Tissue Paper Window

from 36 months · 10-15 min · Sensory

What you need

Stick a few long strips of wide tape across the glass of a patio door at your child's height, sticky side facing you, and hold each end down with a short extra strip of tape across it.
Let your child tear the tissue paper into pieces and press them onto the sticky strips.
Overlap two colours and ask what happens where they cross: yellow and blue make a green patch with the light coming through.
Along the bottom strip, start a pattern, red, yellow, red, yellow, and let them carry it on to the end.

Light coming through thin paper makes colours glow, and overlapping two shows them a new colour without any paint.

Tearing small pieces: Pinching and pulling thin paper into bits.
Colours in the light: Naming each colour as the light shines through it.
Seeing light through: Thin paper lets the daylight in, and the colour comes with it.

Notice them overlapping pieces on purpose to make a new colour.

Choose glass at their height on a bright day. The tape peels off easily afterwards.

Easier: use two colours and let them stick the pieces anywhere

Harder: make a rainbow in stripes, one colour on each strip, then name every colour glowing in the window