Exploring colors

The learner will develop the ability to use science process skills through exploration with primary colors.

A lesson plan for grade K Visual Arts Education

By Kristin Gray

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Related pages

• Color mixing: Students are introduced to the basic steps in mixing secondary colors from primary colors of paint.
• Colorful fruit bowl: Students learn color theory by exploring color mixing. Students will use overlapping to show simple perspective in their picture.
• Mixing colors with Little Blue and Little Yellow: This is an integrated lesson based on a French book entitled Little Blue and Little Yellow by Leo Lionni. Within the lesson, students will experiment with various colors to create new colors and eventually write their own version of this story.

Related topics

• Learn more about arts, colors, hands-on, primary colors, and secondary colors.

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Learning outcomes

Students will use science process skills, emphasizing observation and prediction.

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

45 minutes

Materials/resources

• White Rabbit’s Color Book
• 3 clear plastic cups
• red, yellow, and blue food coloring
• water
• freezer paper 12×18 in. for each student. Draw two vertical lines to divide the paper into 3 sections and label Section 1, Section 2, and Section 3.
• straw for each student (can cut full size straw in half)
• 3 eyedroppers
• two pieces of chart paper; one labeled “What We Think Will Happen” and one labeled “What Happened”

Activities

1. Prior to the lesson, fill each plastic cup with water. Use the food coloring to make the water in one cup red, one yellow, and one blue.
2. Read White Rabbit’s Color Book discussing the changes that happen to the rabbit throughout the book.
3. Give each child a piece of the freezer paper and a straw.
4. In the leftmost section on the freezer paper (Section 1), put one drop of yellow. Instruct the children to practice moving the drop around by dragging (not blowing) within that section only.
5. Add a red drop to Section 1, but do not place it on the yellow. Ask the students to predict what will happen if they mix the two colors together. Record answers on chart paper entitled What We Think Will Happen. Have the children drag the two colors together. Ask them to observe what happened. Record what happened on the What Happened paper.
6. Put one red drop and one blue drop in the middle section (Section 2). Ask the students to guess what will happen when the two colors are mixed. Record on chart paper. Have the students mix the colors. Record what happened.
7. Put one blue drop and one yellow drop in the last section of the freezer paper. Ask the students to guess what will happen. Record suggestions on the chart paper. Have the students mix the colors. Record what happened.
8. Put one red drop in section three of the freezer paper. Ask what they think will happen when the red is mixed with the green. Record suggestions on the chart paper. Have the students mix the colors. Record what happened on the chart paper.

Assessment

Assessment for this activity is mainly oral.

If you would like to use written assessment, you could have the students record their own results in a personal log.

You could also devise a worksheet with “color sentences” (eg. yellow+blue=green) that the children can color.