Paper crafts are an excellent at-home activity for stimulating your preschooler's imagination. In an age of over-stimulating technology, arts and crafts help us slow down, work through a task step by step, and achieve a goal—all while allowing us to express our creativity. Here are seven of our favourite advantages of preschool paper crafts.
1. Improving Fine Motor Skills
Paper crafts encourage children to draw, tear, glue, and paint, among other dexterity-building activities. These activities improve preschoolers' fine motor skills and their ability to concentrate for longer periods of time. Paper crafts put tangible building blocks in the hands of preschoolers, allowing them to focus on each step separately and make adjustments using their motor skills.
2. Developing Imagination
Are we constructing a flower? Is it an animal? Is that a spaceship? Whatever the outcome of your child's paper craft, the journey began with a piece of paper and continues through their imagination to the finished product. Every decision your child makes along the way contributes to the development of their creativity and the discovery of their preferences. From colour selection to the materials they prefer to use, seemingly insignificant decisions have the greatest impact on the outcome of their project.
3. Learning to Follow Instructions
With a goal in mind, your preschooler can practise following a step-by-step procedure to complete a project from start to finish. Working through this with your child, while allowing them to contribute creatively, demonstrates to them what is possible if they put their minds to it. This lesson also demonstrates how our choices affect the outcome of any situation, as well as how much we deviate from the "rules."
4. Promoting Quality Time
Crafts, like any other activity you do with your child, encourage spending quality time together. Choosing a project, following the steps, and celebrating a goal can all be family activities.
5. Inspiring Critical Thinking
Paper crafts encourage critical thinking in your preschooler. They have an infinite number of options as they work on their project, so this is an excellent learning opportunity to see how their decisions affect the outcome. If they do something well or make a good decision, they are likely to do it again. On the other hand, if they see that a decision did not result in the desired outcome, they can make changes to improve the next time. Critical thinking activities encourage your child to explore their own ideas and come up with new, creative ways to achieve a goal.
6. Expressing Emotions
Children express their emotions in numerous ways. Paper crafts provide another outlet for them to express themselves and provide insight into their emotional health. For example, if they're drawing a face and it's frowning, it opens up a channel of communication through which you can ask questions (e.g., "Why did you choose a frown instead of a smile?"). This is just one example, but ultimately, by observing your child's choices and asking questions, you allow them to express themselves in ways that are more comfortable for them.
7. Encouraging Social Skills
Paper crafts foster a collaborative environment in which your child can collaborate with you or a peer to achieve a common goal. This collaboration allows them to improve their communication skills and connect with others their age. Even children with disparate interests can collaborate on a craft project.
