How to Make Coloured Porridge Oats…

Alistair Bryce-CleggCreativity, Malleable Materials, Mark Making, Texture Kitchen2 Comments

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This is a really simple and easy one to do. You can use your coloured oats as a sensory experience, not to mention as an addition to Small World, Creative play and many, many more areas of provision.

You will need:

Porridge Oats – I have found that the LARGE porridge oats work best.

Measuring cup

Measuring spoons

Small container (like and egg cup)

Zip Lock freezer bags

Water

Food colouring or liquid water colour

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What to do:

Put one cup of porridge oats into a Zip Lock freezer bag

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Mix 2 tablespoons of water with a few drops of food colouring in your small container.

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I used this cake decorators gel colour

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  • Pour a SMALL amount of the coloured liquid into the bag with the oats

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  • SHAKE the bag to spread the colour…(it won’t go far!).

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  • Add more liquid and shake again.

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  • Repeat until all of the liquid has been used.

IMPORTANT BIT – All of the oats will not be covered. DO NOT be tempted to add a bit more food colouring and water as the oats get VERY wet very quickly and you will end up with lumps of sticky porridge and have to start again!

  • Once you have used all of your food colouring, tip the oats out of the bag and spread them out to dry. This will take about an hour.

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  • If you want a stronger colour then you can repeat the process again once the oats have dried.

As you can see from the picture above, some colours worked better than others. I considered ‘double dying’ the blue batch, but in the end decided to leave them so that you could see the effect.

They look very inviting laid out in stripes – but even better once little hands have got stuck in!

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They are great if you use them in a tough spot or a table top – but they can be especially effective if you use them on a mirror, tin foil or a light box.

You can add water to them to make a multicoloured mush, which will also make the children’s hands feel super soft!

Goldilocks didn’t know what she was missing!

Alistair

 

2 Comments on “How to Make Coloured Porridge Oats…”

  1. I have died pasta and rice before but never oats so Im going to try big oats for my Goldilocks area. Thanks for the idea.

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