Pi Day Pie Playdough

Happy Pi Day everyone!! Let’s have a little fun and a little pie this March 14th with this silly and educational Pi Day Pie Playdough. It smells yummy and it can help you teach the kids about geometry. This post contains affiliate links.

 

Pi Day Playdough

You need a few things to make this play perfect for Pi Day. First, the heavenly spicy and sweetly scented play dough whose recipe is below. Then you need some pie tins. I used both a toy pie pan and some disposable tins {affiliate}.

You can order your Pi cookie cutter {affiliate}, but if you have access to a 3D printer, it’s even cooler to make your own.  Luckily my friend Ben who works for Make, the organization behind the Maker Faire and one of the best sources of cool projects, has a 3D printer and made one for me. Here are a tutorial and printing files to make your own Pi cookie cutter.

Circle Math

When I set this playdough station up for my five year old, I tried to explain Π to her. For the younger kids like her, definitely talk about a circle’s radius, diameter and circumference. I introduced Pi as a number, too. And showed her one million digits of Pi. Older kids that can actually multiply will get a little bit more out of the math part of this, so start drilling home 2πr :)

Pi Day Pie Playdough Recipe

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 3/4 cup salt
• 1 T. cream of tartar
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1 T. vegetable oil
• 2 tsp. glycerin (optional, but adds a shine and soft feel)

For Pie Crust Dough add:

• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp of Playdough to Plato’s secret pie crust ingredient.

For Apple Playdough add:

• 1 T red liquid watercolor or food coloring

2 tsp. cinnamon

For Pumpkin Playdough add:

• 2 tsp. yellow liquid watercolor or food coloring
• 1 tsp. red liquid watercolor or food coloring
• 1 T. pumpkin pie spice

1. Combine dry ingredients in a large pot and stir until well mixed.
2. Stir in water and oil until combined.  Add orange food coloring until a rich orange color is achieved.
3. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until dough is thick.
4. Remove play dough from the pot and place on a plate or cookie sheet to cool.  Cover with a paper towel or dish cloth so it won’t dry out.
5. Once dough is cool enough to handle, knead dough until smooth.
6. Once dough reaches room temperature, store in an air tight container or zipper bag.

Check out how others are celebrating PI Day:

• 2D and 3D shapes with Magnatiles from Go Science Girls
• Find the Center of a Circle from Planet Smarty Pants
• Pi Inspired Spring Tree Coloring Page from Mama Smiles
• Pi Around the House from Little Bins for Little Hands

Love making STEM fun? Check out another way to combine play dough and math with Feed the Shark Playdough Geometry.

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