Toddler Mitten Painting

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Lately, we have been doing a lot of crafts that end in a uniform finished product. Our letter of the week crafts are a good example of this type of craft. Each child gets pre-cut pieces to assemble together so that their finished craft looks like my example craft. This is a skill that will serve them well once they start school. The ability to follow instructions, look off an example and complete a project are all wonderful skills to acquire. However, I also like to promote creativity and self-expression.

The free form craft activities that we complete often do not make it into a blog post because the finished products are well……….interesting. For the toddler and preschool group, it tends to be all about the process and not really about the finished product. Often, there is no finished product. Just a pile of cut up paper or a big blog of every colour paint that now looks like a mud puddle on the page.

Sometimes, I like to do a free form activity that a parent would still like to hang on the fridge. Here is one of those activities- a mitten painting. We had a big snow storm the other day so the kids and I decided to paint some big mittens.

I cut large mitten shapes out of craft paper depending on their colour preference. They love it when they get to pick the colour for their art. Then I gathered a variety of different painting utensils. Paint brushes in different sizes, plastic forks, q-tips, sponges, little rags, rubber basting brushes and whatever else I could find.

I didn’t give the children any instructions but let them pick and choose what they wanted to do with the painting supplies.

This is a great type of activity for a wide range of ages in your home daycare.

Once they felt they were finished painting, I provided them with some cotton balls and glue. They could glue a fluffy cuff on their mittens if they wanted.