It's a cold day today and one that might warrant an indoor physical activity.
This activity uses paper bowls or plates to hide markers underneath but you
can use anything that keeps children from seeing the color of the marker.
ACTIVITY:
1. This activity has children working on the colors of the rainbow while moving from room to room and doing an exercise before they pass through every doorway.
2. Run off the rainbow template below or draw your own. Tell children about the the acronym ROY G BIV - Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, and Violet. That is the order of the colors of the rainbow. For purposes of this activity, however, we will combine indigo and violet to just use one purple marker.
3. For children who read, leave the template as is. If children do not read, outline the inside of each line of the rainbow with the color that children will need to find. They will fill in the entire color once they find the correct marker.
4. Place the red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple markers under paper plates/bowls in different rooms of the house.
5. Tell children that each time they pass through a doorway to find a marker and color in the rainbow arch, they must do the designated exercise (jumping jacks, toes touches, arm circles, lunges, squats, windmills, etc.) You choose the exercise and the number of times they must do it depending upon time and interest. You can even make each doorway a different exercise if you post a drawing for a reminder or can verbalize the change in exercise.
6. There are two ways to do this activity: (a.) have children move to any room and fill in the rainbow in the correct space with the marker they find (b.) have children fill in the rainbow in the correct order, having to find red first and ending with purple. This way has children moving more because the marker they find may not be the one they need and they will need to travel to a new room.
7. Run off several templates and try doing the activity both ways. Be sure to switch the markers around so children have to search for the one needed.
8. This is a great time to talk about rainbows with your children. Have they ever seen a rainbow? When? What causes a rainbow? Research the difference between reflection and refraction and discuss it.
9. If you have something in your home that will act as a prism, hold it up to the light and see if it will cast a rainbow on the wall. Another fun way to see the colors of the rainbow is to darken the room and shine a flashlight on the back of a CD. It makes beautiful colors in the order of the rainbow. Children love this.
See blog posts below for more activities.
