The Day the Crayons Quit

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Poor Duncan just wants to colour in. But when he opens his box of crayons, he only finds letters, all saying the same thing: We quit!

Beige is tired of playing second fiddle to Brown, Blue needs a break from colouring in all that water, while Pink just wants to be used. Green has no complaints, but Orange and Yellow are no longer speaking to each other.
The battle lines have been drawn. What is Duncan to do?

Teaching Ideas and Resources:

English

• Write a new letter from one of the crayons to Duncan.
• Write a new story about everyday objects that decide to quit.
• Find synonyms for different colours (e.g. Red = Crimson, maroon, rose, cherry). Make a colour thesaurus that you can refer to in your own writing.
• Write a conversation between two (or more) of the crayons.
• Write Duncan’s replies to the crayons’ letters.
• Write a story about a magic, multi-coloured crayon. What might happen to the person who uses it?
• Read the sequel to this book. Which do you prefer?
• Create a display board that shares your children’s writing linked to this book.

Maths

• Find out the cost of different sets of crayons. Work out the cost of each crayon in the sets. Which set is the best value?
• Measure the lengths of the coloured crayons in your classroom. Could you use this information for data handling / statistics activities?

Science

• Find out about colour. What is it? Why do we see things in different colours?
• Learn more about colour blindness. How does this affect some people?
• Yellow and orange crayons have an argument about the colour of the sun. What colour is the sun?

Computing

• Use painting software to mix different colours together.

Design Technology

• Design a new home to help the crayons relax after a busy day of work.

Art

• Create a chart that shows the colours of a range of objects. Use the information in the story to help you.
• How many different colours can you think of?
• Create your own colouring pages that others can colour using crayons that haven’t quit.
• Draw pictures of objects using very unusual colours (e.g. blue strawberry, a green dog).
• Use paint (or other art materials) to create many different shades of the same colour.
• Create a poster that teaches other children about primary, secondary and tertiary colours.
• Can you create your own colour wheel?
• Design a new wrapper for the peach crayon!
• Create a picture that uses all of the colours in your crayon set, just like Duncan does.
• Take a look at our free Colour resources too.