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    Home » Early Years Science » Colour mixing with food colouring and water

    Colour mixing with food colouring and water

    March 29, 2017 By Emma Vanstone 4 Comments

    Colour mixing is a great activity for learning about primary and secondary colours as well as fantastic fine motor control practice if children use a dropper or pipette. Once children have made secondary colours they could then experiment by mixing primary and secondary colours to make tertiary colours or try to make as many different shades of one colour as they can.

    colour mixing activity. Image shows three beakers of water. One blue, one red and one yellow.

    Materials

    Plastic plates

    Water

    Beakers

    Food colouring

    Pipettes or droppers

    Instructions

    Add a small amount of red, yellow and blue food colouring to separate beakers and then top up with a little water.

    Use the pipettes or droppers to drop different colours of water onto a plastic plate and record which new colours are created.

    colour mixing

    Colour Mixing

    What is a primary colour?

    Primary colours cannot be created by mixing other colours together. These are:

    Red, Yellow and Blue

    What is a secondary colour?

    Secondary colours are made by mixing primary colours.

    Yellow + Blue = Green

    Red + Yellow = Orange

    Blue + Red = Purple

    What is a tertiary colour?

    Tertiary colours are made by mixing a primary colour with a secondary colour.

    Questions to ask about primary colours

    What do you think would happen if you used a paper plate instead of a plastic plate?

    Do you think the colours would still mix if you used filter paper or kitchen roll?

    Which colours do you think are warm and which cold colours?

    Watch the video

    More colour mixing activity ideas

    Steve Spangler has a brilliant spinning wheel!

    Rainy Day Mum has a great mess free colour mix activity.

    How about colour mixing with lights like Teach Beside Me?

    Try our easy primary and secondary colour wheel or how about our colour mixing water wall?

    This dropper painting activity is lovely from Imagination Tree and the kitchen towel would be great for allowing colours to mix.

    Red Ted Art has some lovely colour mixing tissue hearts.

    Did you know light can be split into  all the colours of the rainbow? Find out how to make a rainbow here.

    using a hosepipe on a sunny day to make a rainbow

    Science Concepts

    Primary colours

    Secondary colours

    Contains affiliate links

    child dropping coloured water onto a plastic plate to see how the colours mix

    Last Updated on September 12, 2022 by Emma Vanstone

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    Safety Notice

    Science Sparks ( Wild Sparks Enterprises Ltd ) are not liable for the actions of activity of any person who uses the information in this resource or in any of the suggested further resources. Science Sparks assume no liability with regard to injuries or damage to property that may occur as a result of using the information and carrying out the practical activities contained in this resource or in any of the suggested further resources.

    These activities are designed to be carried out by children working with a parent, guardian or other appropriate adult. The adult involved is fully responsible for ensuring that the activities are carried out safely.

    Reader Interactions

    Comments

    1. Cerys

      March 29, 2017 at 10:19 am

      I love simple experiments like this. Thank you so much for including our mess free colour mixing experiment as well.

      Reply
    2. Karyn

      March 29, 2017 at 11:10 am

      Such a fun post! Thanks for including my color mixing with lights activity!

      Reply
    3. Andrew

      April 05, 2017 at 4:34 pm

      Thank you so much. Glad you benefited from the post!

      Reply
    4. Dr. Ben

      April 24, 2017 at 4:22 pm

      Simple and easy to understand. Share with you about Seven Layer Density and other science tricks
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRYOYgGoZak

      Reply

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