Coloured Cloud Dough: How to Upcycle A Broken Box Of Chalk

Reuse broken chalk and engage in fun sensory play. Follow our 3-ingredient coloured cloud dough recipe – a simple kids activity to engage in play-based learning.

The end of the season is always bittersweet for me. While I’m excited for cool fall air and multicoloured leaves, I also hate packing away stuff we haven’t quite finished using like the shorts they haven’t entirely grown out of and may not fit next season. Or, the partially used bubbles, open sunscreen, and the broken down chalk just make we wish we could just finish off before moving on.

Though I hardly have a solution for all of the former items, we have a simple kids activity that resolves the issue of the latter. Specifically, we recently made coloured cloud dough using a broken down box of chalk. It’s three ingredients. An awesome way to engage in sensory play and so much fun!

Related reading: Science says this is why sensory play is so important

How to make coloured cloud dough using old chalk

What we use

• a food processor with a grater attachment or a box grater
• coloured chalk of your choice
• 8 cups of flour
• 1 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• an aluminum pan
• a disposable table cloth

What we did to make coloured cloud dough

I let my kids choose to two colours of sidewalk chalk. We put the colours into the food processor separately so they could have the fun of dumping their respective colours in when we were mixing the dough. I’ve grated chalk by hand before and it is tedious, but it does work. The food pressor does it in seconds. Then, we headed outside on to our shaded front porch with the aluminum pan, the table cloth, and our ingredients. With the plastic sheet down, I set down the pan, and we dumped everything in. You can add more oil or flour to change up the consistency. Mix well with your hands. Then grab the toys of your choice and play!

This mixture will keep for months to come. The sheet does a wonderful job of catching anything that’s come out of the pan and is a great way to wrap up the pan with for storing.

Do you have any great upcycled crafts? Please share them below!