Painting with Magnets

This was a project that Logan did a few weeks ago at the library with Mrs. D., and I am so in love with the cleverness of it! If you have followed my blog for any amount of time, you probably know that I love kids' painting projects, and we have done many, many, many of them, but this was completely new to me. I love that it mixes art and science, too!

Materials:

• round metal cake pan/pie plate
• white paper (card stock works well)
• pencil
• scissors
• magnet
• paper clips
• paint (tempera works well)

Directions:

1. If planning to make more than one of these, you will want to first make a round template for tracing. Place some paper inside your cake pan/pie tin and draw around the inside. Cut out this circle and use it for tracing all your other paper circles. Cut them out.
2. Place a paper circle inside of your cake pan or pie tin.
3. Add some paper clips (Mrs. D. had everyone use two large, plain, metal clips).
4. Next, pour in a little bit of paint. Mrs. D. let each child select two colors. Logan chose yellow and blue.
5. Give your child a magnet (preferably one that is not small enough to be swallowed! Ours were wand-style and were perfect for this.) and show him how to move it around on the bottom of the cake pan or pie tin. (You might need to help hold the pan, too.) This will move the paper clips around. Tell him to move the clips into the paint and then spread them all over the paper, using the magnet. (Help as needed, and make sure that magnets are nowhere near his mouth.) Talk about the process. What do you notice happens? Logan saw that the two colors mixed together to make green.
6. Once the painting is complete, allow it to dry before displaying.

Simple Magnet Board Idea

I don't know where I came across this idea originally. I just know that I have known about it for many years, since my undergraduate days when I was studying elementary education. (This is what my bachelor's degree is, in case you ever wondered.)

Coming across a huge stash of magnet letters in the basement reminded me of this idea and I pulled out the cookie sheets and let the kids entertain themselves with the magnets. It's a nice tactile way of writing, which is much quicker to pull together than my sandpaper letter rubbings, for example. Plus, if you happen to have several sets of letters, they can practice matching up letters from various fonts. Mia, of course, was able to spell her name and to practice other writing, making this is a perfect literacy activity for elementary kids. For Logan, who is just getting interested in letters and the sounds that they make, this was more of a fun way to play around with the letters and do some "writing" of his own. So, it's also a great introductory activity for preschool age kids who are in the emergent stage of literacy.

{She got a bit creative: "W" = "M" and "1" = "I"}

Teaching terms aside, this is a truly simple and smart activity for any mom to do with her kids at home using materials I am nearly positive you already have at hand. The cookie sheets work as a magnetic tray, keeping everything contained for a nice busy bag type activity, and they will work with other magnets as well. For example, my friend Julie showed me a set of circus themed animals and people that she had cut out, laminated, and affixed magnets to so that they could be used to tell a story. This is a pretty cool idea, but for now I will stick with our super simple ABC magnet boards. They're perfect for a rainy day.