Little Activities | Homemade Face and Body Paint

The sensory system is often viewed as something scary or problematic and that's because it is mostly discussed with parents when something's awry — for example, tactile defensiveness or difficult eaters. But in reality, understanding and using sensory input is such a great, positive tool.

The sensory system is the parts of the nervous system that receives, processes and responds to sensory information. Sensory information comes in the forms of touch, taste, smell, vision, hearing, proprioception (body awareness), and vestibular (movement).

Why is it so important? Well to put it very simply, it's how we function as human beings. It's what gives us the ability to understand and respond to our world. It includes things like protecting us from burning our hand, allowing us to have conversations with people, knowing what colours are, and that the smell of peaches can conjure memories of our childhood. It really is an amazing system.

Sensory play in children is especially important because it creates strong pathways in their brains which allow them to be successful in complex learning tasks. This means that sensory play supports many other areas of development — language, fine and gross motor skills, cognition — basically everything.

A fantastic, and often avoided (because who likes to clean) type of sensory play is messy play. But let me tell you, the perks of messy play far outweigh the clean-up afterwards. Messy play is when children make use of all their senses (predominantly touch) in exploration. It is completely process-orientated play — there should be no expectations of an end result of any kind.

Instructions

The title of this activity is pretty self-explanatory. It consists of 2 parts — making the paint and then getting messy with it. A tip: the whole point of this activity is for the kids to make a mess, so select an area where you are happy for that to happen and dress your kids in clothes that can get messy (no clothes are fine too). Remember that the emphasis is on exploring and having fun.

Making the paint

The quantities given are enough to make one colour (for one person). Repeat the recipe for as many colours as you want. The paint can be stored in an airtight container and reused (do not refrigerate).

In a cup or small bowl, mix a few drops of food colouring into the water and set it aside — combining these together before adding it to anything else means that the food colour is less likely to stain.
Combine the body lotion and corn starch and then add the water-food colouring mixture. Keep mixing with a spoon until a smooth paint is formed (it will be thick — the consistency of a thick cream).
Put the paint into containers for use and storage afterwards.

The kids should make the paint themselves. The exploration should begin here already. You can facilitate exploration in the following ways — feel and smell the cream and corn starch; give them a plate with some corn starch on it and let them draw pictures in it; get them to describe what the cream and cornstarch feel like; let them put some cream on. Show them different food colouring and let them identify the colours. All of this helps to engage their sensory system.

The real fun: Face and body painting

You can paint with fingers and brushes on the body and face (give them a mirror to do their own face) and on siblings/parents body and face. It's a good idea to get your kids to ask each other if it's ok before they start painting on one another — just in principle, no one should touch your body without permission.
My advice is to guide them into the activity and then once they have a handle on things, just let them go for it and have fun for as long as they want. Kids will indicate when they have had enough.

I recommend ending this activity with a "cool-down" — have a bucket with warm water, soap and a towel ready and let them wash up afterwards. It helps them to wind down after all the sensory input. It's also a good time to reinforce the importance of hand washing.

Just a note: this is not long-wearing paint. Rinse it off when you are done because if you leave it on for long periods the food colouring may stain the skin. If it does, it's not a crisis — it will come off with a good bath.