Lesson plan Grade 2 Art & Music

Frozen Paint Blocks: A Grade 2 Melting Water Art Lesson

A 45-minute grade 2 art lesson in which students paint with cubes of frozen colored water and argue from what they saw that melting and freezing repeat.

Grade: Grade 2
Subject: Art & Music
Material: Lesson plan
Time: 45 min
Prep: Moderate prep
Materials: 2 ice cube trays with washable liquid paint frozen in them, plus craft sticks set in each cube, A jar of paint that was melted earlier in the week and refrozen, kept solid until the lesson, Heavy paper or card stock, one sheet per student, folded into two panels, Small bowls or foil trays to catch drips, one per pair, A burned or toasted slice of bread on a plate, for comparison only

Standards

2-PS1-4 NGSS

Construct an argument with evidence that some changes caused by heating or cooling can be reversed and some cannot.

How this material aligns: Students paint with frozen colored water, record the cube at the start and end of the painting round, and build a class argument that melting and refreezing return the same water to the same two forms, while a burned slice of toast shown alongside cannot be changed back.

All materials for 2-PS1-4 →

W.2.2 Common Core ELA

Write informative/explanatory texts in which they introduce a topic, use facts and definitions to develop points, and provide a concluding statement or section.

How this material aligns: Each student writes a two-sentence caption under the finished panels that uses the definitions of solid and liquid taught in the lesson and closes with a statement of what the paint did, which is informative writing in the short form this grade begins with.

All materials for W.2.2 →

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This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely, without attribution. Updated 2026-07-23.

Objectives

Students will describe frozen paint as a solid and melted paint as a liquid using what they observe.
Students will give evidence from the painting round that melting and freezing can happen to the same water again.
Students will write two caption sentences that explain what happened to the paint.

Vocabulary

Key words: solid, liquid, melt, freeze, reverse

Teacher overview

Colored water frozen into cubes gives second graders a brush that changes form while they are still using it, and that change is what the lesson is built on. Students paint one panel while the cube is hard and a second panel once it has slumped into liquid, then use the difference between the two panels as their evidence that heating changed the paint and cooling can change it back.

The one piece of preparation that decides whether this works is timing. Freeze the trays at least two days ahead with a craft stick standing in each cube, and keep the second tray in the freezer until the moment you need it, because a cube that has already melted on the counter leaves nothing to observe. Set aside one jar of melted paint at the end of a previous art period, refreeze it, and bring it out solid during the opening, since that jar gives the class its clearest evidence that the change runs both ways and preparing it costs only a shelf in the freezer. Use washable, nontoxic paint, and remind students before the opening that the cubes on sticks are not ice pops and must never go in a mouth.

Procedure

Opening and predictions (8 min). Pass a frozen paint cube around the circle in a bowl so each child can touch it briefly. Read aloud: "This paint is hard and cold. We call that a solid. What do you think will happen when we hold it and paint with it?" Take four or five predictions and record them on chart paper without correcting any of them. Then hold up the jar of paint that was melted last week and frozen again. Read aloud: "This paint was runny. Now it is hard again. Keep that jar in your mind while we paint."

Painting the first panel (14 min). Give each pair a bowl and each student a folded sheet. Students paint the left panel while the cube is still solid, noticing that a hard cube leaves a pale, scratchy mark. Circulate and ask individual students what their cube feels like now compared with a minute ago. Have every student draw a quick sketch of their cube in the margin before they set it down.

Watching the change (8 min). Students rest the cubes in the bowls and step back. While the paint melts, gather the class and show the plate with the burned toast. Read aloud: "We cooked this bread. Can we cool it down and get soft bread back?" Let students answer, then name the difference: some changes can be reversed and some cannot. Send students back to sketch the cube a second time in the margin.

Second panel and building the argument (12 min). Students paint the right panel with the now liquid paint, which spreads in wide wet strokes. Bring the class together and chart the argument with a sentence frame: "Our paint melted because it got warm. It can freeze again because ___." This is the formative check. Every student says the frame aloud to a partner, and you listen for nearly every pair to name warming or cooling as the cause before moving on. Any pair that names color or brushing instead gets a second turn with you at the chart.

Closing captions (3 min). Students write their two caption sentences under the panels and leave the page flat to dry. Collect one cup of melted paint from each table for the freezer so the next class has refrozen paint of its own to look at.

Frozen Paint Blocks: A Grade 2 Melting Water Art Lesson — Grade 2 Art & Music

Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Handout

Fold your paper so it makes two panels side by side.

Left panel, titled Solid. Paint this panel while your cube is still hard and cold. In the margin, draw a small picture of your cube the way it looks right now.

Right panel, titled Liquid. Paint this panel after your cube has melted. In the margin, draw a small picture of your cube the way it looks now.

Caption lines. Write two sentences under your panels. Sentence one tells what a solid is and what a liquid is. Sentence two tells what your paint did while you painted.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Differentiation

Support

Give these students the largest cubes and seat them nearest the warm side of the room so the melt is unmistakable within the painting window. Offer a cloze caption: "Frozen paint is a ___. Melted paint is a ___. My paint ___ because it got warm." Accept the margin sketches in place of the second caption sentence when writing stamina runs out.

Extension

Ask these students to predict which of two cubes will melt first, a cube left in a bowl and a cube held in a hand, then paint a third small panel showing the result and write one sentence naming the cause. Confident writers can add the burned toast to their caption as an example of a change that cannot be reversed.

ELL supports

Pre-teach solid, liquid, melt, and freeze with the objects in hand rather than pictures: the cube, the bowl of melted paint, and the refrozen jar are all on the table. Attach a gesture to each word that the whole class uses, such as a closed fist for solid and open flowing fingers for liquid. Allow captions in the home language with the four target words added in English during a short conference at the drying rack.

Extensions

Pour each table's melted paint into a labeled cup and freeze it overnight, then open the next morning by handing the cups back solid. Students add one more sentence to their captions dated the following day, which turns the lesson into a two-day record of the same water in both forms. A second round of painting with those recycled cubes costs no new materials and produces a class banner of solid-and-liquid pairs for the hallway.