I love to use an engaging picture book as an excuse to spearhead a creative project! After we read a fun picture book about kittens mixing colors, my preschooler and I were eager to give our own color mixing project a try. Because the book I chose spent the whole book mixing colors from their own paint cans, it seemed appropriate to mix our colors in similar ways. The Color Kittens by Margaret Wise Brown is also a delightful read-aloud for a preschooler to enjoy.
Many books could fit a color mixing activity. Colors and how they are mixed is a common theme in picture books, and I may revisit this or a similar activity while reading one of those. For today, I decided to begin with The Color Kittens by Margaret Wise Brown, a simple Little Golden Book about two cats, Brush and Hush, who love to paint with colors.
There is a hint of fairy tale in their story (as it is the explanation of how the world has so many colors) and the text has a pleasant but irregular rhyme and a steady rhythmic feel to it that makes it a delight to read aloud. Brush and Hush’s adventures in making “all the colors in the world” are childlike and loveable. Color mixing and making our own paintings is a natural progression from reading The Color Kittens together.
In The Color Kittens, the kittens search for green paint, which is their favorite color. They mix the red, yellow, and blue paints together in various combinations and keep getting the wrong color. Finally, they mix yellow and blue, of course!
Strawberry and I used our watercolors to do our own color mixing activity. She helped me find just the red, yellow, and blue paints on the tray. Then, I put three circles on the page, one in each of those colors. Finally, we used the brush to mix the colors together and see what they created!
I love how bright the colors are in the watercolor set! I decided to use watercolor for this activity mostly because it is so much less messy than acrylic and even tempera paint. Watercolors are my go to, and this
Of course, since the color kittens got to paint everything they saw, then it was time for my daughter to do the same. Unlike in the book, she painted on paper, not on "everything in the world." I love finding little familiar things in her abstract and colorful painting. She found shapes in her painting, and, as it dried, the wet and less wet spots dried in different colors. She loved oooh and ahh-ing over it, and she loved making it.
We’ve done color mixing activities in the past. She remembered mixing the colored water as a time filler activity a few months ago. This week, as she painted, she loved seeing her cup of rinse water change colors as well. What color would the water become the next time she rinsed her brush?
Mixing colors is a simple lesson to learn. It’s one she’s learned before, and we’ll do these activities again. Putting the painting activity in the context of The Color Kittens gave her a purpose and a fantastic story to go along with her creation. It made our lesson all the more memorable.
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