Nature's Rainbow

 Posted by Rosie

In the third of our series of nature games and activities for children today we have:

  Nature's Rainbow

This is an art and literary nature activity which stimulates children's imagination and gets them looking closely at all the natural colours around them.

For Nature's Rainbow you will need:

• A copy of the story of Rainbow-Land (below)
• Some double sided tape (carpet tape is great as it is quite wide) and a piece of card 
• Something  to collect petals etc in
• Somewhere to collect petals etc.

Before you start stick some double sided tape on a small piece of card.  The card needs to be about 15 x 10 cm and the tape about 10 x 5 cm. 

Nature's Rainbow involves telling the story of "Rainbow-Land".  After the children have heard how without the Rainbow there are no colours they go out to collect colourful natural materials to recreate their own Rainbow.

The Story of Rainbow-Land

In Rainbow-Land everything was beautifully coloured and it was all thanks to the magnificent rainbow that filled the sky every single day.  Each morning the King and Queen of Rainbow-Land would open their sumptuous red velvet curtains and look out over the town below.  They would see the market stall owners setting out their wares.  There was Mrs Plum, the fruit seller who had oranges more orange than you have ever seen and the greenest of green apples.  Next to her was Mr Tulip, the flower seller and I can tell you, his sunflowers were the yellowest you will ever have seen and as for his roses - sooooo red!!  Because of all the bright colours everyone in Rainbow-Land was always happy and it was a wonderful place to live.

One night thought there was a TERRIBLE storm.  Everyone cowered inside as the rain lashed against the windows and the wind howled as it seemed to be pick up everything outside and be throwing it around.  It was the worst storm there had ever been in Rainbow-Land.

The following morning all was once again calm but all was not right.  As the King and Queen looked out of the window they were me with an awful sight.  There was NO COLOUR!  Everything was just grey.  No reds, no blues, nothing.  And far, far away on the horizon they could see the shattered remains of their rainbow, smashed into a million pieces by the storm.

What were they to do?  Their trusted advisers could not think of a solution and they really felt that all was lost.  However a young orphan girl who worked in the kitchens came up with an idea that the rest of the staff thought might just work and so the cook brought her up to tell it to the King and Queen.  She suggested that if everyone in Rainbow-Land worked together to gather up all the pieces of the rainbow they could stick them together and rebuild it.

No-one could tell whether this would work or not but everyone agreed it was their best chance.  They worked all through the day and on into the night, gathering and sticking the pieces together.  At dawn, just as the sun was rising above the Eastern horizon the last piece was dropped into place and as the morning light spread across Rainbow-Land, with it came the colours they all knew so well.

It is said that the little orphan girl grew up to be one of the greatest advisers in the Land - I do not know if this is true or not but I do know I would love to create my own piece of Rainbow-Land, right here and now. Wouldn't you?

At the end of the story ask if the children think they could help the children in the story to create their own rainbow.  Show them a pictures of the rainbows here on our blog, explaining how it is made of natural materials and if they were to collect colourful things they could make one too!

Head off and collect natural materials such as petals, leaves, berries etc.

Bring these back to where you want to create your rainbow and spread them out.  You may then want to remind children of the colours of the rainbow, which I always remember as:

Richard - Red
Of - Orange
York -Yellow
Gained - Green
Battle - Blue
In - Indigo
Vain - Violet

If any colours seem to be missing you can head out again to look for them.

Remove the backing  paper from the tape (if it is carpet tape be aware that it is now VERY sticky!).  Then ask the children to tear the natural materials into small pieces and stick them onto the sticky area to make their own rainbow, either in strips of colour for older children or randomly for younger ones.  You can either use all one type of petal or leaf etc for one colour or add a mixture.

And there you have it - a Rainbow made from natural materials that will bring colour into anyone's life!  They are great made into greetings cards or en masse make a lovely wall display.

Do let me know if you have a go at this activity.  Summer and Autumn are good times to do it but you can still do it in the winter or without natural materials by tearing the colours from plant pictures in a magazine.

For more Nature Games and Activities you might like to try please do look here:

Nature Activities