I was given a gift card to an office supplies store for Christmas. And if that wasn’t awesome enough, I was also given an hour to wander around that store… on my own!
I spent some of the gift card on practical, useful items that we actually needed, but I spend some of it on something I have always wanted but never really been able to justify – a laminator!
So the laminator has sat mostly unused since that Christmas purchase. It is such a cool toy but I am just not sure what I can use it for.
I got it out yesterday to laminate another set of play dough printables (more on that soon) and suddenly had an idea…
“Lets experiment!” I told the boys…. “I wonder if we can draw on the laminating sheets?”
We got out some pastels and I opened up a laminating pocket and taped it to the table, one for each of the boys.
You have to press down hard to get nice thick, vibrant, lines of colour on the laminating pocket and they are slippery so taping them was essential.
Morgan drew a picture of Nanny, and Noah just filled his sheet with lines, circles and lots of colour. Later the girls came and joined in and both drew rainbows and various other things.
Then it was time for the experiment… what would happen when we put the drawn on sheets through the laminator?
We poked in the pocket at one end and waited, not very patiently, for it to come out the other side… and it worked!
We discovered that lighter colours didn’t show up so well on the clear background, and the more colour you put the better it looked. Thickly drawn pastels, overlapping colours and big solid shapes turned out the best, but all the images were interested and look cool stuck up on the window.
Do you have a laminator? What do you use it for?
What a great idea Kate, never would have thought to use the laminating pouches to draw on, my kids would love this and we’ve got heaps of the pouches which I got on special a while ago.
I get quite a bit of use out of my laminator – I use it to laminate photos that I put on the fridge so they last longer and the ones I put in frames as sometimes they get a bit damaged as well, sticking to the frames and things. I also use it to laminate bookmarks so they last longer and nice pictures that the kids like to stick on their bedroom walls.
I also laminate alphabet letter cards which I make on the computer and stick up on the walls or we use them underneath our ‘writeboards’ which enables your child to write or trace on a clear reusable board with a whiteboard marker, colour in and write with whiteboard crayons and also paint with water colour paints.
we have also used foil to make pictures with and then laminated them. cellophane pictures work great and once laminated u can draw lines to make it look like stained glass.
Wow!? Foil too!? Now, what is cellophane paper? And, you obviously put it between the laminating page sleeves right?
Cellophane is clear plastic, it comes in all colours and is often used as wrapping paper here, and yes, it goes in the middle of the laminating pocket :)
I laminate all the girls school things – well not all, but flash cards, 100’s charts, clock faces and other things I want to keep nice(er).
I’ve been meaning to try using a laminated pouch for mono printing.
We laminate collections of autumn leaves which look great on the window too. Also finger puppets and high frequency words eg family members names, to, dear, love from etc which are then blu taked onto the wall near our drawing table for Miss 4 to use when writing.
What a neat idea! Will have to give this a try. I make books for my kids with photos of them and a story to go with the pictures and then laminate! They love them!
Hi KAte, yes, I agree, a pleasant activity, and anything that uses technology and causes a visible change is interesting to children – but the thing I think about is sustainability – plastic lasts forever
(well, longer than our houses, cars or we do) – is it necessary to add to the plastic in the world to give the children a novel art experience?
I love my laminator but i am trying to be more particular about using it…just a thought…I enjoy your blog!
That’s a really good point and is one of the reason I only let my kids do one picture each. I’m also thinking about ways we could reuse the pictures we made… maybe making tea light candle covers out of them, or cutting them up and using them in collage??
I’ve already pinned this cool process art activity, but I wanted to stop by and leave a comment too! I love how you let the kiddos try something new — kind of a mix of science with the art. I have been thinking about getting a laminator for home — when I do, we’ll have to try this out. :)
Brilliant idea. When I was teaching I was totally addicted to my laminator and found it strangely relaxing to do after school….hmmmm….anyway, love that those slippery plastic pockets can be used to make such great art. :)
What a neat idea! I might have to try this as an art project with my first and second grade class!
This has finally convinced me to buy a laminator – but there are so many options. And prices! Any suggestions or recommendations of where to start?