Make gorgeous drips and swirling designs by painting with straws. This is a wonderful preschool art activity, but fun for all ages.
Materials: Straw Blown Painting
- Watercolor paper or card stock — we used 8.5 x 11 card stock from the office supply store. A heavier weight paper will do a good job absorbing the paint and water.
- Liquid watercolors. We like to use Sax Concentrated Liquid Watercolors from Amazon. They’re washable and non-toxic.
- Eye droppers or pipettes. If you don’t have a pipette, you can forage your medicine cabinet for a medicine dropper.
- Straws
- Tray to hold the paper. This keeps the paint from blowing all over the table
- Paper towels, sponge, or towels. Optional, but you won’t regret this insurance policy
Blow Painting Steps
- Set up a tray with a heavy sheet of paper
- Place a few bowls filled with a bit of liquid watercolors nearby. Place a pipette in or next to the watercolors.
- Invite your child to draw watercolor paint into the dropper and then squeeze it on the paper.
- With a straw, blow the paint around the paper.
Experiments and Extensions
- Once your child has had enough paint blowing, add a brush and invite him or her to paint
- Test regular narrow straws against fat milkshake straws. Which works better? Our favorite was the fat straw.
- After the paint blowings have dried, add another layer of paint blowings with different colors
- Fold in half and turn your paintings into cards. See 40 Homemade Cards that Kids can Make for ideas.
- Dip the end of a straw into tempera paint and then use it as a stamp. Watch Art Tips and Tricks: 5 Non-traditional Painting Tools to see this in action.
My kids love straw painting too. I think it’s because when they’re drinking with straws I’m always telling them not to blow in their drinks, but when they’re painting they can go for it! We used glittery paint on black paper to create some fireworks> https://nurturestore.co.uk/firework-craft
ooooh, Firework painting with glitter — that’s awesome, Cathy. Thanks for sharing the link.
i love that N used an analogous color palette for these paintings. keeps the results from getting muddy. N’s works of art are so lovely and what a fun process! we’ve only done the blown paint thing once two autumns ago to make trees — which is a timely application in the coming month’s too, so maybe we’ll do it again: https://www.paintcutpaste.com/windblown-tree/ — and i’ll try to add an image to my comment, too! 🙂
Thanks for adding the art vocabulary bit, Jen 🙂 I should have thought of that. I try to keep our palette tight when I can, but sometimes it’s impossible! I love the wind blown tree…perfect for fall and all the leaves that are currently shedding from our trees. Sniff sniff.
We had a lot of fun a few days ago, with watered squid ink and straws. It was first time Micaela blew through the straw for an art project! Next time I want to try with coloured watercolors. (http://andhisnamewasaikendrum.wordpress.com/2011/08/29/haunted-squids/)
Congratulatios for this inspiring blog and thanks for sharing!
This is brilliant! Painting with actual squid ink…oh my! I’m off to share this on Facebook 🙂
We have not done straw painting, because I don’t trust that Jaycee wouldn’t “drink” it! I bet you could do it with water and food coloring, too though. Hmmm. . .
Thanks for stopping by the Sit and Relax weekend hop!
Michelle
Heartfelt Balance Handmade Life
You absolutely could do this with water and food coloring, and that’s where I’d start if I thought my child might suck the paint right up (it happened when my daughter was almost 2 1/2…how old is Jaycee?). Glad to find you on the Sit and Relax hop!
I’m not familiar with liquid watercolor paint. How does it come? Is it a powder that you mix with water or does it come in a bottle? Maybe a dumb question! : /
she made some great art there! we enjoy straw painting too! FUN!
Would love to invite you over to my weekly child centered linky party – The Sunday Showcase to share your idea.
You can link up here – http://momto2poshlildivas.blogspot.com/search/label/Sunday%20Showcase
Bernadette
[…] Blown Straw Painting in Preschool […]
[…] and narrower ones, as well as varying the intensity of blowing. We liked the idea of Tinkerlab to put the art project in a tray, so that the paint wouldn’t blow all over the table. Unfortunately, we haven’t thought […]
[…] Straw painting […]
[…] Painting with Straws […]
[…] Pretend you are the Big Bad Wolf while you create art with this Straw Painting Activity. […]