Colour Mixing Activity for Kids

Have you got a little one who loves using playdough, paint, pencils or crayons? In this colour mixing activity for kids, they get the chance to visually see which two colours make another colour when mixed together. They can experiment with shades and tone, and the best part is that they can learn a ton, but without realising that they're doing anything educational!

I have a child who, for some reason, is incredibly curious about what happens when you mix colours. Whether it’s playdough, paint, pencils or crayons, she wants to know every possible colour that can be made by combining other colours.

After a recent trip to Costco, we were left with a very large empty carton of eggs. I hate throwing out packaging when it could be used for something else, so I had a think about how I could use it for an art and craft activity.

And so, the colour mixing activity for kids was born! I find that if we do colour mixing with paint on paper, my daughter often mixes every colour together, and it eventually turns into a giant browny-green mess. The carton gave her the chance to have each colour in a separate section next to each other, and she could clearly see which two colours could be mixed together and where they needed to be mixed. The length of the carton meant there were 6 spaces in each row, so we could use both halves of the carton (3 in each row) to have the separate colours and then a space to mix them together. We used these Crayola Washable Kids Paint, which are a staple in our house for art & craft time!

My daughter enjoyed seeing how the shades changed when she added more of one of the original colours, and she would then adjust it to see how it changed again when she added more of the other colour. It actually kept her entertained for quite a while, and if you're a parent of a four year old, you'll know that it can be a hard feat to keep them entertained for longer than 5 minutes!

This was a super simple activity, but she absolutely loved it! There’s definitely a lot of times where we have unstructured art time, and my daughter will paint whatever comes to mind. But she seemed to really enjoy the structure that came with this activity, and to my (happy) surprise, there were no browny-green paint messes at the end! 

There’s many educational benefits of colour mixing. It promotes creativity, critical thinking (such as cause and effect), fine motor skills, inquiry and investigation, and problem solving skills. When we’re out and about and see an object of a certain colour (like a green car), we ask what two colours make green. She is getting better at remembering the colours, and is keen to try the colour mixing activity again. I’ve also shown my daughter colour mixing videos (which are incredibly satisfying to watch!), and she wants to try and re-create those colours herself with our paint activity. 

This is a great activity to try at home if you’ve got a 3-5 year old who is loves paint, colouring or craft. 

Have you tried this activity (or something similar) with your little one? Let me know if the comments below!