Painting the clouds



Focusing on his work.

Our Maple Room two-and-three-year-olds have been enjoying the outdoors this spring!  One day this week, I found them out at the picnic tables deeply engaged in an activity with mirrors and shaving cream. 

Shaving cream is an engrossing sensory experience for children who are old enough to keep it out of their mouths (usually about 2 or 2 1/2 and up).  On this sunny, but partly cloudy day, teachers Alex and Hannah took child-safe mirrors outside on the picnic tables.  


A close-up.  Shaving cream is great for touching, too.

The children were able to see the reflections of the clouds in the mirrors on the tables, and they used the shaving cream to "paint" what they saw.

 Children were able to observe the clouds above in a very different way, and use shaving cream to create their own representations of clouds.

Observing the world around them is a natural thing that young children do, and teachers help by extending that experience by talking to them about what they see, adding new vocabulary words and giving children the opportunity to express themselves artistically.

When children learn that a drawing or painting
can "represent" something else, they are making 

Cloud painting can be a social activity.

strides toward that same understanding that will help them to learn to read later. (Letters make up words that abstractly represent something else.)

They can also learn new vocabulary, like "wispy" and "fluffy" or even "cumulus," "stratus," and "cirrus." 

How can you help at home? What can you observe outside with your child?  Take a table outside with crayons and paper, or hand over a clipboard and pencil and let your child draw what she sees (no coloring sheets necessary!)