Bring Your Paintings Out in the Rain!

As I was going through photos today, I ran across a number of picture sets of things that I had intended to blog about a LONG time ago. When life gets crazy, the blog is typically the first thing to go. Now that I am reorganizing and rethinking things, I thought I would pull a couple of those "someday" posts together for you. (For those of you who have children in care, you will notice that these photos are almost a year old- but that's okay)

Last summer- we had a couple of great days of warm, summer rain. It wasn't raining really hard- gently, just slightly more than a sprinkle... So we decided that we would create some paintings and bring them outside in the rain.

In order to keep the paper from tearing- and for the process to work best, we opted to use pieces of freezer paper to paint on. We also used a combination of tempera and watercolor paints, being water soluble- the rain could have an impact on the painting.

We spent some time working on our paintings- the children speculated as they painted as to what might happen. The predictions were quite varied, from the paint washing completely off so that we would have to paint the paper all over again to nothing happening at all- we would just get wet paper.

The forecast was to rain all day- so we didn't worry too much about the time or hurrying to get outside. When the children were finally ready to go outside- the rain had nearly stopped. There were only a few very light sprinkles in the air. I gave the children the option to "make more rain" by using a spray bottle, but they decided that they wanted to keep their paintings just the way they were and then- we went to hop in the mud puddles!

The end result- well, we can try for that for another day!

We came to the conclusion that if you really want it to stop raining-

just make a plan to do something really cool in the rain!

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A Few Ideas With Marker Caps (As Promised)

Yesterday, I hope I convinced you not to throw away your markers that "don't work." Today, I will share with you a few ideas for what to do with all of the caps. The possibilities are nearly endless, but here are a few of our recent creations: 1) A Leprechaun/Fairy Ladder/Rope Ladder: 2) #1 if not permanently secured can also double as a rope bridge: 3) #1/#2 can also be made into a train track for your homemade trains :). (No photo available) 4) You can use them as beads for a necklace: 5) You could make them into a wind chime. (No photo available). 6. You can use them as small manipulatives to count, sort, and make patterns with. (No photo available). 7) You could use them as playing pieces in your own homemade board game. (No photo available). 8) You could put them on a wire and glue them in place to make a twirling whirly-gig. 9) You could top them with a lid from a milk jug to make tiny tables or toadstools. 10) You could make them...

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"The Markers Don't Work!"

How may times have you heard, "Ms. (fill your name in here), this marker doesn't work!" I know I hear it all the time. Sometimes it is because our little friends forget to replace the caps, and sometimes the markers have just been "all used up!" What do you do with all those markers that just don't work? Please don't tell me that you throw them out, try this instead: First, sort your markers out. Put the caps in one container ( save those too, I'll show you what you can do with them in tomorrow's post) and the markers in another. I have a box for the markers that "don't work" for the children to place them into every time they run across one. You can also have the children help you test the markers periodically to sort out the ones that need to be removed from the "working set." When it comes time to use "the markers that don't work," we use a small sponge paint roller to roll water onto our card...

Ms. Amy's Blog @Child Central Station

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