Elementary Color

by Milton Bradley

The idea is simply to suddenly show to the class a series of disks in rapid rotation and ask them to guess what colors it is composed of, i.e., what the definite name of the color is.

The following is a suggestion for this exercise, supposing that a broken green yellow is to be shown:—

Select a green, a yellow, a white and a black disk of medium size and combine them as follows: Y.20, G.10, W.10, N.60. Then, having previously removed the nut from the spindle of the wheel and laid it in a convenient place, take the combined disks and lay on the top of them any other disk of a larger size, with the center holes of all corresponding with each other and place all these disks on the spindle of the wheel with the larger disk still covering the face of the others. Having previously furnished an assistant with a sheet of cardboard of sufficient size to conceal the disks from the class have it held in front of the wheel while the disk which conceals the combination is removed, the nut screwed to place and the disks put into rapid rotation; then order the card taken away and ask the class what color they see, still continuing the rotation.

The correct answer should be broken green-yellow, and not a shade of green-yellow, a broken yellow-green, a tint of yellow or a yellow shade; for there is but one true name and that should be stated. Definite expressions of color are as possible as the terms used regarding other scientific subjects, and should be encouraged.

Much interest can be inspired and valuable instruction imparted to the children by experiments with the color wheel, but whenever color analysis is the object in view, if disks of more than one of the standard colors are used in the same combination they must be of colors adjacent to each other in the spectrum.

For example, if a blue and a yellow disk are united and placed in rotation the result may be a blue gray, a yellow gray, or perhaps very nearly a neutral gray, because blue and yellow are so nearly complementary to each other. But a nomenclature of the resulting color effect expressed in terms of blue and yellow is not of practical value, because it is evident that in the analysis of a gray-blue, yellow has no logical place. If in an attempt to match a color which seems to be a broken blue, something else besides the blue, white and black is required, it must be either green or violet, i.e., one of the two standard colors adjacent to the blue in the spectrum. In other words, every color in nature is a spectrum color, i.e., either a pure spectrum color, a tint or a shade of a spectrum color, or a broken spectrum color. Hence every color can be matched, and therefore analyzed by the combination of one disk of a standard color with a white disk, a black disk or both, or else by two adjacent spectrum standards with white and black or both.

There are many combinations of disks outside the limitations above named which are valuable and interesting in color investigation when not used for simple analysis, but if they are presented as pleasing experiments before the pupils can understand their logical relation to the subject of color education, the result may be entirely misleading rather than instructive.

In making experiments in broken colors with the wheel the most satisfactory results are secured in orange, violet, green and yellow, while the red is fairly good and the blue less satisfactory than the others because of the slight effect of gray or violet which comes into the lighter tones by rotation, to which reference has already been made.

As explained on Page 54, the so-called tertiary colors, russets, citrines and olives were formerly supposed to be classes of peculiar colors to which these names were given. The fact that these are all broken spectrum colors was first demonstrated by the use of the color wheel and they are now quite generally accepted as such by those who have given heed to modern methods of color instruction.

As already shown the disks have also seemed to correctly define the several scales of colors, so that in contrast to the color charts of a dozen years ago a distinction is clearly drawn between the colors in the yellow and the orange scales, or even between the yellow-orange and the orange-yellow scales, so accurately do the disks determine the hue of a color.