Creativity is critical to your child’s mental, social, and emotional development, as it opens up the mind to entirely unique ways of thinking. As such, it’s important to provide your child with the means to pursue their creative ventures, allowing them to form hobbies and grow their creative mind. For many children, their creative endeavor of choice is painting for kids, which provides them with both a unique medium and a novel sensory experience. Of course, painting can mean a lot of things, so there may be a bit of trial and error to figure out, but the results will make it all worth it. To get you started, though, we’ve put together a few of our favorite easy and creative painting ideas for kids to enjoy.
1. Painting Over a Coloring Sheet
If you’re looking for ways to challenge your child’s creative mind and hone their fine motor skills, try having them paint over a coloring sheet. Though this doesn’t allow for the same boundless creativity as other forms of painting, your child will still be able to work their creative muscles by deciding on colors. In addition, the need to stay within the lines while painting will help them to grow their fine motor skills. Doing so while painting holds far more importance than it does when coloring with crayons or pencils, as painting over the lines will render them invisible and interfere with the final image. As a result, your child will develop their fine motor skills in order to adapt, learning invaluable life skills while also having a great time.
2. Finger Painting
Finger painting is the simplest form of painting, and is perfect for kids of all ages. For younger kids, it’s an excellent way to introduce the idea of creative activities, and can even help to develop their fine motor skills as they learn to make more precise motions to paint the things they want. In addition, getting your child set up with the materials you need for finger painting is extremely easy and cost-efficient. All you need is a canvas or piece of paper, as well as some non-toxic washable tempera paints in various colors. Once you’ve put those materials in front of your child, just turn them loose and see what they create!
3. Painting Clay Sculptures
Painting clay sculptures is once again a great way to develop fine motor skills, and helps your child explore multiple avenues of creative expression through two artistic mediums. For your kid to get started, they’ll need a large amount of polymer clay and several colors of tempera paint. Then, they can put together a clay sculpture. This sculpture can be anything, from a commonplace household item to a zany, far-out imaginary creature. No matter what they decide to put together, though, they’ll be using their creative mind to do so, and the very precise, minute motions required to manipulate the clay into the shape they want will help them to greatly develop their fine motor skills.
Once they’ve shaped the sculpture, all you have to do is pop it in the oven until it sets, and it’ll be ready for your kid to paint. This will allow your kid to follow through with and complete their original vision by coloring in the blank statue. In addition, painting on a textured, 3D surface will give them a unique sensory experience and help them to further expand, develop, and specialize their fine motor skills. While this activity may be on the pricier side, it’s an unforgettable experience, and the statue your child will have to show for it at the end is sure to create fond memories that will last for years to come.
4. Group Painting Party
Creative development can go hand-in-hand with social development, and by turning the act of painting into a fun group activity, you’ll be able to involve your child’s friends in their growth as well. Children often bond over shared interests, so by having them paint together, you create the circumstances for a shared interest to appear. The ultimate result of this is not only a boost to your child’s development, but the formation of lifelong friendships.
5. Open, Freehand Painting
Finally, there’s simple, openhand painting. Just set your child in front of a canvas with their supplies of choice, and let them paint however they want. You may be surprised to see just how much they can do when given the opportunity and freedom to do so!
Interested in more fun ideas and products that will grow your child’s mind and encourage their creative development? Feel free to visit our shop at ToysCentral today!