Magic Colouring for Earth Day

I have a great activity for Earth Day today. Magic Colouring is lots of fun and you can tailor it according to any topic or current interest. Today we are doing this as an experiment for Earth Day and it's a fun one to talk about cause and effect. Kids are always really blown away by it and the good thing is -it's using items you will no doubt already have at hand. So lets get stuck in.....

Earth Day takes place annually on the 22nd of March. It's fast approaching but I have lots of simple play ideas and arts and craft that will bring fun and excitement to your homes and settings. Arts and crafts are such a great way to connect and they are a fabulous base for igniting great discussion. You can use these activities I am busy sharing to discuss what you could do for Earth Day to help the planet.

2 x Kitchen Towels

Recycled Cardboard (to protect your surface)

Washable Marker Pens

Permanent Marker Pens

A Large Tray or Container

Water

Pop down your piece of recycled cardboard. It is really important you protect your surfaces as the permanent marker pen will go through to your surfaces and it is really difficult to remove these marks. 

I always save my cardboard from my Amazon orders and this comes in so handy for this. 

Get two pieces of kitchen towel and place them on top of one another. Make sure you place them on top so all the corners match up. This will make it easier when you need to bring them back together later on. 

Trace around a circular object with your permanent marker and draw the pieces of land. 

Take off the top sheet and you will see the bottom sheet has the outline of your earth. This is the one we will be colouring in with washable markers. 

We use washable markers at this stage as they bleed and blend when it makes contact with water. The permanent markers that we used in the first stage will stay in place. These markers do not bleed and blend when they come into contact with water. 

Once fully coloured in you can pop your top sheet back on. Do double check that the Earth shapes match up well. 

This is when we need our trays of water. I find it works so much better using a light coloured tray. Darker trays can really dull the colours so the effect isn't as good. 

You haven't got to use anything fancy. 

I always use our large Pirex dishes. Works so well! If you have others to do just squeeze the towel out in the water. Empty and refill. Takes a few seconds and then you're ready to go again!

Gently place your sheets into the water and you will see the earth on the top which has no colour colour in 'magically before your eyes. Lots of fun! 

You may find it really useful to do 2/3 of them so you can repeat the experiment a few times over. Children love watching on as these shapes fill with colour. 

So much fun - give it a go!