A Heartfelt Book & Magic Flashlight Art!
After reading Averiss’ “Hope” we decided to create Magic Flashlight art! I’m excited to walk you through how we made this fun & Magical Flashlight art, so let’s get started…
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Summary of “Hope”
“Hope” by Corrinne Averiss and illustrated by Sebastien Pelon is a heartwarming book about a young boys experience of life without his dog, who fell ill and is being looked after for a few days. Wanting a definitive answer, but having to instead find HOPE that everything will be okay again. It has a happy ending. 😉 Our favorite part was when the dad shines a flashlight in the dark room and says, “Hope is keeping a little light on, however dark things seem”.
How We Made Magic Flashlight Art…
We tend to keep the activities as simple as possible around here. We’re not interested in complicated or costly. We are also all about fostering independence. For this activity we were inspired by @ourmindfulpod‘s Instagram Post here.
First my daughter colored designs on one side of the clear plastic page protector with permanent markers. Then she cut out a shape similar to the one you can see on the cover. The paper doesn’t have to be yellow, but we like yellow and wanted it to look more like the scenes from the story. But any light colored paper will work.
Then I cut one side of the page protector so that 2 sides were closed and 2 were open (the part you slip the paper into and one of the long sides. Then my daughter found some black paper and slipped it into the opened page protector. This instantly changed how her designs looked. She commented how it looked like the light was turned off.
Lastly, I handed her the yellow “light” paper and the moment she slipped it between the black paper and her drawings on the page protector her drawings lit up! She was very surprised and loved the cool effect, as did I. 🙂
Wait?!? Am I Supposed To Be Making One Too?
I highly recommend getting hands on and doing art projects with your child. If you’d rather not, thats okay too, but please do not correct anything they do. If you want the art to look a certain way – make your own.
Especially if your child is little, its okay if it doesn’t turn out the way you imagined. Maybe its what they imagined. Also, its a process. They are learning. They will learn more through trial and error than if you correct them or do it for them. All they will learn if you “help” is that they didn’t do a good enough job on their own or they can’t do it; not exactly the message you want to give your kid. Am I right?!?
Believe me, I know it can be really challenging to let them make “mistakes”. Try doing the project along side them. It will allow you to focus on your own work, give them appropriate modeling of how to use the materials, and show them that you like art too! A lot of what I talk about in “What about the Sensory Mess?” applies to Art projects as well, you might wanna check it out! I love how each art has its own identity. I would suggest Magic Flashlight Art if you’re looking for a simple and inviting art activity to connect with your child.
Materials We Used
- “Hope” book (from the library or buy it here)
- Clear page protector
- Scissor
- Black paper
- Yellow paper (or any light color)
- Permanent markers
Click HERE for Free Printable copy (Email Subscribers Only)
How to Make Magic Flashlight Art?
- Use permanent markers to draw on one side of the clear page protector.
TIP: A lot of smaller drawings are better than one big drawing because the “flashlight” will only expose a small portion of it. - Cut a lightbulb shape out of light colored paper (we chose yellow).
- Cut one long side of the clear page protector, so that the original opening and one long side is open and one long and one short side are still closed.
- Place a dark colored paper (we chose black) in to the page protector.
- Holding the page protector so that the drawings are face up, insert the light bulb cut out in between the dark paper and the drawings.
- This should immediately illuminate the drawings!
Click HERE for Free Printable copy (Email Subscribers Only)
Wait, There’s More…
I believe you can easily strengthen communication skills and foster independence all while playing and connecting with your child. To help you do this; I’ve created a FREE printable for each activity called, “Communicating & Connecting”.
It will give you a list of suggestions I’ve found very helpful as a Mom & as a special education teacher; to help you build lifelong skills. Please don’t feel obligated to do everything on the list (but if you do, you’re a rockstar 😉 ).
As a Thank You for subscribing; this is a special FREEBIE for our Email Subscribers Only. 🙂 Click here if you’ve already subscribed. Otherwise, Sign Up below to get the password & access to our entire FREE Printables Library today! 😉
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