Art Project: Marble Painting

A cardboard box with marbles and apple shapes cut out of paper inside. The marbles are covered in red paint and streaks of paint are also on the paper apples.

This is a really fun project that kids (or adults) of almost any age and any art skill level can do! It's also really fun because you get to shake marbles around in a box and that's just pretty cool. You can also customize the project by allowing the student to trace or draw something they're really interested, like cars, trains, or dinosaurs.

I've made a video demonstration of the activity that you can show to your student. At the beginning of the video, I talk a bit about how to use video modeling to teach new skills and why it's a helpful teaching approach for students with autism. Once you've watched that (it's just for us grown-ups), you can skip to the art project demonstration and show just that part to your child or students. Adaptation: if your child or student has trouble cutting around small details (like I had trouble with the leaf of the apple), you can just draw a box around their drawing and they can cut out the box. Or, you can cut out their drawing for them, whichever is more appropriate for the child and situation. Another idea is to just put a blank piece of paper in the box and paint on it - no shape needed! Supplies needed for this project: Paper Crayon or marker Scissors Marbles Paint Paper plate (or something to hold the paint) Empty box