We love to get creative with crafts, but momstown moms know that there are lots of ways to teach your child about colour through science, sensory bins and even outdoor scavenger hunts! Here are 10 great activities to help your toddler and preschooler learn about colours and colour mixing.
1. Introduce your baby and toddler to colour with a rainbow sensory bin! Adding in safe items like coloured feathers, balls, beaded necklaces and coloured pasta or cereal is a great way to start using colour words at a very young age.
2. If you child already knows their basic colours, show them how to create a colour wheel. By learning about mixing and matching, your preschooler can find even more ways to get creative with art!
3. Use science to teach your child about colour mixing and secondary colours. We love this idea that the Barrie Little Scientists did with plastic cups and food colouring! Colour magic at it's best!
4. When you are in the car, waiting in the doctor's office, or even sitting in a restaurant, keep your toddler busy by playing I Spy! "I Spy something RED", "I Spy something GREEN" and see if you and your toddler can play and learn together!
5. Go on a colour matching nature hunt with this amazing idea from Oakville. Using paint chips, the children took their "booklets" outside to match colours to leaves, flowers, water, bugs and so much more!
6. Get crafting with rainbows! What a fun way to learn ROYGBIV! We have ideas for tissue rainbows, R is for Rainbow alphabet crafts, Rainbows with beads and even games to Pin the Cloud of the Rainbow from momstown Guelph!
7. What could be more fun than eating some colours! Create a rainbow fruit tray, rainbow waffles or cereal rainbow as you teach your toddler the colours! Or how about making your own "Colour Buffet" using bowls and plates with a variet of different coloured foods. Ask your child to find the red foods, the brown foods, the yellow foods and make a rainbow on their own plate! We even love how momstown Oakville made their own edible food colouring!
8. Sorting can be fun and help your toddler or preschooler to learn their colours! Try muffin tins, egg cartons, recycled Easter eggs or even Tupperware to sort all kids of colourful household items.
9. Books about colour are a great way to take a moment to sit with your child and go page by page talking about the items on the page, what colour they are and if they can find something that colour in their own room.
10. Even young chldren can work on fine motor skills or just help mom create a colourful bracelet using a Rainbow Loom! Ask your child to sort the colours into piles or help you choose the pattern to help work on colour recognition in a fun way! Your child can then wear their creation and have a reminder of their hard work!
