Messy Mondays: Stomp Painting

On Friday we were finally able to try this art idea I saw on Pinterest!

I wanted to do this the week before, but it rained. An art activity this messy works best with a smaller group of toddlers, as opposed to the entire class at once. Since Friday was gorgeous outside, one of our teachers took five of our toddlers to the playground. The other two of us helped the other five toddlers do stomp painting, and then the groups switched places.

But first, I set the scene while they were in music class. Another teacher and I had moved our snack tables to one side, creating a border between the carpeted area of the room and the tile. I spread a shower curtain on the ground and then a long piece of paper for door decorating. Although once it was laid out it didn't look as long as I had thought it was.

Then I squirted different colors of paint onto different plates. Given the ages of our toddlers (this group is 18-27 months), most of them don't have a strong preference about paint colors. A few have started requesting their favorites - purple, green, etc. - but most are just excited to see paint! We did blue, green, and black today.

When we were ready to begin, we took off all the toddlers' clothes. Everything except their diapers. Toddler painting is a messy undertaking, ya know.

So don't forget these. You'll need a lot!

We helped each child step onto a plate of paint. They only put one foot into paint; walking in paint can be slippery and that way they at least had the other foot to help them keep their traction.

And they were off!

Toddler Stomp Painting

Supplies Needed

l-o-n-g piece of paper

paint

paper plates (for paint)

wipes!

 My fellow teacher and I stayed close to help everyone stay on the paper - which mostly happened. But our "explorers" made such cute little prints on the floor! You can barely see the toes on this one.

 It looks like they liked it.

This was one of those art projects I didn't even try to keep. It's about the process, anyway, right?

This was a fun one to try, but I don't think we'll do it again anytime soon. Our group enjoyed it, but they lost interest faster than I thought they would. Couple that with how much teacher involvement it called for, and we will probably wait a few months to try it again.

But I'm glad we tried it. You never know what activities will become favorites, and it's always fun to try something new!

Messy Mondays: Train Painting

 

A few weeks ago my toddler class learned about trains! These kids love almost anything transportation, so a unit organized around things that go seemed to be a good fit.

When I first learned about process art vs product art (new post about this on Thursday!), something that caught my interest very quickly was the easy set-up. Process art is more of the child's work than the teacher's. This means teacher preparation for process art is typically simple: just give the kids the art materials and let them at it.  They'll do the rest all on their own.

For this activity, I modified a painting-with-cars activity from Pinterest. It couldn't be more simple!

Supplies
Art smocks or old t-shirts
Paper
Paint
Toy trains

Process

Squirt some paint on the child's paper (or pour some paint into a bowl) and place it in front of the child. Give the child a toy train.

And that's it!

Toddlers love rolling cars and trucks and trains, and adding paint to the equation makes it even more fun. One of our little boys figured out that of he tilted his tray, he could make his train slowly roll across his paper. I love watching how their little minds see things differently - and you can see those differences in their finished products, too.