Painting with mittens

Fun and unique ways to expand on a classic children’s story!

A fun way to change up the painting process is by offering different materials to paint with.  We changed up the painting experience and invited the children to explore the process of painting with mittens…

Introducing a Story

Before we began painting with mittens, we gathered together for morning circle and read “The Three Little Kittens” by Paul Galdone. This book features the classic folktale of the three little kittens who have lost their mittens, complete with beautiful illustrations and wonderful words that rhyme. It is a simple to read version of the tale and our class loved it…

Expanding on the Story

We then played a fun mitten matching game…

In this game, each child chose one mitten from the collection of mittens we had spread out on the floor and placed the mitten on one hand. When the music played, the children went around the classroom looking for who might have on their matching mitten.  We played several rounds of our mitten matching game, and as we played, the children got the hang of it and became more invested and excited to find their matching mitten…

Painting with Mittens

Next, we moved on to our centers.  Mitten painting was offered at the art table.  For this simple and fun activity, a variety of paint was set out along with paper plates, mittens, and large sheets of paper…

The children put the mittens on their hands and then chose which colors of paint they wanted to use. They squeezed their paint out onto the paper plates and then pushed their mitten into the paint.  A few children chose to squeeze the paint directly onto their mittens…

When pressed onto the paper, the mittens left a perfect print (most of the time)…

Enjoying the Process!

Of course, some children didn’t stop at just leaving prints.  Some children wanted to cover their whole paper.  So they stamped away until their entire paper was covered.  The mittens left a beautiful texture in the paint…

Who knew that mittens could be used to make such interesting prints?

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 Links to grow on

Planning marvelous mitten activities by Teach Preschool

Felt board mitten math by Teach Preschool

Salt watercolor mitten art by Mom to 2 Posh Lil Divas