ships Australia wide. Contains small parts, and the Slimy Surgeons science kit is marked for ages 8 and up. Adult supervision is needed.

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Size guide

Body Clues Play Kit

$97.00

$97.00 ~~$0.00~~

WHAT'S INSIDE

What's in this play kit

A full kit of play-tools, curated to work together.

Body Clues cards

Sixty cards, each has a small thing to do and then a question about what happened. Dance for a minute, then feel your heart. Lift your shoulders up to your ears and hold, then say what your shoulders are telling you. We love that the cards ask before they tell, because it helps your child to recognise the clues for themselves.

Body Clues workbook

Your child works through it as a detective, one body part at a time: the heart, the lungs, the brain, the stomach, the bladder and the muscles. Each section asks them to draw where it sits, build it out of dough, then go looking for the clues that part of their own body gives them.

Slimy Surgeons kit

Three experiments that turn powder and water into a set of organs, so your child ends up holding a stomach and a brain, instead of just looking at a picture of one. For a hands-on sensory experience, allowing children to understand more about what’s actually inside them.

Modelling dough

Six colours of soft dough for the modelling that happens in the workbook: a heart, a pair of lungs, a stomach, and a length of intestine long enough to hold up against their own belly. Building the shape with their hands helps them understand where the part sits and what it is doing in there.

All About Body and Emotions set

A mierEdu magnetic board with a face and a body to build up layer by layer, a set of organ pieces, fact cards and a Human Body Manual. Perfect for a child who wants to know all the little things like, how many chambers a heart has, and they can go and explore for themselves.

My Body Needs stickers

More than five hundred stickers for their drink bottle, the lunch box, the workbook and the calendar. I need water. Time for bed. Snack time. We love these because the prompt is there to remind them to check in with their body clues regularly.

Learning Snapshot booklet

The understanding for you (the adult), on interoception, which is the sense that tells a child what is going on inside their own body. It covers why the signal comes through clearly for some children and faintly for others, and it shows you how to put one of your own into words as it happens: my mouth is dry, so I am going to get a drink of water.

Parent Guide

A short guide for you (the adult), covering how to work through the six body parts, what each game in the box is doing, and what to say when your child tells you they cannot feel a thing.

Why we built it this way

Six body parts, one at a time

The heart, the lungs, the brain, the stomach, the bladder and the muscles. Your child finds where each one sits, builds it out of dough, then makes it work and reports back. We do the anatomy first and the noticing second. This makes a signal easier for them to catch when they’re familiar with the body part.

What it feels like for them

A tight chest represents worried for one child and excited for another. A growling stomach could be hunger, or nerves. The cards ask your child what it feels like for them, so they really connect in with their own clues, and they can recognise when it turns up again.

A need gets louder the longer it waits

Hunger that nobody answers turns into h-anger. This kit works at the stage before it gets to that, helping your child to tune into their body, and catch the clue before it gets away from them.

INCLUDED WITH YOUR PLAY KIT

The videos that come with it

Everything in the kit is ready to use from the day it arrives, so your child can pick a body clue card and have a go at the first one as soon as they open the box. When you want the learning behind it, there is an hour and a half of teaching from our therapists across twenty five videos. Some walk you through how to use the tools. One walks through the workbook page by page, so your child can follow along with it independently. And, then the videos for you go into how the six body parts link to what your child needs and what they are feeling. They also cover how to keep the noticing going with them in their normal everyday. We'll send your invitation to access it all when your kit ships.

WHO THIS PLAY KIT IS FOR

If this sounds like what’s going on at your place

They go from zero to 100, and there is never anything in between.
Afterwards they can tell me exactly what set it off, but they never catch it before it’s too late.
They do not eat, drink or go to the toilet until it is suddenly an emergency.

If any of that sounds like your child, this is who we built the play kit for.

Who made this

Kait is an OT. She has been working with children and families for nearly 20 years, and she has four kids of her own. Having a word for a feeling is one thing. Noticing it early enough to say something is another, and that one starts in the body, with a heart, a stomach and a set of muscles most children have never been asked to pay any attention to. Our therapy team made the Body Clues cards and the workbook, then curated the science kit and the magnetic body board to sit beside them, so your child gets the anatomy through their hands and the noticing through the questions on the cards. It all works together through play.

5,000+
Australian children have used our play kits
20 years
of Kait working with children and families

Body Clues Play Kit