Learn why artists have been featuring food as a subject in their work for centuries.  You’ve been told to eat your vegetables, but have you ever tried to paint them? Special Guest Lisa McLaughlin, the baker behind Jesse’s Girl Cookies, invites us into her kitchen to experiment with modern art techniques on cakes, and then we’ll make our own painting of a scrumptious treat inspired by 20th-Century painter Wayne Thiebaud.

Learn about art and the five senses. A lot of art is made to be seen — but what if you could touch, hear, and even smell works of art? In this episode, host Lauren Paullin shows you how to mix paints that smell like pastries and transform sounds into sketches. You'll also learn about a fascinating condition called synesthesia, which links multiple senses together in the brain so that some people can taste music, hear color, and smell words! Developed for students in grades 4- adults.

Students perform DNA forensics using food coloring to enhance their understanding of DNA fingerprinting, restriction enzymes, genotyping and DNA gel electrophoresis. They place small drops of different food coloring ("water-based paint") on strips of filter paper and then place one paper strip end in water. As water travels along the paper strips, students observe the pigments that compose the paint decompose into their color components. This is an example of the chromatography concept applied to DNA forensics, with the pigments in the paint that define the color being analogous to DNA fragments of different lengths.

Students learn about the separation techniques of sedimentation and centrifugation and investigate whether blood is a homogeneous or a heterogeneous mixture. Working in groups as if they are biomedical researchers, they employ the scientific method and make observations about the known characteristics of urine, milk and blood. They probe further by analyzing research on the properties and fractionation modes of blood. As students learn about certain strange characteristics with the fractionation behavior of blood, they formulate hypotheses on the unique nature of blood. Using provided materials —olive oil, tomato juice and petroleum jelly—they design an experiment and construct a blood model. They test their hypotheses by conducting experiments on the blood model, and then propose theories for the nature of blood as a mixture—arriving at the theory of mixture dualism in blood—that blood is a complex mixture system. An activity-guiding handout and PowerPoint® presentation are provided for this student-directed, project-based activity.

Learn about the connections between the arts and the Earth. Make art at home using natural and recycled materials, travel the world to see some of the planet’s oldest paintings (in caves!), and check out an Earth-friendly music video featuring primary school students in Mamelodi Township, South Africa.

In this activity, learners overlap the three primary colors to see how all other colors are made. This activity also explains how color can be explained by the subtraction of colors of light, related to the principles of absorption and reflection of light.