Thermic Tablets

The Thermic Tablets are a fascinating material from the Sensorial area of the classroom that are designed to help a child refine their haptic or thermal sense. In other words, distinguishing differences in temperature!

The tablets are made of different natural materials. The ones pictured here are glass, slate, cork, steel, wood, and felt. These materials look and feel different, but the sense the child will be isolating here is temperature. Which ones are warmer, cooler, the warmest, the coolest? Also, which ones match?

One set of tablets is used as the control, with the second set mixed up at random somewhere else on the working space, usually below the control tablets. The child will start with one tablet, typically on the far left, pressing his or her left wrist to it to feel the temperature. Next, with her right wrist, she will test the other tablets one by one to find the matching temperature.

They’ll set aside the matching pair, and move on to the next in the line of control tablets.

Presentations of the Thermic Tablets differ, some guides preferring to use the pointer and middle finger to feel temperature, but our example here uses the wrist. Some presentations include doing the activity with closed eyes or a blindfold, which is a fun challenge for the child! Another extension is doing the activity from a distance, separating the control and the matching pair so the child can walk between the two.

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