Creating a Light Table for Preschool

Follow my blog with Bloglovin I wanted an easy and inexpensive way to create a light table for my preschool class. Thankfully, for the internet, I found different ideas and took what I could do (and find) and created my own light table.

I found a clear plastic container with a frosted lid. I already had metallic spray paint (of course) and sprayed the inside of the container. This is to help with reflecting the light up to the lid.

I then picked up three battery operated lights from Walmart. I chose three long florescent lights that would fit along the long sides of the container and one in the center. Luckily, the church was able to give me all of the batteries I needed which saved me money.

Presto. Once I figured out where the batteries went in the lights (embarrassed to say that took a long time) I turned on the lights, put the lid on the container and magic happened.

The kids had a blast working with the different colored shapes. And figuring out how different colors if added on top of one another created another color. They then made 'pictures' with the different shapes.

What is great about using a plastic container is that it houses the lights and whatever I want to use for the table.

QUESTION: How can you use a light table?

8 comments:

Splendid Little Stars said...

How very cool! I can imagine kids having hours of fun with this!

Linda B said...

That sounds fun.

Kathleen said...

This is very cool! Thanks for sharing your idea =)

storybeader said...

how neat! I'm sure the kids will have fun with that! We have a light table at work, and use it for looking at negatives and slides... {:-D

Memories for Life said...

How cool...and creative!
They could also use it to trace/draw pictures.
I love Deb's idea for looking at negatives too!

SarahBeth said...

What a great idea! It also shows the kids how you can create something from more or less on-hand materials instead of buying something expensive! I bet they'll have a ton of fun!

pasqueflower said...

What a super fun project!!

Judy Nolan said...

Clever way to assemble a very safe light box! Makes me embarrassed to admit I paid for my light box years ago...