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By The Educators Spin On It 10 Comments

Let’s Make Rain: A Pre-writing Activity for Preschool

Making Rain Writing Activity for Kids

Try this rain painting craft with your preschool child. The down strokes provide practice for developing good writing habits.

Children are naturally curious about the changes in weather. My preschooler was staring out the car window this afternoon with a million questions about the cloud.  Why are there clouds in the sky? How do they get there? Why do they move? And how can they make rain?

This rain painting craft project uses this interest in weather.

Let’s Make Rain is a fun and easy activity to do with your weather unit that is great for early writing.

Let's Make Rain: A Fun and Easy Rain Painting Craft. A great pre-writing activity for Playful Preschool

Affiliate links included.

Rain Painting Craft : A Pre-writing Activity for Preschool

Objective: Strengthen fine motor muscles and practice downward writing strokes with a crayon.

Materials Needed for Rain Painting Craft

  • White paper
  • White crayon
  • Watercolor Paints
  • Paint Brush
  • Paint cup of water

I don’t know what I would do without my paint cups!

Lesson Plan for How to Make Rain with Preschoolers

1. Read a story about rain.

  • Down Comes the Rain
  • Rain
  • Little Cloud

2. Discuss the story and how rain is formed. (Water Cycle)

3. Encourage the preschooler to make rain using short downward strokes with the crayon. The more strokes, the more rain there will be.  We made up our own song to sing while making our raindrops.

The rain falls down, down, down.
Down, down, down.
The rain falls down, down, down.
Onto the ground.

4. Then, dip the paintbrush into the water and paint over the raindrops with a cool color: blues or purples work best.

5. Let dry and display.

*If the child pushes too lightly with the crayon, it will not resist the water color paint.

Plan Your Weather Themed Learning Week:

  • Preschool Songs: I’m a Cloud
  • How Hard has it Rained? A Preschool Science Investigation
  • Weather Sensory Bin
  • Create Your Own Clouds with Preschoolers
  • Simple Evaporation ExperimentExplore Clouds and Rain for Fine Motor Practice
  • Make a Pinwheel Weathervane for Preschool Wind Watching
    Watch this quick video for a preview of the activities pictured:

You may also like these activities for developing fine motor and hand-eye coordination as well:

  • Fine Motor Activities for Vision and Hand-Eye Coordination
  • Trace, Match, Write
  • Make a Shape Scarecrow
  • Alphabet Sensory Bin

Like this idea? Pin for later or share now with a friend!

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Filed Under: Kids Activities, Science Tagged With: Amanda, Playful Preschool, Preschool, Weather

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Comments

  1. Growing Book by Book says

    March 11, 2015 at 7:04 am

    So genius and so simple! Downwards stroke are something we are working on right now and I love this idea. Plus, it is raining here today so this will be a perfect activity. Love, love, love!

    Reply
  2. Natasha Johnson says

    March 11, 2015 at 7:04 am

    My preschooler has not had much success with the pain resistant Crayon trick. She's not a Crayon person, but I can make the rain and let her paint. This is pretty cool.

    Reply
  3. Theresa A says

    March 11, 2015 at 7:59 am

    What a fun way to use crayon resist to capture the weather. The picture is really beautiful. We will have to make one!

    Reply
  4. Danielle Buckley says

    March 11, 2015 at 9:55 am

    My son loves making crayon resist paintings so this is perfect for us this week!

    Reply
  5. Devany LeDrew says

    March 11, 2015 at 10:11 am

    What a fun, seasonal art project!

    Reply
  6. Bonnie's Book Biz says

    March 11, 2015 at 12:23 pm

    This looks like a fun and simple activity to do with the kids!

    Reply
  7. Mary Catherine says

    March 11, 2015 at 1:56 pm

    I love the pre-writing skills involved, as well as the art technique of crayon resist. 🙂 Another idea for the lesson plan book. Thanks! 🙂

    Reply
  8. Nicolette Roux says

    March 13, 2015 at 5:46 pm

    oh how we love our crayon resist arts this side!

    Reply
  9. Cerys Parker says

    March 16, 2015 at 8:27 am

    Great activity for preschool and prewriting, I've got to work on the pressure of my little one's marks do you have any tips?

    Reply

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Early childhood teacher, author, speaker and mom of 3. Kim Vij shares ways to make learning fun and parenting an adventure by sharing all kinds of easy kid crafts, activities and even recipes for kids!
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