Rubber Band Painting

A few weeks ago my son got into the car after preschool with flecks of dried paint all over his sweet face. I immediately demanded to know what kind of fun he'd been having without his little sister and me. So he taught us how to rubber band paint.


Place a piece of paper on a baking sheet and wrap rubber bands around the whole thing.

Paint the rubber bands. He kept reminding us "Not too much paint!"

Pull back the rubber bands and let them go.

Rotate the paper and repeat. At first my son was just going to show us how and not participate himself, but he soon found my rubber band painting skills lacking and took over my project. I must admit that I gave it over pretty reluctantly. It's fun. (This can get pretty messy and would make a great outside project.)

This would be a fun activity to pair with the book, Bubble Gum, Bubble Gum about a variety of animals who get stuck one by one in bubble gum melting on the road. Kids could pretend the rubber bands are the gum on the road as the animals try to pull their way out of it.

These paintings also remind me of Stephen Gammell's illustrations. We've done projects inspired by Gammel's artwork in the past including fly swatter painting

and painting with water balloons,

After we did this activity, I also found snap painting at Teach Preschool.  Her students chose lots of different ways to apply the paint to the rubber bands.