I am not sure that there are many children out there who don’t like getting their hands covered in paint! My absolutely love it and so when I am feeling a bit brave I like to whip out a stack of paper and paints and let them go mad.
Hand painting is a great activity for body awareness and to further this even more I like to try to teach them what all the fingers are called. My 2 year old loses interest by the time we get to the second finger (Ruby Ring) but my 4 year old loves it.
Along with Body Awareness, smearing paint all over their hands stimulates their senses and the little ones get to experience the cool paint on their hands, the difference between the wet paint and the rough paper. can see and learn how different colours are made (a favourite of my 4 year old) and that my overlapping yellow and blue they get a green hand. So even though the cleaning up isn’t that much fun and you may end up with a stray handprint or two it really is a worthwhile activity.
So with all that in mind, today they made some handprint vase pictures for my mom for mother’s day, a handprint painting for their dad for his birthday and some general smearing of paint all over the place.
What you need
• Acrylic or poster paints (I have found the ones with the little roller balls in them great as they don’t leave open tubs of paint to spill over)
• Paper
• A damp rag for wiping hands
• Coloured paper (to cut a vase shape for the flower vase)
• Glitter, stickers or anything else you want to embellish your pictures
My little ones are very proud of their paintings.
