Wednesday 21 November 2012

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

Thursday 15 November 2012

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




Wednesday 14 November 2012

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