Colour My World #3 - What is colour?

This week we explored one of Enxin's inquiries: How come there is colour? What is colour?

To help the children understand that we see colours through light, we did an experiment. First we sat in the dark and the children immediately noticed that they couldn't see anything. Then I asked the children to grab a piece of fabric from the dark and shone the flashlight on it. They each exclaimed the colour in his/her hands. 

They came to the conclusion that we cannot see anything in the dark (not even colours) and when there is light, we can see. 

I explained to the children that all light rays contain colour. When light shines on an object, only some colours bounce off it. Our eyes detect the colours in the light coming from objects and we see them as that particular colour. 

Sitting in the dark

It's a red scarf!

light beams passing through a triangular prism

It's green!

Making the light spectrum

Colour My World #2 - Primary and Secondary Colours

Testing the colours

The results 

The Water Group started off their inquiry on colour with the concept change in mind. The children became scientists and tried to figure out how primary colours can make secondary colours. They eagerly tested the colours and recorded their findings. I love the way that the children worked together and voiced their thoughts and questions as they did their experiment. I could hear them say: "Let's see what will happen if I mix red and blue", "How about mixing all the colours (red, blue and yellow) together." and "Hey, I can't make the primary colours."

"I made purple!"

What a group of thinkers!

Painting with primary colours

Painting with secondary colours

Colour My World #1 - Children's thought on colour

Exploring with colour tiles

Decorating a house with colour cellophane

Below is information on our new unit - Colour My World

Transdisciplinary Theme:  How the World Works

Central Idea:  Colour is all around us and make a difference in our lives

The three concepts that we are focusing on are perspective, function and change.

To let the children experience and start thinking about our central idea and lines of inquiry, activities about colours were set up. Below are comments/questions the children came up with during the activities:

Enxin: What is colour?
Pippa: Colours can change.
Aiden: I like blue.
Natalya: All the colours are in the rainbow.
Peter: I like it because it looks beautiful.
Andrew: Red and yellow makes orange.

Colour mixing