Super Sun!

"Shadows" left by objects

Today was a nice sunny day, so we made a sun picture craft while we played in the backyard. I wanted to do something fun/educational today, but when we're outside their attention span isn't long. They want to play! (Which I don't blame them. It was nice out today).

The sun picture is a super easy craft for a sunny day and doesn't take a lot of set-up time. You need a piece of black construction paper and opaque items (Examples: scissors, toys, pencils or pens, rocks. You can try fresh flowers, but they may wilt in the sun, so silk flowers would probably work better.) Place the items on the piece of construction paper and let it sit out for several hours in direct sunlight. After a few hours, check one of the smaller objects and see if the paper has faded enough to leave a shadow. (You could also use it as a teaching exercise to show the benefits of sunscreen by smearing some sunscreen on the paper!)

There is also a photo paper that results in a blue image. I did these in a photography class in college, and they're a lot of fun! You can get it here or here. If you are looking for note card sizes, for example to send cool artwork to Grandma, try here.