Color Mixing - Tempera Paint, Light Table, Transparencies

9/20/2023

In the past few days, we (the children as well as adults) began to notice that the tempera paints were looking a little low and this was the perfect opportunity for the children to mix paints to use at our easel.

In Brown Room, we did a good bit of paint mixing with different techniques - tray mixing (small amounts of paint to create new colors - think artists' palette) and with small containers, but the children had not mixed in the jars that we keep at the easel. We know that they have some preexisting knowledge of color theory, mixing, etc. and so we chose to provide primary colors, white, black, and the color wheel which can be a helpful tool.

We also looked at some of the colors and color names that parents created at our New Parent Reception in the spring-- these will be used in our Outdoor Classroom soon.

"I did math!" - Eliza, 3.10 years

The color wheel is a tool for understanding what Eliza helped determine was "paint math". You can see, on a basic level, what color you will get if "you start with one color, add a new color, and it makes a new one."

"Red plus white makes 'Dark Pink'. I want to call it 'Dark Pink'."
- Eliza, 3.10 years

"Blueberry blue."
- Christopher, 3.7 years

Creating a three-step color with Win

"I want to make green. That green." - Win, 4.3 years [pointing to a dark green on the color wheel]

The green that Win wanted to create required a few extra steps as it required her to mix two primary colors (red and blue) to create a secondary color (purple) before adding more yellow (another primary color). You can see these steps on the color wheel to the right. She was patient with the process, and discovered that her desired shade of green required much more yellow than she originally anticipated.

[R to L]: Eliza's "Dark Pink"; Win's "Darker green"; Pierce's "Butter"; Eliza's "Light orange"; Pierce's "Spiderman Blue" and "Race car blue"; Christopher's "Blueberry blue" and "Crab yellow"

Expanding our concept of Color Mixing

"What's happening in the studio?" - multiple children
What do you see? What do you think could be happening there today?
"I see a light table." - Eliza, 3.10 years
"Maybe we can mix colors in light." - Henri, 4.1 years
**we anticipate much more work around Henri's suggestion that we were "mixing colors in light".

In fact, today's work in the studio was set up to offer a broader context for color mixing. There was a light table with trays of colorful, transparent materials in the primary colors as well as some secondary colors (pink, orange, green, purple, etc.). On a second table, there were materials for "tray mixing" with tempera paint.

We started at the light tables which had three transparent sheets on it - one red, one yellow, and one blue. The children began by layering materials on top of the same colors (e.g. red transparent materials on top of the red sheet) - they were matching. Then, they began to mix them. As they mixed, they started sharing observations about the changing colors. Interestingly, none of them expressed any ideas about how the layers of matching colors changed the original transparent sheet.

The whole group busy layering, building a tower ("That's a good idea, Win." - Gracie), and discussing the colors they made.

Pierce's Green

Pierce paid very close attention to the effect that his layers were having on the color. He observed the green floppy disk and then layered red and blue on top of the yellow transparency. Upon closer examination, he noticed that it had made a shade of green. Pierce was thoughtful and intentional about the placement of his materials and then moved to the trays to experiment with the tempera paint.