Art and Math Activities : Coin Rubbings
With a few coins and colored pencils create this fun art-math combo activity.
This is one of those indoor kids activities that is set-up free and mess-free and that is a big plus in a busy mother’s day. Let’s be honest we want it all, right? An engaging, fun and if possible educational indoor kids activities which does not have any elaborate set up and mess free. What? That is like having your cake and eating it too This art and math activity fits the bill! It is unique and my kid loved seeing the impressions on the paper.
Materials ( affiliate links)
- Paper
- Shuttle Art 172 Colored Pencils
- Crayons
Update: During this global pandemic, when schools are shut down for the rest of the academic year we redid this coin rubbing activity with my now 9 year old. The one in this image is now 11!! The said 9 year old still loved the activity given that we were using her favorite art supplies – her 172 color pencil set. She ferociously guards her set with life because she truly loves this giant palette of colors.
They are organized into 4 trays and comes with a DIY color chart which is probably essential because the set has one big drawback. The wrappers don’t match the true color. The chart makes picking the exact shade of purple so easy! Resident artist loves this set. ( Not a sponsored post by the way)
Back to the post!
I provided my preschooler with a few coins, sheets of white paper and crayons and colored pencils. I had her lay out a few coins on a sheet and cover them with another sheet of white paper. Then she made coin impressions by coloring over the coins.
I should mention that we started off this kids activity as crayon rubbings but soon found out that colored pencils worked much better than crayons. The reason : kids find it hard to NOT push hard while coloring. Gentle shading is difficult to practice at this age. That’s why colored pencils were a perfect solutions since the pressure did not affect the coin impression. In fact the way the kids pushed on their writing materials was perfect. It gave the coin rubbings the right color and detail and with crayon rubbings the details would have been lost with the excess pressure.
These are the beautiful coin impressions my kid and I made. I sat down and made one with her with the intention of turning it into a matching game.
Math Matching Game
I set out my coin rubbings paper and a few coins for her.
She set out matching the impressions to the coins. A few of them were challenging but her focus was pretty good. Unique and out of the usual workbook activities really get my preschooler to focus and we all know focusing on one activity for a long duration is not something many preschoolers can do.
Our completed game.
More ideas to make coin rubbings fun!
You could lay out a few coins on the paper, cover it up with another sheet and have the kids crayon rub. In this game the child does not know what coins are under the paper. He/she guesses as and when she rubs and creates a new coin impression.
Set up coin rubbings math/money equations
Create a pattern ( flower or a shape) and the child can rub and create designs. How fun?
If you end up using crayons, wash over the paper with water colors to have the crayon colors pop out.
Recap:
Use a variety of coins
Use colored pencils
Use the coin impressions paper to make up a matching game
Thanks for reading
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