Kindergarten Kool-Aid Art

Happy New Year! As my first post for the year I'll start with one of my resolutions. I resolve to schedule time every other week to update the blog and website. Now that the craziness of the holidays has passed, I think it will be easier to find the time to share our classroom activities with you! If I stick to this resolution, then maybe I'll be able to make it a weekly thing....but baby steps, people, baby steps.

SO. This post I've wanted to share for almost a month now! Our amazing PTA put on a Holiday Carnival at our school. One of the features of this carnival is a silent auction that includes gift baskets and donated items, along with art created by the students. Last year we made 2 different paintings, and this year we completed a class "Kool-aid Art" project, and also a photo collage of the kids hands in the shape of hearts. The heart hands project was inspired by this photo, and the Kool-aid art was something I saw here, and then adapted for a classroom project. As a side note, "Fun at Home with Kids" is a really cute website with great ideas for things to do at home with your kiddos. It's really geared towards a younger toddler audience, so if you have younger siblings at home it might be one to bookmark.

Now back to our classroom. Our Kool-aid Art was easy peasy to make, smelled absolutely DELICIOUS, and turned out great! If you'd like to do this at home, here's the skinny on "how-to"

Materials:

Kool-aid-My advice is to buy all the colors you can find, because you will be surprised at the types that produce a rich, vibrant color, or those that are more diluted. They run around 5/$1, so splurge...buy 10 packs....nothing is too good for kid art! ;) ha

A heavy weight paper that will support water without ripping or soaking through

Paintbrushes

Small Cups

Water

The Procedure:

1. Begin by giving the paper a "wash" of water. This is a technique used in water colors where you paint the water, generously, on the page and then float the color into it after. You want to make sure there is a bit of water pooled on the top of the page. Just gently add water to the paper, and don't overwork it.

2. Putting the paintbrushes and water aside, and making sure your fingers are completely dry, allow the child to pinch small amounts of the kool-aid and drop them into the water on the page. The only assistance I gave at this point was to make sure they sprinkled it into the water and didn't create a hill of kool-aid in one space. Generally, the kids were so excited to see the colors swirl, and work together that they wanted to do this naturally.

3. VERY CAREFULLY move the page to a drying location.

4. Wait.....

5. When dry, you have a few choices. If you're doing this with just your child, you might decide to frame the art as it is. Since we were creating a classroom piece from all of their art, we only painted in the middle of the paper and the kids knew a small square would be cut from their artwork. If you're creating work like ours, you'll need to have a few different paintings to cut the squares from. Then, cut equal size squares and arrange however you'd like them to be framed for the space.

6. Sit back, and enjoy the beautiful art!

I think this project turned out simply beautiful! It really was very easy, and the kids LOVED it. If you try this at home, let me know how it goes! Happy crafting, from my kids, to yours!