Melted Crayon Art

        
For the past year or so I’ve seen wonderful melted crayon art work
on the internet.  Crayons melted by using a blow dryer.  Wow how
fun would that be to try?

 
Yesterday I set up a canvas to do as a group to see to see if there would be
interest and how the children would react to the noise of the blow dryers.
        
There was great interest from both children and grown ups. 
There were some children that didn’t like the noise but if we
kept it on low they were okay.  Some even gave it a try to the
surprise of their parents.

Today I set up the art table for each child to create their own
melted art.
      
As I set up an instruction sheet the first child joined me and
started gluing his crayons on to a piece of cardboard.
 
After gluing the colours of his choice to his cardboard he started the
blow dryer.  And blew and blew and blew.
        
It takes quite awhile for the crayons to begin to melt.  I was
impatient so decided to put them in the oven to get them started.
 
Two minutes was a bit too long but we quickly went back to the art table and
used the blow dryer to move the crayon around to make a design.

 
I was excited to see that many families busy at the art table.  A bonus
was the science aspect of the art.  The crayon changing from solid to
liquid when heated, soft when it was still warm and hard again when
cooled off.

  
These children did have the patience to use only the blow dryer to make their
crayons melt.  Well done and beautiful.
       
I would recommend trying this art activity.  If you come up with
ways to modify it to make the crayons melt easier and quicker
please let me know.

Cloud Hunt

Last Friday we had a beautiful sunny day to head out
                 on a cloud hunt.
  
Our Nature Bags were packed with a cloud viewer
  found at E is for Explore, clipboard, blue paper,
          cotton balls and a glue stick.
       
Before heading out we enjoyed Eric Carle’s
         book “Little Cloud”.


We walked across the school yard and set up some mats
    so we could sit back and study the clouds.
 
I listened as the grown ups talked with their children about the
names of the clouds and how you could tell if the weather was
going to be good or if it was going to rain.
      
Then they dug out their cotton balls, paper and glue
 
and started to build their own clouds; rockets, cats, big and fluffy.

 
Then I shared one more book called “A Sky Full of Clouds”.  The children
took a smaller copy home.
 
 
           Clouds come and go, change shape and help us imagine.

Splatter Painting

      
     
 
We used mesh domes that are typically used at picnics to keep
bugs off the food and a flat mesh splatter screen.
      
We started by using tempera paint but it was thick and clogged
the screen fairly quickly.  So we changed to waterpaint pucks with
water and they worked much better.

 
 

Make it Rain Part 2

        
      Nicole’s experiment was so attractive that I
          left the materials out for today. 
 
      There was a whole new group of children today
  and I decided to perform it on the overhead projector.
 
As I sprayed the shaving cream in the bowl of water the children
                watched it on the wall. 
            It looked like a cloud moving.
             Until it was dark.
 
    I started to add food colouring, one at a time.  Nothing happened. 
                     So I had to keep adding more.
      
                       And the children kept watching. 
   How full did the cloud need to be before it would start to rain? 
                          I added more colouring.
     
     Then finally it started to drizzle.
     Then pour.
  Then a flood of colour.

 
                    The children were fascinated. 
    The colours were illuminated on the projector but not on the wall.
            
As the children watched the wall I moved the cloud to the side. 
      It was like the sun beginning to shine through.
      
I was starting to scoop out the cloud so we could
continue looking at the colour on the wall when
our visiting music teacher arrived.  I had totally
forgotten she was coming so we quickly cleaned
up and that was that
                          – for today.