Special needs children get tremendous benefits from art lessons. They are usually poor academically, but not with arts. This study is crucial to maximise these children’s involvement in arts because they are prone to diseases due to their weak immune system. Most paints are labelled ‘non-toxic’ but they are not entirely safe. The ‘Volatile Organic Compounds’ that is found in common paints is actually hazardous. This research was to find out ways to produce food grade paints to be used in special children's art classes. Experiments were done with variety of edible ingredients to produce the safest paint substance.

1. Experimenting and Introducing Food Grade
Paints to Children:
A Case Study on
Putrajaya Precint 9(2) Pre-school for Special
Children
Juhanita Jiman & Ling Siew Woei
Multimedia University,
Cyberjaya, MALAYSIA

2. Introduction
 Art nurtures healthy
social interactions and
well-being culture in
the society.
 Color can stimulate
thinking, feeling and
evoke emotion.
 Art lessons have greater
roles in special children
education, they give them
freedom and room to
express themselves
and be creative.

3. Harmful Ingredients
 Four main ingredients for paints are: binder,
pigment, solvent and filler.
 All four main ingredients of these store-
bought paints mostly have synthetic
substances. Most of these synthetic
ingredients contain VOCs.
 A Johns Hopkins University study found that
more than 300 toxic chemicals and 150
carcinogens may be present in paint.

4. Danger of VOC
 These children are exposed to harmful
synthetic dyes and paints during art
classes. The VOC (Volatile Organic
Compounds) that is found in common store
bought paints have significant vapor
pressures that can affect the
environment and human health.
 Special needs children have greater risk
compared to normal children due to their
weak immune system.

5. Understanding children with special needs
 These children may have physical disabilities,
speech problems, other developmental delays, or
have difficulty communicating and interacting with
their surroundings.
 These special children may have specific needs
based on what they are capable or not capable of,
therefore, understanding their basic needs is
crucial in helping them to cope with their learning
environment.
 Special needs children deserve to be treated
equally. They need extra love and care to go
through their challenging life.

6. Focus of the paper
 This study was to find out ways to
produce safe, fun, cheap and
environmentally friendly
(green)paints to be used by children
especially special needs children.
Investigations and experiments was
carried out on edible organic materials
to create the base of the paints and
finding suitable color pigments.

7. Understanding ‘green’ and safe organic paints
 A safer choice is making home made paints from
natural ingredients.
 Paint is not easy to make but it can be an
enjoyable task. Planning is essential and need a
lot of room for experimentations.
 Recipes, ingredients, and proportions have
to be written down in detailed record so the
paints can be replicated
 Proportions of ingredients are the most
important; an incorrect ratio may reduce the
ability to adhere to a surface, durability, and
quality.

8. The Olden Days Paint Substitutes
Traditional egg tempera recipe
 Traditionally, egg tempera can be used inside or
outside and can last for over 20 years. This paint
dries in about an hour to a glossy finish. Customary
egg tempera consists of egg yolk, boiled linseed
oil, water, and pigment.
 Egg tempera is a luminous, semi-translucent paint
that dries quickly. To avoid mold and bacterial
growth on the painting, only sterile water is used
to mix with the paint.

9. Old recipe
Methods for egg tempera base
•Separate an egg, leaving the membrane around the
yolk intact.
•Discard the white and remove the remaining egg
white by gently wash the yolk under lukewarm water,
or carefully pat with a paper towel.
•Hold the intact yolk over a glass or ceramic
container, and puncture the membrane to let the
liquid out. Discard the membrane.
•Stir this egg yolk with a whisker or a fork. Add 2
tablespoons water plus 1/3 teaspoon white household
vinegar to two parts of yolk, and stir again. The slight
acidity of the diluted vinegar helps to emulsify the
egg yolk and extends the life of the paint.

10. Egg Tempera Painting Demo by Alex Garcia
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=453992

11. The old-style pigments
 Colors and pigments follow a symbolic and artistic
progression from dark and "earthy" for base colors to
"spiritual" or "heavenly" for final layers.
 Base layers are more coarsely ground, darker and
less expensive pigments.
 The most beautiful, costly, and finely ground
pigments are reserved for top floats and finishing
touches.
 Blue was particularly rare and precious, used selectively
for the most exalted subjects. Gold leaf is typically
used for subdued and subtle icon colors.
 Some pigments are taken from rocks and ground into
natural red and brown ochre. There are also other
pigments such as the iridescent white that is made of
ground seashells.

12. Experimental Egg Tempera base paint
 Traditional egg tempera recipe has thinner
consistency and it is translucent.
 In history, a lot of tempera layers were needed to get
desired effect and color.
 For this experimental purpose, thicker and more
opaque paint is needed for children to work more
effectively.
 The same basic egg yolk base ingredients are used to
make an improvised version of egg tempera, one part
plain flour is mixed to add extra consistency to the
paint. Because of egg yolk has an unpleasant odor,
grated lemon rind is added to add fresh scent to the
paints.

13. Experimental Egg Tempera: The pigments
 The pigments are taken mostly from plants and
edible sources. The plants (mostly leaves) are
processed and strained to get the juice. The
juice is then boiled rapidly and left to evaporate
leaving a thick almost powdery color paste.
 However, after
long
experiments,
the help of a
very tiny drop
of liquid food
coloring is
needed to get
a dominant
effect.

14. Experimental Egg: Yellow
Yellow is the easiest
color to get because
the base tempera
itself is yellow.
However, one part of
turmeric and saffron
powder is added to
get a better and
brighter color.

