Nature Colour Hunt

Saturday is family day at the George home. My kids love doing activities with both Dad and Mum involved. They do loads of craft activities with Mum, but when Dad gets involved it’s a real treat.

This week we tried to do something nature related keeping in mind the theme at Kids Joy School – Jungle: Trees, Plants and Water. My kids love going out on a mission. So we decided to do a Nature Colour Hunt. Basically we had to find things in nature that were on our colour palette.

If you are planning to try this out, all you have to do is go down in your compound or go to a park or a place with lots of trees. You’ll be surprised at the number of colours you’ll find in nature!

We started by dividing a piece of white chart paper into 10 segments and colouring each a different colour. (Colouring is great for their fine motor skills and helps to steady their fingers and strengthen their muscles for writing.) We placed the paper on a tray – you could also use a box or even an egg carton. We then went out on our nature hunt!

My 2 ½ year old straightaway went for the mud and I helped her put it on the brown segment. My 4 year old son went around searching for the right shade of green to match the green on the paper!

Being this season, there were plenty of Gulmohar trees around and red petals were in abundance. Yellow and white too were easy to find. Father and son then went on a expedition to find purple and found one little purple flower on the ground. A rule in our family is that we do not pluck flowers or leaves. Whenever we use things in nature for our craft or art activities, it has to be something on the ground- just one of the ways we are trying to teach our kids to preserve nature and appreciate it without damaging it.

We tried catching a black ant but it just wouldn’t stay on the black segment (Surprise, surprise!), so we decided that a black twig would have to do.

The toughest was blue, we walked all around but just weren’t able to find something blue that was natural and that could be put on the paper (the sky was just too tough to get!). We almost gave up and decided that a blue sweet wrapper and a blue piece of thread would have to do, when suddenly father and daughter came triumphantly with a tiny blue flower that was just perfect!

We also had fun looking at different trees and plants – talking about the differences between a tree and a shrub and describing the textures of different flowers. I think things are best learnt on the field and this is a great activity for kids to explore nature and begun to appreciate it in real life rather than just watch videos or see pictures.

 

One of our friends came just in time to take a family picture of our ‘Nature Colour Hunt’ completed activity! All in all it was a fun time.

Things you need:

  1. A box of crayons
  2. A tray or big box
  3. A piece of white chart paper
  4. Pencil (and ruler for those who like to be precise!)
  5. A nice open space with lots of trees and flowers to go for the nature hunt.

Method:

  1. Cut the white chart according to the size of the tray or box.
  2. Divide the chart into 6 – 10 segments and sit together and colour in different colours.
  3. Go on your nature hunt and have fun!

 

Note: You could also try this activity with other things. Instead of colour, you could go on a Shapes Nature Hunt, or an Alphabet Nature Hunt.

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