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Objectives:

This is a good lesson to show how pioneers or early civilizations may have used plant dyes to color cloth.

What You Need:

• crock pots
• beets
• spinach or kale
• black walnuts in the shell
• dry onion skins
• paint brushes
• paper

What You Do:

1. Discuss with the students that before we had synthetic dyes, people had to make their own paints and dyes using plants and other resources available. Show the students the nuts and vegetables you have and ask how the pioneers may have used these materials.

2. The night before the painting lesson, place beets, spinach or kale, walnuts, and onion skins in separate crock pots with enough water to barely cover them. Cook all night. The following morning, the water in each of these pots should have turned into natural dyes. The beet water will be magenta, the onion water will be amber, the spinach or kale water will be a light green and the black walnut water will be brown.

3. Pour a small amount of paint into bowls and ask students to smell them. Discuss which vegetable made which paint.

4. Provide brushes and paper (plain or coloring pages) and permit students to paint using the natural dyes.

5. After the painting experience, ask students what other natural materials might make dyes the pioneers could have used. Experiment with student suggestions.

►More Painting Lessons

Recommended Books:

The Craft of Natural Dyeing
A great background of the craft, easy instructions and even a glossary of terms.
by: Jenny Dean