Shaving Cream Painting

Shaving cream painting is a great way for kids to explore lots of different motor skills, textures, hand motions, and colors. The shaving cream activity began with 1 pile of plain white cream on their cookie trays for them to get used to the texture, pliability, and feel. Some kids were reluctant and thought they were getting "too messy," and kept asking to wash their hands. After some kids got used to the idea and realized they were allowed to get messy and have fun this time, they loosened up and started squishing, molding, or scooping their cream with a spoon.


After their initial plain painting warm-up, we introduced a color to their shaving cream, and an extra big squirt so they can start building and piling (1 Squirt of a food dye does well, and DOES NOT stain the kids hands, or any other surface). In addition to the food dye we used this time, powdered tempura paint or finger paints can also be used.


There were some kids who were particularly enjoying this activity, so while the other kids cleaned up, I let them experiment with the addition of another color to their pile of cream. These kids had fun guessing what colors it might turn into as they squished. This is a great way for the kids to loosen up, and just be kids, while learning about many different things, depending on the prompt. This will now be a monthly activity with different prompts, as followed, and in this successive order according to skill development:

Cream and Food Color Mixing (making purple, orange, green from red blue and yellow)
Cream and Food Color Mixing (making a pattern or design)
Cream and Finger Paint (Print Making, by laying a sheet of art paper on top of their colorful design)
Cream and Writing (thin layers and writing with their fingers)
Cream and Writing (thin layers and writing with an object/paint brush)
[repeat]