Water for Schools
Menu

Worksheet Kindergarten Art & Music

Bright Hydrants on Primrose Street: A Color-Contrast Design Page

Kindergartners judge which hydrants stand out on grass, snow, a brick wall, and a gray sidewalk, then pick and defend a paint color for a Primrose Street hydrant.

Objectives

  1. Students will tell whether a colored object is easy or hard to see against a given background.
  2. Students will explain that a color stands out when it is different from the color behind it.
  3. Students will choose a hydrant color that contrasts with green grass and give a reason for it.

Vocabulary

Key words: hydrant, stand out, background, bright, pipe

Teacher overview

Primrose Street is a fictional street where the town is repainting its fire hydrants. A hydrant is the short metal post where firefighters connect a hose to the water pipe that runs under the street, and in an emergency they need to spot it quickly, often at night, in rain, or after snow. This page uses that job to teach contrast, one of the first design ideas young artists can reason about. A color is easy to see when it is different from whatever is behind it, and a hydrant that matches its background blends into it.

The page is read aloud. Print each hydrant as a simple outline standing on its background: a green strip of grass for items 1, 2, and 10, a white snowbank for items 3, 4, and 8, a red brick wall for item 5, and a gray sidewalk for item 6. Color the hydrants in items 1 through 5 before copying, or tell children which color each one is as you read, since the answers depend on the pairing of hydrant and background. Leave the hydrants in items 6 and 10 uncolored for the children to fill in.

Two misconceptions come up often with this page. The first is that a bright or favorite color always stands out. Item 5 addresses it directly: a red hydrant is bright, yet in front of a red brick wall it nearly disappears, while a yellow one is easy to find. When children get this item wrong, ask them to put a finger on where the hydrant ends and the wall begins. The second misconception is about the water. Many children picture a hydrant as a small tank that is filled with water ahead of time. It is actually connected to a large pipe under the street, which is part of the same system that brings clean water to homes and to the school. Item 9 raises this, and it is worth a sentence of explanation even for children who answer it correctly.

Bright Hydrants on Primrose Street: A Color-Contrast Design Page — Kindergarten Art & Music
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Worksheet

Read each item out loud. Point to each picture as you read.

  1. A green hydrant stands on green grass. Is it easy to see or hard to see?
  2. A red hydrant stands on green grass. Is it easy to see or hard to see?
  3. Snow fell last night. A white hydrant stands in the white snow. Is it easy to see or hard to see?
  4. Hydrant A is white. Hydrant B is red. They both stand in the snow. Which one is easy to see?
  5. Hydrant C is red. It stands by a red brick wall. Hydrant D is yellow. It stands by the same red wall. Which one is easy to see?
  6. Hydrant E stands on a gray sidewalk. Color it so it is easy to see. What color did you use?
  7. Firefighters need to find a hydrant fast. Why do we paint a hydrant a color that stands out?
  8. Deep snow can hide a short hydrant. Draw a tall pole with a flag next to it. Why does the flag help?
  9. The hydrant gets its water from a big pipe. Is the pipe under the street, or up in a tree?
  10. The Primrose Street hydrant stands on green grass. What color would you paint it? Color it. Tell why.

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

Answer Key
  1. Answer: Hard to see.
    The green hydrant matches the green grass, so its edges blend into the background.
  2. Answer: Easy to see.
    Red is very different from green, so the hydrant's shape stands out clearly against the grass. A child with red-green color blindness may honestly find this hydrant hard to see; accept the answer and ask the child to describe what they see.
  3. Answer: Hard to see.
    White on white has almost no contrast. After a snowfall a white hydrant can be missed entirely.
  4. Answer: Hydrant B.
    The red hydrant is different from the white snow, so it stands out. The white one blends in.
  5. Answer: Hydrant D.
    This is the key item on the page. Red is a bright color, but against a red wall the red hydrant has no contrast. Yellow is different from red, so Hydrant D is the easy one to find.
  6. Answer: Any color that is not gray, such as yellow, red, or orange.
    Accept any color clearly different from the gray sidewalk. A child who colors the hydrant gray or white should compare it with the sidewalk and try again.
  7. Answer: So firefighters can see it and find it fast.
    Accept any answer about finding it quickly, seeing it from far away, or not losing it in the grass or snow.
  8. Answer: The flag sticks up above the snow.
    Accept "people can see the flag when the hydrant is covered" or similar. The pole is a design choice about height rather than color, and it solves the problem that item 3 raised.
  9. Answer: Under the street.
    The hydrant connects to a large water pipe buried under the street, and that pipe is part of the system that brings clean water to houses and the school.
  10. Answer: Accept any color that is different from green, with a reason.
    Strong reasons name the grass, as in "yellow, because it is not like the green grass," or name the firefighters, as in "red, so the firefighters can see it." A child who chooses green should be asked item 1 again and allowed to change the color.

Differentiation

Support

Cut out a few paper hydrant shapes in different colors and let the child slide each one across the backgrounds on the page, saying easy or hard for each. Moving the same hydrant from grass to snow makes the idea that the background matters visible without any reading. For item 6, offer three crayons, one of them gray, so the choice is manageable.

Extension

Give the child a second copy of the item 10 hydrant with a yellow background and ask for a new color that stands out there. Then ask whether their first color still works on yellow, and why or why not. Children ready for more can design a hydrant that stays easy to see in two places, such as on grass in summer and in snow in winter.

ELL supports

Teach easy to see and hard to see with a gesture: eyes wide and a pointing finger for easy, a hand shading the eyes and a squint for hard. Children can answer items 1 through 5 with the gesture alone. Hold each crayon against the background on the page while naming the color, and accept item 10 in the home language, restating the reason in English.

Extensions

Take a short walk around the school neighborhood and look for a real hydrant, noting its color and what is behind it. Back in class, children can hold colored paper squares against photos of backgrounds they saw on the walk, such as a hedge, a brick wall, or a sidewalk, and vote on which square stands out most against each one.