Catapult Painting – Super Fun Art Activity for Kids!

I taught three preschool camps this summer with an awesome co-teacher (I shall dub her Ms. Smarty Pants)!  She and I had fun planning great experiences for the kiddos, and we both enjoyed ourselves immensely.  One of my favorite parts of the camps was a unique, and oh-so-fun, art activity for kids!  It may be my favorite because it involved a catapult!  Yes, you read that right — a catapult!

use a catapult to create a unique art activity for kids

Now, I cannot take responsibility for the catapult.  That was all Ms. Smarty Pants’ idea, and her mother-in-law ran with it and created something awesome!  The plans they used to build the catapult came from Storm the Castle, so be sure to check out the ideas over there.

In addition to catapulting water balloons and pompoms, we came up with an awesome art activity for kids to get into!  And adults, too, as I had just as much fun as the kiddos.  🙂  It all started with my exclamation of, “Catapult painting!!  We should totally use the to catapult paint!”  My preschoolers loved our gravity painting experiment, so I thought they’d have fun with the catapult too.  Ms. Smarty Pants, the enabler that she is, said it sounded like a grand idea.

What we used (affiliate links below)
An awesome homemade catapult inspired by Storm the Castle
Large pompoms (like these)
White butcher paper (like this)
Liquid watercolors (I used these, but you could also try these)

What we did
Ms. Smarty Pants and I taped a large piece of butcher paper to the playground shed.  Then I placed a few squirts of liquid watercolors into some small bowls.  Of course the children were dying to know what we were doing.  My response of, “painting with the catapult!” was met with giggles.

The kiddos dipped large pompoms into the paint, then placed the pompoms into the catapult’s bowl.  We worked together to bring the bar down, then let it go after a count of three!  We then watched with excitement as the pompom made a paint splat on our paper!

In case you’re wondering – yes, the watercolors came off of the shed!  We simply hosed it down when we were done.

Oh how we all enjoyed creating a splat-filled masterpiece using paint, pompoms, and a homemade catapult.  I think this counts as an incredibly fun art activity for kids – what do you think?  Would you give it a go?

Just for kicks, I checked to see if anyone else had tried this.  I came across Child Central Station’s painting with individual catapults!  Be sure to check out how they got into this unique art experience.