Bright Bubblewrap Dots

Even more dots (well, sorta...)!

Art Project: Bubblewrap printing with highlighters
Supplies:
highlighter markers
paper
bubblewrap

Book:  
Lots of dots / Frazier, Craig

Music to make art by:  
Always be a unicorn [sound recording] / Austin, Helen

 What Kids Do:  color on the bubble wrap with the highlighters (both the bumpy side and the smooth side):

 draw shapes on the bubble wrap:

 Then, press it, ink-side-down, onto the paper.

 Press REALLLLY hard!

 Admire the dots!

 Or... just make your own dots directly on the paper.  Much simpler really, Miss Carissa.

 Or, forget the dots. Let's just take this cap off and on over and over, m'kay?

 SO. MUCH. FUN!!

 And what would a class with bubble wrap be without a little popping?

 And hopping on the popping?

 squishhhhhhhhhhhh pop! pop! pop!

Hindsight Tips: 
-- I think the results would be a bit more impressive if we'd used paint instead of highlighters.  I thought I'd actually done that variation at some point in the past, but i can't find it in the blog archives, so it must have been pre-blog.  There was very little actual bubble wrap printing being done in class.  Everyone had fun and stayed just as long as they usually do, but as a printing project, this wasn't exceptionally satisfying.
--Bubble wrap is available in long rolls that are perforated every 12" which makes it easy to give everyone a sheet of bubble wrap to work with.  Or, you can always use whatever scraps of bubblewrap you can collect from your own stash or ask parents to bring in some from their stash.

 Variations to try: 

--try this with paint! 
--try pushing bubble wrap into playdough to see if you can make an impression (I haven't tested this, just throwing the idea out there.

Adult Challenge:  (my favorite!) Don't tell your child that their artwork is "pretty" or say "good job!"  These are rather empty words (what if your child wasn't going for pretty, but instead made artwork that expressed their fears?  "pretty" deflates the power of their artistic expression) PLUS, then they'll learn to look to you for approval of their art rather than trusting their own judgment of whether or not they did a "good job."  Instead, talk to them about their process ("you worked so hard on that!" "how does that bubble wrap feel?") and ask them to tell YOU about their art (although... don't be surprised if it doesn't have a story behind it.  At this age, kids are blessedly able to make art for art's sake!).