Teaching Kids about Colors
Recognizing colors and identifying color names is an important part of a child’s development. This connection of colors, color names, and color words create the cognitive link between visual clues and the spoken and written word. The process of learning to identify a color by name is actually more complex than it seems. A child needs to realize that colors are not shapes, sizes, objects, textures, but rather the shade, hue, and vibrance of something you see. Learning colors lays the foundation to complex cognitive thinking and neural pathways that will allow for complex thinking.
Colors are usually taught during the preschool years and will hopefully be mastered during this time. I always like to add into the kindergarten year a color unit. I have found that beginning a more complex study of colors with something student’s already know, quickly puts a young 5 year old at ease and lays a great foundation for new learning.
This is a great time to show students they can always learn more about something they think they already know about. What? Colors have a word that represents it? What? Colors can be mixed to make new colors? What? Colors come in different shades, hues, and vibrance? Kindergartners love learning!
Expanding learning of known concepts builds background knowledge, deepens understanding, and lays foundation that will cross over into all areas of their academic future.
