Last Updated on April 20, 2020 by Sheryl Cooper
We’ve done plenty of rainbow painting activities, but painting with a sponge on the easel was new. Painting rainbows with sponges has been featured on many blogs, such as Teach Preschool and Hands On As We Grow. However, I was looking for something we could do on our easel. It occurred to me that sponge painting rainbows on a vertical surface could be pretty cool! And it’s also a great lesson in color mixing, as you will see in this post.
What you will need:
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Plastic squirt bottles, one for each color
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Sponge
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Tempera paint: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet (purple)
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Upright surface, such as an easel
Setting up this rainbow activity:
Pour tempera paint into plastic squeeze bottles. (I hope you love these bottles as much as we do. We use them for lots of different art activities, even with glue!)
Invite the children to paint a rainbow!
This also worked with our youngest class, our 2 year olds.
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YES! As I read thru this and saw the pictures, I wanted to throw my hands up in the air and cheer “yes! this is how this activity should be done!!!” i love your open-ended style, sheryl.
A “mess” can be cleaned up, but the experiences a child has can never be replaced:) Awesome!!!
That looks like fun even for adults 😀 I might try that some time.
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Sheryl,
Did you put the paint on the sponge for the 2’s or did you let them do it themselves??
Great idea… I want to try 😉
Michelle
At first I did it. Then, when I saw that some wanted to do it themselves, I placed the bottles at the edge of the counter and let them go for it.
(I apologize for not seeing this comment earlier!)
This is a great idea! I have to try it with my 2 and 3 years old’s. You are right though, they will eventually mix the colors together. Oh but the fun they have!
This is my first time visiting your site. I run an in-home child care service. My website is http://www.aunttamishouse.blogspot.com
Happy to have you here, Tami!
Fabulous!! I love how you let them keep going–it’s so tempting sometime to steal the art work when it first looks done–but it still looks so cool when they decide it’s really done!
excellent site, some brilliant ideas to use.
Thank you!
I found your blog on pinterest – love it! Perfect for my “baby” girl (3). Also liking that easel – what brand is it?
Little Tykes. Not as bulky as some of the others we’ve had, and folds flat easily.
This is such a great idea! My three-year-old loves to paint and we’ve used everything from brushes to our fingers to chopped vegetables, but it never occurred to me to use sponges. I love the different textures the kids created and the way they blended the colors. I can’t wait to try this with my daughter!
Oh my gosh. I just discovered your blog tonight, but I’m obsessed. You are such an inspiring teacher!!!!
This quote… “Yes, if my desire was for it to look just like a rainbow, I would’ve pulled the paper off the easel right then. But I didn’t. I knew they wanted to experience more. And they did.”
This is exactly what I needed to hear. It sometimes really irritates me when a child makes something like this… like a rainbow, but then they just CAN NOT STOP THEMSELVES from putting more and more and more paint on. But you said it right. You hit the nail on the head. They just want to EXPERIENCE more.
And I need to accept that this okay. This is GOOD. THIS is the GOAL. 😀
It’s very hard for me to watch a teacher/adult stop a child from adding his own touches on work. I know we tend to have expectations on what it should look like, but we are not them. This is THEIR work, THEIR experience. I now love to sit back and watch as they take it to their level. I love the look in their eyes as they discover. To me, that is much more important than the outcome. This is why I try not to do cookie cutter art work, except perhaps special seasonal projects.
Occasionally for Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, etc. I may want to have a rainbow (or whatever) and I do take the paper right then, but I ALWAYS then let them continue to do more papers however they want. I always explain that this one is for me but you can do anything you want on the next one. Love the paint on the sponge idea!
Yes, I’ve done that, too! If it’s something for a special event, I quickly hand them another piece of paper to “finish”. 🙂
Would also be a great way to teach that red and blue make purple and so on without them even realizing. It would be priceless to watch the light dawn! You’ve certainly hit on a winner!!
excellent idea!
We try the same with his hands. Each fingers get a different colour and woala. He made his own rainbow handprint 🙂 after he tested all kind of movement with his painted hand and he love that he get different colours and shapes.
What kind of paper did you use?
I believe we used a slick paper, such as finger painting paper. Being slick allows the sponge to move easier.