M's first go at printing, quite surprised how successful they were and it was also significantly less stressful than trying to teach a class of year 9s who think they know everything already !!
We used polystyrene printing sheets which are really the easiest was to do printing with little ones (and sometimes big ones too!) we drew into the sheets using cocktail sticks and biro and also pressed christmas themes biscuit cutters in.
You can buy black printing ink from most art shops and rollers too. seawhite is a great art supplier near brighton. Printing ink is water based and does wash out but it is sticky and messy! It also takes at least 24 hours to dry. Computer paper or thin card is ideal for printing onto, sugar paper doesn't work so well, newspaper and magazines are also good.
Roll out the ink onto a flat surface, a sheet of acetate works well or perspex, or you can buy printing trays. Roll it not too thick or too thin, it should make a sticky sound, if it doesn't it's too thick. Have three areas - One for rolling the ink, one for rolling the ink onto the polystyrene and one for printing in onto paper. You will need two rollers, and ink one and a clean one.
Once you've rolled the ink out, roll it onto your piece of polystyrene, in both directions so it is all covered, turn the polystyrene over onto your paper or card and press down firmly, turn it over so the paper is on the top then use your clean roller to roll in both directions and carefully peel the paper off.
It sounds complicate but it really isn't, it sometimes takes a bit of practice to get a good print but children of all ages love it!
I drew out a star and a tree and M filled them with patterns by pressing in pen lids, etc.
We tried out creating some repeat patterns - once a textile designer always a textile designer!
I cut and folded the card first for M to print onto which worked well.
