Get the kids outdoors and experimenting with color mixing while enjoy simple water play. Perfect for school age children (But big kids like it too!)

Supplies

• Ziplock baggies
• water
• New Markers
• Scrap paper
• paper towels if indoors

How to do Color Mixing Water Play

This activity comes directly from the kids at my after school program. One day I caught some kids coloring pieces of paper and putting them into ziplock bags.

I say “caught” because they thought were being sneaky … and making a big mess. As I grab the paper towels for them to clean up their mess I thought, “this could be a fun activity if supervised correctly.

Once we were outside we filled the bags with about 1/2 cup of water. Then we colored the scraps of paper so no white was showing. As a group we decided what colors we wanted to mix and put them into the bags. Before we put the colored paper in the bags we made predictions about what color the water would turn. Then we put the paper is in the bag and watched the water slowly changes colors as the ink comes off of the paper.

Color Mixing Predictions

The next day we tried it. We went outside and brought with us a few ziplock bags, a pitcher of water, paper scraps and new markers.

When working with the youngest of the kids in my program ages 5-6 I found it helpful to have a color mixing example. At this age kids understand that when two colors are mixed together they make a different color, but not everyone knew what colors would be produced. I found this color mixing chart on Pinterest that helped kids make color predictions.

My Experience

Kids of all ages love this activity. It involves water and is messy, a hit with everyone. I recommend doing this activity outdoors where spilt water is not a big deal because inevitably water will spill and end up everywhere.

More Simple Water Play Activities

If you like Color Mixing Water Play you make like Tinfoil boats. Tinfoil boats challenges children to build a boat that floats using tinfoil and simple supplies you already have on hand. You may also like Float a Paperclip. Float a paperclip is an activity that asks kids to defy physics and make a paperclip float!