Art Collages for Children

Create a collage from abstract images or realistic shapes layered over one another.

Children love art projects and a great way to let them explore the world of cutting, gluing and pasting pictures is to make a colorful collage. The collage can be as abstract or realistic as the child wants and can show everything from a collection of specific pictures to a set of random objects showing things the child enjoys. Try it out with your own children and put the pages in a binder to form your child's first scrapbook.

Educational Collages

Collages consist of lots of shapes and pictures cut out and pasted over one another, but that doesn't make them completely abstract. If you want your children to learn something from their collages or you need a project to use in the classroom, consider a themed collage based around the current lesson. For example, the Artists Helping Children website suggests collages that teach numbers where children glue on similar objects in groups. A collage based on the number five might have pictures or tiny objects such as colorful sequins in clusters of five. The same idea works for creating an alphabet collage where children must cut out a picture to represent each letter of the alphabet. It could be a picture of the letter itself, or an object that starts with that letter. Educational collages entertain children's creative sides while helping them learn.

Personality Collages

Children enjoy expressing their own ideas and independent personalities. You can encourage personal growth by asking kids to make a collage that represents themselves and what they enjoy. Provide magazines for children to clip pictures out of and make duplicate copies of family photographs so children can cut them up and paste them on their collage. Fill up an entire page or let children cut out a large piece of their favorite colored paper in the shape of the first letter of their name. Glue the paper to a piece of cardboard or poster board for more support.

Shape Collages

Children can also create themed collages by cutting the background paper into a specific shape. A child who enjoys baseball might cut a white piece of paper into a round circle and glue baseball-related pictures onto it before adding thin red lines to represent the stitches on the ball. If a student wants to make a certain shape but finds it too complicated to cut out, you can look for a template online and print it off. Then trace the shape onto the paper and cut it out for the child. Popular examples include a ballet shoe for children who enjoy dance, a large music note for children who enjoy music or want to play an instrument, or a simple shape like a sun to represent a child's favorite season.

References

• Artists Helping Children Arts & Crafts: Collage Crafts for Children