Creative ice painting

What you need

• Some ice Some paint and a paintbrush/es
• A space to paint that is easily cleaned up

Benefits

Painting ice is a lovely, sensory experience that will encourage focus and concentration from children of all ages. It is fascinating to watch it change as the ice melts and eventually leaves just a colourful pool of water!

The experience

Prepare your ice ahead of time. It could be that you fill a shallow tray or baking dish with water and freeze, to provide a large sheet of ice for your child to paint, or you could fill an ice cube tray or other containers filled with water to create different shaped ice sculptures.

Set up an area such as on an easily wipeable floor or a ground surface or a table. Provide some paint and a brush and encourage your child to enjoy painting the ice. Talk about what is happening - how are the colours changing? Is the ice changing? Why do we think this is?

Older children can enjoy making predictions and considering the scientific process of the ice melting into water, whilst babies and young toddlers will simply enjoy the sensory process and observing and showing fascination over what is happening and the changes they can see.