Christmas colours on the light-table

Last week we asked the children what colour they thought Christmas was... the first colour mentioned was white - thirteen times in fact in one short statement about the colour of Christmas... white most definitely needed to be included...

Pink was anthter colour the children thought was Christmas - although they were unable to explain why - it just was... red, green, black and blue all were suggested too.

It was not quite what I was expecting - as I knew that mixing all these colours together would create a colour that none of the children had mentioned... and yes, maybe I could have challenged their thought process by allowing that to happen and the resulting colour of Christmas would be a very dark brown... but, but I just couldn't pull myself round to do that THIS time... so it was the PAPER that was blue, black or green - and the paint was white and then red was added to create the pink - a bit of Christmas magic.

I had wrapped the light-table in a big plastic sheet that had come with the latest delivery of art supplies (I love it when you can recycle) and squirted it with white paint.
The children got to squish it around one by one, using their fingers to create patterns. Once they were saitisfied with their pattern a piece of paper was placed on top and a little gentle press and a magic spell from the child (they all made up their own) the paper was lifted up and a print of their light-table creation was saved on paper!

Once each child had created their own white masterpiece - there was the chance for those who wanted another go to work in pairs ... this time red was added to the white (the children were well aware of the colours they had chosen as we had read their words back to them just before the session)...
The children who did this bit could not believe their eyes as their hands turned pink - it was red on the light table but pink on their hands and paper!!!

Not all the children liked doing this - one child put her finger in a few times and moved it a bit with her nose wrinkled and a look on her face as to say "what on earth...?"

there were many different techniques... some kind of skated, some scratched, some smoothes their hands over, others bounced their hands up and down.... etc

some worked with one hand while other worked with two...

most created random patterns and needed encouragement to create something specific which nearly always got wiped out to continue the experience and just feels the paint glide under and the light shine through...