This is part of my 15 minute focus series. We do this the week after we do Light and Shadows. We learn the skill of using permanent markers carefully as we make “stained glass” art.

Supplies

You’ll need:

• A bright light that can shine on a wall, so that when you place items in front of the light, they cast a shadow on the wall. We use an old style overhead projector. You could set up a shop light or a bright flashlight (even your cell phone could work), or you could use a modern projctor and just show a plain white slide on the wall.
• Miscellaneous items to put in front of the light to make shadows – make sure some are opaque, some are translucent, and some are transparent – I’ll share some examples below
• Card stock or paper – quarter sheet per kid
• Thin transparent plastic sheets. I used plastic sheet protectors. You could use transparency sheets, or laminating pouches – seal them with no paper inside, so they are transparent. One quarter sheet per kid.
• Sharpies or other permanent markers, in a variety of colors, including black
• a picture of a stained glass window

Prep

Cut a shape out of the card stock / paper to make a frame. I did this activity in February, so I made a heart shaped frame. Tape the plastic sheet onto the frame. Use a black Sharpie to make lines like on stained glass.

I just made random lines on mine, but later looked up stained glass designs, so here are some nice ones:

Science Concept

I turn on my bright light source, I turn off the overhead lights so the room is dark.

I do a quick intro and demo to remind them of what we had learned the previous week – when light is shining directly on the wall, all the light travels to the wall. But if we put an object between the light and the wall, some of the light gets stuck on the object and can’t get to the wall, so we see a shadow on the wall.

I hold up a few different opaque objects in front of the light to illustrate this: look, my keys make a key shaped shadow; this book makes a book shaped shadow, this toy animal makes an animal shaped shadow. I ask them what color all the shadows are. They’re all black. I hold up a white piece of paper. Why does the white piece of paper make a black shadow?? It’s opaque – it blocks all the light.

Then I hold up some translucent objects – lots of light table supplies will work for this, or colorful plastic bracelets, or translucent “Duplos”, or wood blocks with acrylic centers. What color are the shadows? The same color as the object! They are letting most of the light pass through so we still see the light on the wall, but since the object is colorful, the shadow is colorful. That’s called translucent.

Then I hold up some transparent items: eyeglasses, glass jars or drinking glasses. When almost all the light comes through, we call that transparent.

Craft – “Stained Glass”

Intro

I hold up a picture of a stained glass window, and ask if they’ve ever seen a window like this. (Most have, some haven’t.) Then I hold up a picture of a stained glass window and its shadow. Like this one:

I have them notice that where the black lines are in the window, we see black shadows, but where the colored glass is, we see colored shadows. I tell them we’ll make fake stained glass windows today.

Sharpie Intro

I explain that we’re going to use a special kind of marker today – one that’s called permanent. I ask if they know what that means. I say our regular markers are called washable – if we get them on our hands, we can wash them off with water and soap. If we get permanent markers on our hands, or our clothes, or the table, they are hard to wash off, so we need to be extra careful today not to get markers on anything other than our project.

Craft Demo

I hold up one paper-frame-with-plastic-sheet heart. I show them how there are black lines that make lots of spaces in the heart. I suggest that we could make each space a different color.

I demo how to color in the spaces and how I try really hard to stay in the shape, but it’s OK if some gets into the next shape, or onto the paper. When we turn it over, it will look good on the front.

Activity

I pass out the hearts, being sure to set them down with the back side facing up (the one that has the plastic taped to it.) I put out the sharpies. They color in their hearts, and then they test them out on the projector. I also show them how they could hang them in a window at home.

I had good success with this not being a messy project (because there’s a fair amount of frame around the area they are coloring), but of course we did have some permanent marker on the table. I showed the kids that all we had to do was squirt on some hand sanitizer and rub it in, then wipe it up, and there’s no more marker!

I have book and song suggestions in my shadow science post.