How does sunlight turn into energy?
And is there an easy way for kids to see that happening, while doing an art project? (Well, yes–that’s what this project is about!)
We’ve been reading a lot of picture books about space and rockets, and these books sometimes mention solar panels.
In my own picture book, The Rocket that Flew to Mars, I included a bank of solar panels. These solar panels power the new bio-dome built on Mars.
For spacecraft orbiting Earth and for missions to Mars, solar panels are a critical source of energy. They’re becoming increasingly important as a source of renewable energy on earth as well.
So, I thought it would be fun to create art using solar energy!
I’ve had the materials for this project for over a year. This week we finally got around to creating sun prints using photo-sensitive paper.
Book notes:
As I mentioned, my book, The Rocket that Flew to Mars, uses solar panels as an energy source.
I also highly recommend Molly Bang’s My Light. This book focuses on how humans use the sun’s energy in various forms to create electricity.
Want to add a story-time to this project? You can pair up these two books with the art for a mini unit study.
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If you want to avoid shopping on Amazon, I suggest checking Bookshop or your local bookstores instead.
My Light, by Molly Bang
The Rocket that Flew to Mars, by Audrey Sauble
Project Supplies:
- Photo-sensitive paper or cyanotype paper (we used Nature Print Paper from Dick Blick Art, but Amazon has options as well).
- Materials for creating a picture on the paper (bold, flat shapes like ferns work best).
- A tub of cold water for rinsing the prints.
- A towel to lay the prints out while the dry.
For this project, my goal was to show my kids that the sun’s energy causes the paper to change.
Before we got started, we talked about solar panels and what happens when the sun’s energy hits the solar panels. The solar panels collect the energy, the energy creates change, and then the changes create an electrical current.
On photo-sensitive paper, the sun’s energy causes the paper to change color. A leaf laid across the paper blocks the sunlight from that section of the paper, protecting that section from changing. This creates a shadow image of the leaf.
This is an activity that goes fast!
The photo-sensitive paper only needs a couple minutes in the sun to create a print. So, to avoid blurring the pictures, I had my kids gather all of their materials ahead of time. We even planned out the pictures on regular paper before pulling out the photo paper.
Start by deciding how many papers to use and what you want to place on them.
Once your kids are ready, lay out the photo paper one sheet at a time.
Have your kids place their leaves or other objects on the paper. Then lay out the next paper until all the papers are set up.
At this point, you’ll need to wait. You won’t see changes right away. After several minutes, though, you will notice that the paper is starting to fade.
Wait a few more minutes, until the paper is almost white. Then collect all of the papers and place them in the tub of water. You usually want to let the paper soak for a minute, but follow the instructions on the packet
Finally, move the finished prints to a towel in the shade to dry.
The images only need to soak for a few minutes. So, you can easily run a couple batches of prints and try different arrangements on the paper.
If you want, you can also turn this project into a science experiment! Try different arrangements to test what happens when the papers don’t get as much sunlight.
In The Rocket that Flew to Mars, I mention that Mars is dusty. This can be a problem for solar panels if there isn’t a way to keep them clean. With this in mind, we left one paper in the shade, where it got very little sunshine. We covered another paper with a couple sheets of wax paper to simulate a dusty solar panel.
When the prints were dried, we found that the shaded paper still picked up some light. But, both the shaded and the dusty images looked noticeably less detailed than the ones placed in full sunlight.
Have you tried sun prints before? How did it go?
This particularly project is a great way to combine science and art! I hope you will try it out and pay attention to other ways that solar energy changes our lives.
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