I know most Pre-K teachers have used both dry and liquid watercolors with their students before, but have you ever used “tube” watercolors?

I’m a big fan of liquid watercolors, because of their many uses, but I also love to use these “tube” watercolors because it gives children experience with a different kind of watercolor paint. The colors you get from these are brilliant and beautiful (as long as you don’t water them down too much).

Watercolors that come in a tube are used by “real” artists. A set of them like I have costs around $10 (and even less if you use a craft store coupon), and they last a long, long time. The tubes are small, but you get a lot out of them because the paint is concentrated. To use these, I use a white plastic paint tray for each child. I let the children choose six colors they want to use (I give them a second tray later on if they really need more colors). I squeeze the paint into the trays, and the kids are responsible for the rest. You only need to squeeze a very small amount of paint into each bowl in the tray. A little goes a long way. Each child has their own baby food jar of water, and I keep a bucket and a pitcher of clean water at the table, so we can dump dirty water and get clean water as needed. Children are taught how to use the watercolors first. Children dip their paintbrush into clean water (they will have about one drop on the brush), and stir the water and paint together with the brush. Then, they can use it to paint. The brush needs to washed off in the jar between colors. Show them what happens when too much water is added to the paint (colors are weak), and show them how a drop of water will make deeper colors.
At first, children will need plenty of opportunities to experiment with the paints. Their paintings may be the abstract type when they first experiment with these paints, and later on they may paint with more detail. It’s also a good idea to have children think of something they want to make first and draw an outline using a permanent thin black pen (the ink must be permanent, not water soluble).

The ink drawing can then be painted. I recommend using watercolor paintbrushes (thin, not too fat) with white construction paper or watercolor paper.

Another interesting thing about this particular type of paint is that if you have a lot of paint left over in the tray, you can save it by letting it dry. When it dries, it will look exactly like the dry watercolor paint sets you find anywhere, and you use it the same way, by wetting the dry paint with water.


This is great to know! We used to have watercolors on our school supply list – but not anymore. : ( This will help my “pocket dollars” go a long way.
I love this post! My students love to paint and I am always looking for ways to make it more interesting.
Jonelle
Thanks so much!
Thanks so much for posting this! I can’t wait to pick up some of these paints at the craft store! I have just recently discovered your website and I love it! You have so many great and realistic ideas!
I was also wondering if you would post some more Large Group activities. I really struggle with coming up with movement ideas other than dancing with streamers!
Thanks again for such an awesome website!!!
Hi Christy! Thanks so much! I have some Large Group activities in the works, along with a BUNCH of other stuff in the works. š So, I am planning to do some.
PS…I love the baby food water jar idea! I have bags of these left over from my son and was waiting for a brilliant idea for them!
This is a great idea! We go through countless numbers of watercolor paint and this will save us money. Thanks Debbe
Try wet on wet painting, you’ll love it. Works best with watercolor paper but can be done with construction paper too. Use a large flat brush dipped it water to wet the whole paper first, then paint with the water colors. Try only putting out 2-3 colors, so they can focus on watching the colors bleed into one another.
Just a word of caution, I found out that some tube paints (usually the artists ones) contain traditional artist pigments such as cadmium salts that are toxic. Just be sure to check the labels.
Thank you so much mam for your brilliant idea
Thanks for posting this. I was unsure how to use the watercolors in the tubes. Your post was clear and simple to follow. Thanks!