For these paintings each of the kids had a cardboard tray that we laid a piece of paper in the bottom of, then blobbed paint onto the paper. A requested a lot more paint than L.

They each chose some marbles to place in their tray. We have a collection of small marbles, and a few larger ones, over which the girls argued. The largest marbles made larger tracks in the paint, but the size of the marbles didn’t really matter for this painting technique. Both L and A placed more than one marble in at a time, and then tilted the tray about to make the marbles roll around. If they tilted the tray too fast the marbles would sometimes fly right out, and we ended up with a few splashes of paint, but that’s what the muck mat is for.

Once the marbles ran through the blobbed paint, they transported the paint all over the paper, making lovely patterns. As A had used so much paint, some of her marbles actually got stuck in the paint, and we had to push them along. It also meant that the paint colours mixed together and covered the paper, allowing the marbles to form tracks in the paint, rather than making tracks with the paint.

These are easy and fun paintings to do, and they look great!