Color vs little color, keeping it consistent?

[Janeway]

Here is something I have been thinking about...

 

If you use some materials with a small child that is colorful, and some that are not colorful, I would think it could be difficult to get a small child on board with things. For example, if I am using a two tone spelling, I should probably keep math and handwriting two toned. Or, if I really want to use a colorful spelling, I should pick colorful for the others?

 

I traveled to the convention today. I have always used Spelling Workout, which is two toned. I had thought I would look at Zaner-Bloser spelling. SWO was sitting right next to Purposeful Design Spelling. Purposeful Design was very appealing visually with colorful (but not distracting) pages. Zaner-Bloser was also colorful. Compared to those, SWO looked so dull. I could see a child balking at having to do SWO after doing colorful pages with realistic pictures and such. 

[maize]

I dunno, some children might like the variety of very different looking materials.

 

Color or no color doesn't seem to make a big difference for my kids.

[HomeAgain]

I don't know.  I think children gravitate to things that look nice. Period. 

 

I still have a young child (6) and we don't use much in the way of written curriculum for him.  That said, the things he moves towards are not all colorful or all black/white.  It's the quality and intrigue of the work.  He did not like Mathematical Reasoning (colorful), but enjoys MEP (b/w).  He did not like basal readers (b/w), but enjoyed a series of readers using actual children's books (colorful).  Did not like colorful handwriting sheets, but simple b/w.  Our most used manipulative for a long while was (is?) a set of pine spindles, very plain in a box.

 

It's quality that speaks to him.  Something that feels nice to use, is at the right level, and requires respect of the material.

[happypamama]

I think it depends on the child.

 

My first child doesn't care about color or pictures; in fact, she dislikes them.  She likes things simple and clean and without all the cute graphics that some programs use to make things "fun;" those things aren't fun for her, but annoying.

 

My second child likes a little color and fun.

 

My third child doesn't really seem to care.  He liked MEP 1 with its gentle pictures in pastel colors, but he doesn't seem to care if they're there or not.

 

Edited May 7, 2016 by happypamama

[Carol in Cal.]

I think that a thoughtful mix is fine.

There are times when color and even drawings can be a distraction, and times when it is an enhancement.

For example, DD didn't like math, and colorful pages were just a distraction;

But she loved literature, so instead of being a distraction, illustrations were an enhancement.

Know your kid, teach your kid.

[Garga]

I'll echo what others have said.  Some kids find all the pictures on the sides to be too distracting and they can't focus on their work.  Others love them.  You just never know.

[Janeway]

The pictures in Purposeful Design were specifically like this. If he had to write "nest" then there would be a colored pictured that definitely looked like a nest with a little bird in it. It was drawn, not a photograph and looked nice. But it did not have pictures that did not directly relate to the topic. I personally hate the pictures when they do not relate to the topic.

[Baile]

I think it's fine to have a mix. Singapore Math textbooks are in color, the workbooks are in black and white, and none of my kids have ever complained or even mentioned it. 

[Lori D.]

I have a very strongly visual-spatial learner, and color/no color/limited color was not the issue for him -- amount of white space/clutter on the work page was the deal breaker for him. All the way through the grades, he needed lots of white space, not "busy" looking, and not too many different topics on one page in order to focus and not feel overwhelmed. 

 

DS did not have any problems moving from full color work pages to 1-2 color pages to black and white. I suppose that could have possibly been because we absolutely needed to break up any writing work for one subject with a non-writing activity, before doing another activity requiring any writing, so he never was doing back-to-back workbooks / work pages. But he never expressed a preference for/against color or B&W, or expressed a need for "consistency" with how much color. He was much more focused on whether or not he "clicked" with the presentation and way of explaining the material.

 

Example:

Math-U-See, yes. (B&W workbook; visual video lesson presentation, concrete explanations, work pages with lots of white space, mostly focused on the one lesson topic, with a small amount of review problems)

 

Saxon, no. (B&W workbook; text-driven/word based reading of explanation; abstract/algorithm-based; crowded workbook page -- too many problems (lost his place/felt overwhelmed); also too many topics on a page -- his brain could only focus on limited math topics per day)

 

One other observation: we also really needed to limit the overall use of workbooks and work pages -- those just were not a very effective learning tool for our VS learner. Hands-on / doing / manipulating, then watching (like an educational video), and then hearing read-alouds were all better input sources of learning over workbooks /  pages for our DS.

 

 

 

JMO: I think most kids unconsciously pick up on the switch in "look" of materials and it actually helps them switch mental gears to the new topic:

 

- two-tone, with a specific picture on the cover … ding! it's Spelling

- full-color, with a different picture on the cover … ding! it's Geography

- black & white, with a different image on the cover … ding! it's Math

 

I think the only time it might be a potential problem is if a child is highly OCD or has other attention-fixation issues and absolutely MUST have everything the same, as much as possible. I think it's more likely even in such a case, that the child would more be fixated on "only" Spelling Workout for Spelling, and "only" Math Mammoth for Math -- that the child would feel compelled to continue with the same publisher for each subject that the child was initially exposed to when first encountering that subject. But even that is a stretch and probably pretty unlikely. ;)

Edited May 7, 2016 by Lori D.

[Targhee]

I think it is individual specific. I'd personally prefer black on off white with nice layout and type setting over multicolor with poor layout and type setting. I might like two tone over multicolor if the illustrations are more appealing. I might have a preference based on fonts alone (Comic Sans is enough to make me put the book down without second thought).

 

Then again, I really like BFSU even though it's black on stark white, has no real illustrations, has a boring serif font that is fully justified (vs columns) and no layout to speak of. It's because I *love* the approach and content.

 

My kids have really liked some color limited pages (RSO Bio 2) and disliked heavily colored/photo filled ones (MPH Science). There's much more to it than color.

 

I don't think, unless you are using materials all from one publisher, that you can manage the same aesthetic in all books.

Edited May 7, 2016 by Targhee