4 Simple Art Ideas for Infants and Toddlers

The sweet little Mother's day craft my youngest brought home reminded me of a post from last year: Why Most Young Children Don't Like Making Crafts.

The gist - these cute-themed crafts that young children bring home are made (mostly) by their teachers.

To be clear - I don't think there's anything wrong with that! I love my son's teachers and I appreciate the sentiment.

I share this because it's helpful to understand why your child might have no interest in doing these kinds of crafts at home.

At this age, their focus is on the process rather than the product.

They're interested in the art tools, colours, textures, etc., not the end product.

Art that requires them to follow too many instructions or create something that will look identical to what others create is not in their best interest developmentally. 

The goal for art activities with infants and toddlers should be to provide them with a rich sensory experience.

When you realize this, you'll have more patience and understanding when their art gets messy. 

4 Simple Art Ideas for Infants and Toddlers

1. Colour Mixing Canvas - This activity is great for infants and toddlers. You can adapt it in different ways as the child grows.  All you need is tempera paint in primary colours and a canvas.

• In infancy, put some dollops of paint on the canvas and then slide it into a freezer bag. Invite the child to move the colours around with their hands.  When they’re finished, remove the canvas and let it dry.  
• For toddlers, invite them to explore the paint with their hands. Do the activity without the freezer bag.  
• Add art tools, like paint brushes, rollers, sponges, etc., to enrich their exploration.
  
• Mix colours on a larger scale with a giant canvas, using different tools and body parts to paint.  
• Take this activity outdoors. Use spray bottles filled with watered down paint to paint a giant canvas outside. An old white sheet works really well too!

2. Play Dough - Recommended for toddlers, once they’re out of the mouthing stage. 

• Invite the child to use their hands to explore the play dough. It's great for fine motor skills.
• You can add tools or loose parts, like a rolling pin, textured stamps, cookie cutters, things found in nature, etc. to enrich their exploration. Making play dough is a great activity in itself. Click here for the BEST Play Dough recipe.   

3. Gluing - Recommended for toddlers, once they’re out of the mouthing stage and are able to follow multi-step instructions.

• All you need is some paper, scraps and glue.
• Put the scraps in a bowl and demonstrate how to put glue on one side and then glue it to the piece of paper. This activity allows children to explore gluing in an open-ended way.
• You can make this activity more meaningful to the child by cutting out pictures of cars, animals, or whatever they have a strong interest in. For a mess-free alternative, you could also just use stickers.  

4. Cutting Strips - Recommended for children who can safely use scissors.

• All you need are some strips of paper and child-sized scissors.
• You can create strips by simply cutting paper down to a manageable size or check out our FREE Printable Cutting Strips.
• Demonstrate how to cut the strips into smaller pieces. Tip: Save your snippets and use them for the gluing activity above.

How To Create an Art Area

Besides these activities above, you can pique your child’s interest in art activities simply by keeping some of their art materials accessible.

Designate a small area of their play area for art activities.

Make sure the materials you have out you’re comfortable with, i.e. they’re safe, won’t result in too big of a mess, etc.

I would recommend:

• a few crayons and some paper on a tray
• Play dough in a container with some tools on a tray
• a bowl of stickers with some paper on a tray

Start there and rotate the materials based on your child’s interest. 

Rotating materials doesn’t necessarily mean swapping them out for something else, it could be adding something to it, i.e. switching up the tools being used with the play dough or adding different sized stickers.