15. Experimental Egg: Red, Green, Purple
The pigments
 Red is extracted from red
spinach, hibiscus and mixed
with paprika powder.
 Green is derived from
screwpine leaves (pandan) and
a few different kinds of grass
and leaves.
 Purplish blue is taken from
purple dragon fruit. This fruit
has the strongest pigment.

16. The Experiment : Situation
 Putrajaya Precint 9(2) Integration School was
chosen because of its readiness for special
needs pre-school education; being the only
school in Putrajaya that has special needs children
at pre-school level.
 Special needs children from pre-school level are
chosen to participate in this research because at
this level, these special children are exposed to a
lot of art activities as part of their therapy.
 These special children were invited to have art
lesson experimenting with the freshly made organic
paints. Four basic colors were pre-mixed for the
children to use. They are red, yellow, green and
purplish blue.

17. The Art Activity: Warming Up session
Breaking up the silence with circle time.
After about half an hour of ice breaking session, we
got their attention.

18. The Art Activity : Warming Up session
The children put
on their loose
adult's t-shirt as
art aprons and
they also
covered their
working table
with canvas.

19. The Observation : The teachers
During the first few minutes of the activity, the
children were quite nervous and not quite know what
to do with the paints in the cute bottles.
The teachers had to help
them poured the paints into
homemade palette made out
of empty egg containers. It
was observed that the
teachers are very creative by
recycling used items to be
used in art classes i.e. the
egg containers palettes, old
adult t-shirt as aprons and
used cloths, fruits,
vegetables and sponges as
art tools.

20. The Observation cont…
This initial step was quite intense. They
were probably shy and not used to
being watched and observed. They
finally got used to us and started to do
their usual art lesson. They seemed to
be very eager to use the paints. The
children starting to loosen up, relaxed
and looked more happy and
enthusiastic.

21. These children were given an art block each.
We briefly explained to the children that they
basically can draw anything they want. They
were encouraged to be as creative using the
paint and materials provided.
The Observation cont…laying out paper

22. The children spent
about an hour making
and finishing their
paintings.
We were amazed on
how these children
managed to employ all
the methods they know
to create their craft.
The Observation cont…self-expression

23. So how did they express
themselves?
They used brushes,
sponges, old dabbing
clothes and even their
hands and fingers.

27. The Observation cont…laying out paper
Some of them even managed to finish more
than one painting. They were very happy
with their artworks.

28. enjoying the art activity

29. Beautiful results of brushes, sponges, old
dabbing clothes, hands and fingers…

33. The teachers were
extremely pleased with
the results. According
to them, these children
were seen unusually
enthusiastic and
attentive to the class
that day.
This is probably due to
the new faces they
were seeing or the cute
bottles of paints that
they were using.
The Observation cont…excitements

34. Interview report
A few children (who are able to talk) were casually
interviewed and asked about their opinion on the art lesson
that day and about the new paints that they used.
All of them positively said that they
liked the paints especially the
fresh scent of the paints. They
could not describe about the lemon
scent but they did notice that the paints
smell good. They also said that the
paints feel good to the touch and the
colors were attractive.

35. Teachers interview
When the two teachers were interviewed, both of them
agreed that these paints are seen more child-friendly
and safer than the ordinary ‘non-toxic’ acrylic paints
that they normally used.
According to them, the so-called ‘non-toxic’ paints that
they usually used have some kind of unpleasant odor
that was earlier explained as VOC. Even though the
odor is not that strong, it is very much noticeable. They
also believe that in a long term run, this odor will be
hazardous to the children during prolong inhalation.
These teachers were also commented, during their
lessons using normal acrylic paints, these children
were seen to lick their fingers. This is even more
dangerous because the chemical base of the paints is
non-edible and could cause health risks to these
children.

36. Future research: Awareness and education
Unfortunately, organic and natural paints are
quite new to the Malaysian society. The
culture to ‘nurture the nature’ for better living
is still an alien concept for most Malaysians.
It is actually a big task to first educate the
teachers and parents. There are some
parents who are concerned about what
materials their children are using at school,
but due to lack of resources, their concerns
are not taken any further.

37.  Organic and natural paints available in the overseas market
may not be the parents choice due to the hefty price,
although they may have heard about the hazards normal
paints may cause to their children. There is no known
Malaysian store that sells these natural art products. Even in
the global market, only very few stores are available selling
this kind of materials. These stores are basically started by
people who are concerned about the hazardous children art
materials.
 Clementine Arts is one of the examples of those
people who started their business out of their concerns on
children’s health risks. Because or there are only a handful of
natural paints stores globally, the cost of natural and organic
paints is really high.
Future research:

38. teachers and parents are too busy to make these paints
themselves. These paints require tedious process and
patience. It is seen that further research and investigations
on organic natural art paints are beneficial for the society.
the method of producing the paints’ body or base materials
and methods of preservation. It is seen that, to prolong shelf
life with less effective natural preservatives, powdered
paints are probably the answer. Thus, the research may
include how can the powder be produced and later mixed
into desired consistency. The solvent or solution to mix the
paint should also be investigated.
get stronger color pigments from varieties of edible sources.
Future research: Preparing the paints

39. THANK YOU !
juhanita@mmu.edu.my
Acknowledgement
Photos courtesy of
Ling Siew Woei
Special thanks to The
Head Mistress of
Putrajaya Precint 9(2)
School (Pn. Hjh
Khamisah Noor bt Md.
Zin)
Two teachers from
Pre-school for Special
Children : (Puan Siti
Nordiyana and Puan
Normaliza)
Special Children from
Putrajaya Precint 9(2)
School