Watercolor Art Supplies

When it comes to watercolor art supplies, they seem to disappear. However, if you apply these teacher tested techniques, you will find your watercolor supplies last longer and are more effective.

Kids love watercolors but unless they know how to use them, it becomes a watery mess. Here we will discuss choosing child appropriate watercolors and tips to make the art project pop with color.

Watercolor Brands

Like everything else, you can find tons of brands of watercolors (not to mention types.)

Some of your more popular brands include:

• Crayola Watercolors
• Primacolor
• Rose Art

As a teacher, it has been my experience, through hundreds of kids, that the price of the watercolor does not matter. In fact, my experience shows it is all about the technique.

How Does Kids Roseart Watercolors Work?

For best results, you need to follow certain techniques to get the colors to show up. If you do not teach the kids the proper technique, they will end up with soaked paper and a watery mess. As a side note, this technique works for all the watercolor brands including Crayola.

Prepare the Colors

Watercolors need to be “primed” for maximum effectiveness. Therefore, you need to add a couple of drops of water to each color. You can use the brush to rub the water in a little bit, but it does need a tiny bit of water to start the flow.

Prepare the Extras

You will need:

• 2 cups half full of water
• 3 Paper Towels/ Dish Rags
• Construction Paper/ Porous Paper
• An extra watercolor brush

It helps to set these up in an assembly line order as follows.

Dirty Water Cup:

Each time your child wants to change color, the child will clean off the excess color in the dirty water cup. This cup is only for rinsing off the brush. It is not used for adding liquid to the watercolors.

The Dirty Color Towel:

After rinsing off the brush, the brush will have dirty water on it. The brush should be dabbed on the next towel to remove any excess watercolor. (If you skip this step, your yellow and red colors will turn an icky brown.)

The Clean Water Cup:

Next, your child will dip the brush in the clean water cup. The water needs to stay clean in order to maintain the integrity of the colors. (If a color needs to be primed again, use this water.)

The Second Clean Towel:

This towel is used to tap off excess water. Too much water on the brush will make the watercolors to watery and won’t show color.

Begin Painting

With the paint primed and the brush slightly damp, you are ready to paint. All you need to do is rub the brush around in the color. Circular motions work best to coat the entire brush. This will give you the fullest color.

• If water starts to pool in the color, take the extra paper towel and dab out the water.
• If the paints accidentally mix or dirty water gets on the paint, take the paper towel and dab that up. (Do not rub)
• When paints need to be re-primed, use the additional clean brush and add a drop of clean water to the paint. If necessary, rub it in. Then clean the brush with the dirty water, dirty towel,  and clean water.

Picture Perfect Watercolor

This may sound like a lot of work, but it really is worth the extra minute or two it takes to set up. Additionally, if you teach your child the method, then they will have better success at school.

The process is easy to learn and I have taught children as young as 4 this process. They pick it up fast and they love to paint!