51 replies to this topic

[Beau]

I've gone through the usual painting activities with the children (printing with a variety of objects and body parts :D , sponge painting, with string, mirrror painting, bubble painting, with marbles, colour washes over crayon, etc.) Frankly I'm getting bored with the same old things and wondered if any of you had any inspired new ideas for me. :)

[dartybunny]

We are going to try using old anti- bacterial bottles filled with various coloured paints to create massive spray paint pics round stencils.

Don't know whether it will work but it's worth a try! :D

[Galleon]

Dear Beau,
I would really recommend the 'Little book of messy play'. that has loads of great ideas such as riding a scooter through paint and then painting with it, ( we had great fun indoors and outdoors doing this and we also mixed our colours as we rode !) also filling gloves with paint, tie up the top and hang it, pierce the fingers with needles and then swing over paper and also using spray bottles with paint in to make different effects. They do a whole series of books which are all good from www.featherstone.com They also do a 'Little book of Science through art'
I really like too the 'Dip and dab' colour mixing method....dip a brush in water dab it on a sponge so it is not too wet, dip it in a yghurt pot of powder paint and then mix in a mixing palette. It is a great way for children to explore colour mixing. My Nursery children will spend ages fascinated by this simple way of colour mixing and getting very quick results.
Best wishes
Galleon

[janice]

that sounds like a fab idea and would love to try it out .............. but reckon I might have to cover everything (including all children/adults/equip) in protective sheets!!!!!!! Mind you .... it would certainly liven up the decor!

No, I'm only joking ...... it's a great idea - thanks!!!

Janice

[janice]

sorry for my confusing comment - it was meant for dartybunny! :D

[hali]

Someone on here told me about putting paint plus other materials on tables - mixing -and making prints from it...

It was messy but excellent and Ofsted loved it. :D

[Galleon]

I love mess...about the scooter and paint idea, when we did it indoors we sectioned off a little corner with tables and put covers and newspapers on the floor and tied plastic bags round our ankles. The pictures of the adults and the children doing it were entertaining too !
Best wishes
Galleon

[bubblejack]

Well I have done some mad messy painting activities over the years and making splats is one of them. We asked parents to bring in empty halves of egg shells. We filled them with paint and asked the children to throw them on to a large sheet of paper on the floor. The collage we made was amazing and the children and adults had so much fun.

[Catherine]

If one of my work colleagues (sp) saw these ideas she would have a blue fit just imagining us doing them.

Don't worry we do loads of messy things.

The children really enjoyed toe painting on Monday. Dipping toes in the paint was great fun I would recommend it !!

[Helen]

Hi,
Some painting activities we have done recently include:
1) Using the polystyrene circles that pizzas come on (OK we live on frozen food ) to make imprints and use for printing. Alternating the colours works well.
2)Making paint with chalk (broken up and crushed with little rolling pins) mix with liquid starch and use it for painting.
3) Rip up tissue paper and put into little bowls of water. Use the coloured liquid to paint with.
4) Back to the pizza trays!- cover with silver foil, draw a simple line drawing with blunt pencil (don't tear the foil) and paint with glitter paint (fairly transparent with glitter already added)over the top. We did fish with lots of wavy lines for the sea, and used blues and greens to paint with. Looked great!
5)Sprinkle icing sugar-water over the paper first before painting with pastel-coloured paint.
6)Make the paint really thick by mixing with flour, and use a lolly stick to spread it onto cardboard (unfold cereal boxes and use the inside). Good for textures.
7) Mix paint with sand.
8) Paint as normal, then sprinkle salt over the picture.

Hope these help! :)

[Anita]

A couple of ideas that we tried recently.
1. We collected used tea bags and dried them. The children dipped them into paint and dropped them onto paper from a height. The floor needs to be well covered as it can be very messy!!
2. Children squirt blue green and white paint onto paper. They then place a piece of cling film over the complete sheet of paper and use their fingers to spread the paint over the entire paper, mixing the colours. When these are dry you can use as the background for an underwater picture. The children had great fun covering cut out fish with glue and adding glitter and sequins.

[Linda McDowell]

I have seen some beautiful pictures in one of our local nurseries using icing sugar wash. They did paintings of a vase of irises. Wash a white piece of paper completely with icing sugar dissolved in water. Then paint over it using brushes either with poster paint or food colouring. The result is wonderful! They look like water colour paintings and are very effective.
Just a tip if you do the paint in spray bottles. We did this one year for bonfire pictures. It is very good but watch the consistency of the paint, the nozzles can get clogged very quickly!
Linda

[LJW]

Last year I had a really crazy idea for painting with balls and coits as part of our sporty theme prior to sports day. NOONE VOLUNTEERED TO HELP ME!!!!! Can't understand it!!! I have photos to show just how fab it was but, with hindsight, it did get a little out of hand and would probably have been better out of doors. I covered the floor with a huge roll of paper from our local scrapstore (ex newsprint I think). The children then rolled balls, coits etc in paint trays and had a very happy and messy time rolling back and forth. OK we had to strip the children and hose them down afterwards (not literally) but it certainly was a whole body experience.
PS it took ages to get the pink and purple stain off the floor. If you can't do these things when you're little when can you?

[Gezabel]

One that we did recently was the "paint on the table" with a variety of materials to add. I can't remember them all but we had shampoo, flour, uncooked rice, and herbs to name but a few. The children were free to add as many (or as few!) as they liked - they mixed either with their hands or a variety of brushes, spoons and other untensils,

When they had tired of experimenting (eventually!!) they spread the paint for one last time, made a pattern or picture (again with fingers or brushes etc) then put a sheet of paper on top and took a print.

It was very very messy ( but hey! who cares!!) and we happened to do it the day Mrs Ofsted arrived and she was very impressed!

THe interaction between the children was fantastic and the language/conversation that resulted was superb.


MM must do it again - sooooooooooon :D

[janice]

wow - these ideas just get better and better !!!!!!!

Geraldine - really like that idea - think that would work with using VERY large trays as well wouldn't it ?????? - they could still take a print of it.

Thanks for that!

Janice

(Need to somehow engineer it that Ofsted see that one !!!)