Highlight the color yellow for preschoolers.
Preschool children appreciate activities that incorporate the five senses of sight, sound, taste, touch and smell. When planning lessons on colors, you can focus on the color yellow by appealing to children's sensory abilities. Select materials that do not provoke allergies. Then, make the lessons safe, fun and informative through imaginative activities with the color yellow.
Sight
Decorate the preschool room with yellow drawings and objects. Make poster boards or displays of colors, with the names underneath. Highlight yellow by having a "yellow" day, where yellow is the prominent color. Make a yellow sun and cut out yellow stars, find or make photos or drawings of things like yellow butter, lemons and yellow squash or serve refreshments such as yellow lemonade. Ask the children about yellow items in their homes. Ask if any of the children are wearing yellow. In the fall, look for yellow leaves on the ground or on the trees.
Touch
Children are sensitive to their tactile surroundings. Provide yellow items that are safe for the children. Stuffed animals such as ducks are often made from soft yellow materials. Other stuffed animals such as kittens, dogs, lions and birds can come in yellow. Place uncut lemons, bananas and squash on the table or floor and let the preschoolers describe the textures. Send the children on a classroom search to find toys or dolls that are yellow. At snack time, children can notice food such as butter, macaroni and cheese or desserts in the color yellow. During these activities, assist the children in finding names for the different shades of yellow. Familiarize them with terms such as "butter yellow," or encourage them to find new names, such as "lion yellow."
Taste
Appeal to preschooler's taste with the color yellow. Cut a lemon, bananas and yellow squash into enough pieces for each child to taste the items. You can also add some melted butter. Give the children a cup of water and a yellow paper plate with the slices. Invite the children to squeeze some lemon juice on the plate. They can dip their finger into the juice or taste the lemon itself. Help them describe the taste and offer the water as a way to dilute the sourness. Do the same with the yellow squash, both with and without the butter. A surprise ending to the lesson might be a dessert. Yellow or lemon cake, or yellow cookies with lemon icing close the lesson with a sweet taste.
Smell
Invite the children to smell various fruits and vegetables like lemons, yellow grapefruit and squash. Use seasonal flowers to appeal to their sense of smell, too. Yellow daffodils, tulips, roses and petunias bring pleasant smells into the classroom. Play games to identify the smells. At a table or in a circle on the floor, take turns asking the children to close their eyes and identify a flower by its smell. Most preschool classrooms contain non-toxic scented markers. Children can draw the sun, flowers and animals with their scented yellow markers.
Sound
Children can associate various sounds with the color yellow. Play music that evokes bright, sunny days. Beethoven's Pastoral provides sunny music. Show the Pastoral selection from Fantasia, and ask the children to call out when they see the color yellow. Common answers can include the rainbow and flowers. Sing songs with the color yellow added to the lyrics, such as "Twinkle, Twinkle, Yellow Star" to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star." Show videos and DVDs with yellow animals making sounds. Children can hear yellow canaries and song birds, or the roar of yellow lions. Many stuffed animals come with sounds. Let children explore and describe the sounds from stuffed animals such as Tweety, a yellow canary.
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