I've used this activity soooo many times over the past few years with my own kids and with kids I've taught. Little ones just love to see the colors mix as you add one color of water to another.
It's always amusing to hear what they think the colored water tastes like... It's usually been a good mix of "This tastes just like watermelon (etc.)!" "It smells like the pool!" and "It just tastes regular."
The beauty of this activity is that it takes less than 5 minutes to set up, and kids love to play with the water - mixing it, moving it (explained below), tasting it... it's endless fun!
On to the process:
Make the colored water
1) Set out 6 clear cups or mason jars with lids.
2) Pour clear water into 3 of the cups/jars.
3) Add a few drops of food coloring to each of the cups/jars (one cup blue, one cup yellow, one cup red). Let a child mix the color into the water with a spoon (or by shaking the jar after closing the lid).
4) In the 3 empty cups/jars, create the secondary colors by mixing primary colors together (yellow + blue = green; blue + red = purple; yellow + red = orange). [Tip: When creating purple and orange, mix the red in second and go slow - it's easy to over-saturate these ones!)
Now that you've got your colored water, it's time to play with it!
- Explore what other colors you can make by mixing
- Taste the different colors
- Put small plastic toys in the water to see if they look different or the same
- Use our free printable to do the Color Moving activity outlined below
Color Moving Activity (aka Water Drop Activity)
1) Print the page
2) Place it under wax paper (use blue painter's tape to hold the wax paper down)
3) Place several drops of each color of water on top of the wax paper
4) Let your child use a toothpick to drag each drop of colored water onto the matching smiley face
I hope you get plenty of play time out of this activity! If you try it, snap a quick pic and tag us on social media @mmhmm_mama so we can see the fun!!
(The printable page is available in color and black and white. If you choose black and white, you'll need to color the page yourself for this activity).