Take the children outside to look at the colors in their environment. Point out trees, flowers, rocks, etc. and name the colors of the various objects to the children. If the weather is inclement, help the children observe colors indoors by pointing out things such as yellow pencils and white paper.
Use fruits and vegetables or pictures of these foods to help students name colors. You can use, for example, milk for white, pumpkins for orange, corn for yellow and potatoes for brown. However, you may also want to show older children exceptions to the color rules with chocolate milk, white pumpkins, blue corn, and purple potatoes.
Continue the food theme by using natural dyes to color fabric squares or paper. Cut out white fabric or paper squares. Give bowls of natural dyes such as cold tea or coffee for brown color or smashed berries for other colors. Do not use mordants such as alum or iron. Use salt and baking powder in the dye to keep the colors fast.
Allow the students to make rainbows using prisms. Also provide the children with kaleidoscopes. An outside experiment would be to show how water from a hose can create a rainbow. Squirt water from a hose so that it catches the light and makes a rainbow. Explain to the children that raindrops reflect sunlight to create rainbows.
Show children how to mix primary colors to make secondary colors by mixing paint on a paint tray. Let the children experiment with colors by painting on construction paper. You can show how colors can be opaque or transparent by diluting paint. Put a blob of paint on watercolor paper and add water to the paint. Mix the water and paint over the paper. You can, if you are feeling adventurous, use frosting instead of paint as your medium.