5 Hands-On Activities for Teaching Colors and Color Words

Who doesn’t love a little color? Colors brighten up our world. They’re cheerful and fun!

I absolutely love teaching about colors and color words. Plus, kids LOVE exploring color: matching, sorting, and mixing. In this post, I’ll share some of my favorite activities for teaching about colors and color words. I’ll also share some tips and resources (including a freebie!)

Colors and color words are important skills for kindergarten students to master. Learning to read and write color words helps young students develop independence reading directions and writing simple sentences. This blog post has fun ideas for teaching colors and color words. Plus, there are free printable color word crowns. There are also links to center activities, worksheets, and other resources. #Teach #Colors #Kindergarten #ColorWords

Activity #1: Color Matching & Sorting

One of the earliest color-related skills is matching. It’s usually one of the easiest skills (except for those with color blindness), and many young kids can do it independently, making matching and sorting activities excellent options for introducing centers in the first few months of kindergarten.

Here are some options:

Color word puzzles build matching skills and introduce color words.
Sorting pictures or objects can help kids classify different shades of colors.
Give students paint chips for each color. Use a marker to write the color on the front of the paint chip and have them find pictures in magazines to glue onto the back. Hole punch the paint chips and use a binder clip to create a color book.

Activity #2: Color Stories

Books are a wonderful tool for introducing young kids to all sorts of things. Colors are no exception. There are so many excellent books that introduce kids to color words, primary colors, secondary colors, and color mixing. These are a few of my favorites. (The book links are affiliate links.)

This is one of my all-time favorite books for teaching about colors. I love how interactive Mix It Up is. It asks the reader to touch, mix, and interact with the colors as if they were really painting.

Mouse Paint is such a perfect book for teaching colors. Kids enjoy following along as the three mice get into some paint and end up mixing the colors as they dance and play.

The illustrations in this book are fun, colorful, and bright. Monsters Love Colors is a great book for introducing colors, color words, and color mixing to young kids.

Activity #3: Color Mixing

Reading about colors is great, but there’s no substitute for hands-on exploration. Color-mixing activities are always a hit.

A waterproof light table is perfect for color-mixing exploration. The lighting really makes the colors pop, but there are plenty of other color-mixing options.

Mix paints on paper
Use a white ice cube tray with colored water and an eye dropper
Try combining small amounts of red, blue, and yellow playdough

Activity #4: Color Theme Days

Does your school do theme days like crazy hair day or silly socks day? Kids love those days. So, why not use that enthusiasm to help teach colors?

Plan two weeks of color days. Encourage kids to wear something with the color of the day and send home a small baggie for them to collect things that are the same color. (Remind them to only bring in things that aren’t valuable and allow any child who isn’t able to collect things at home to look for examples from the classroom to put in their bag.)

Activity #5: Games and Center Activities

Once kids can identify, match, and sort different colors, it’s time to work on color words. There are so many center options. The options are practically endless, but here are a few of my favorite center activities.

Playdough is always fun. Combine some playdough, stamps, and dry-erase markers for a hands-on center that’s perfect for practicing color words.

Spin a color, write it with a white crayon, and paint over it with watercolor paint to make it magically appear. This center is a great way to practice color words while introducing painting expectations.

This is a great center for practicing color words and reviewing phonics. Using the initial sound of each picture, kids crack the code to discover the color words. This is a great way to challenge kids to think.

Hands-on centers are awesome and lots of fun, but worksheets have a place too. These simple color sheets are NO PREP and range from simple coloring to more challenging simple sentences.

Where Can You Get The Free Color Crowns?

You can get the free color crowns right below.

Are You Looking For More Color Activities?

These are my go-to recommended color and color word activities. You’ll find everything you need to move from color matching and sorting to fluently reading and writing color words.

Click on the links to find out more.