Summer is a memory, School Is In Session
Welcome to Kid's Korner
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| Special Thanks to my fabulous teaching partner Amanda for loaning me her daughter Cynthia |
It’s that time
of year. Long carefree hot summer nights have been traded in for evenings
filled with soccer, dance lessons and homework. Lazy days of enjoying doing
absolutely nothing are replaced with early to bed and early to rise. But just
because summer is gone, does not mean you have to give up those precious moments
with your children laughing, giggling and just having fun. Creativity is alive
and well and although we are now leaving Summer Camp behind, it’s time to
transition into to Kid’s Korner.
Like Summer
Camp, Kid’s Korner will be filled with free or almost free activities with
items readily available in your own home and are perfect to do with the entire
family. Because time is at a premium for most families, Kid’s Korner Activities
will be shorter in nature as well as combining ideas that can easily be
incorporated into school and holiday themes without giving up any of the fun.
Many of our Kid’s Korner activities will come straight from my Kindergarten classroom
including this quick and easy to do fun fall project. Total time for today’s
entire activity-under 20 minutes, excluding drying time. Everyone has 20
minutes to spare and think of the memories you will be creating with your
child. Let’s get started!
Today in my class, as part of our units on colors and
plants, we created Fall Leaves using “bleeding” tissue paper. Not sure what
bleeding tissue paper is? It’s simply tissue paper whose colors bleed through
when combined with a liquid such as water. The effect is an expensive and
sophisticated look and no one will ever suspect was so inexpensive and simple
to create.
For
this project you will need:
Tissue
Paper-we used fall colors such as yellow,
orange, red and green –torn into small pieces
Newspaper
to cover the table (we used plastic place mats)
Tag
Board, Poster Board or Card Stock cut into the
shape of leaves (construction paper can also be used)
Vinegar
and Water-mix equal parts of the vinegar and water
together ahead of time. To have enough for my entire class I used 2 cups of
water to 2 cups vinegar. No vinegar-no problem! This project will work with
water only. The purpose of the vinegar it to help set the color.
Paint
Brushes or Spray Bottles
To begin, cut out various leaf shapes from
your tag board, poster board or construction paper. If you’re children are older, they will have
a great time cutting or even tearing their own shapes. For my class, the leaves
were precut. Put your leaf shapes on newspaper to help soak up the excess
liquid for when you paint the leaf in the next step.
Next, have your children paint the water
and vinegar solution onto their leaves.
We have also done it by using spray bottles filled with the water and
vinegar solution to spray the leaves.
Once the leaves are damp, have the children
place the pieces of tissue paper on top of the leaves. Before your eyes, and to
the amazement of your kids, the colors will start to bleed from the tissue
paper as if the leaves were being magically painted. You can overlap the
tissue paper for a more mixed up color look. It really is an amazing affect
and one that children will love-especially when you tell them ahead of time
that if the say the secret words, their leaves will magically turn colors.
When the leaves are completely covered,
coat the leaves with another layer of the vinegar and water solution.
Set aside to completely dry-this could
take a few hours to overnight, depending on the weather and where you live
When the leaves are dry, peel off the
tissue paper. What remains are fall leaves that are beautiful in color and instantly
ready to be proudly displayed.
Don’t just stop with Fall leaves! After my
students had gone through the process once with my supervision, I left the
materials out and they created butterflies, pumpkins, apples-the list is
endless!
This simple yet fun project is perfect for
a Saturday afternoon at home with the family or at your next scout meeting when
you discover it was your week to lead the art that day! We want to see what you’ve
created. Be sure to send us pictures so
we can feature you in upcoming article. We want to see where your imagination
took you today!
Are you a crafty person? Are you the go to
person when it comes to easy to do projects with children? Did you find a
fabulous idea that you’re dying to try out? Send it to me at snshine123@aol.com and you may see
yourself and your children featured on an upcoming edition of Kid’s Korner!
Looking for the links on previous Summer Camps so you can relive the fun one last time? It’s not too late to have some Summer Camp fun!
Gayle is a Disney Gal that loves churros for breakfast, still gets giddy with delight at the first sight of the “Disneyland next exit sign”, loves the overwhelming emotions and memories that come with each and every return to the Happiest Place on Earth and dreams of one day being the Captain of the Jungle Boat. To learn more about Gayle, click here
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