20 Best Creative Activities for Kids

As any mother would know, it is hard to keep your child occupied for long periods of time. Children usually have a notoriously small attention span, making it difficult for their caretakers or parents to breathe in peace. It is especially beneficial to have some kid’s creative activities at home lined up for your child if you crave some time to yourself and also want to help your child improve in the meantime.

Video: 7 Fun and Exciting Creative Activities for Kids

Activities for children have to be chosen carefully, as a lot of their mental and intellectual growth depends on what they do during their formative years. An exercise that can work the brain while also intellectually stimulating the child can have a telling effect on their development. Therefore, it is imperative that parents choose the activities that their children do with great care.

Fun Creative Activities for Children

Here are some of the best creative activities for preschoolers & toddlers:

1. Cut and Glue

Using scissors is an activity that all children take some time to learn and is an important motor skill too. This is one of the creative craft activities for kids which helps them build their creativity and also create memorable pieces of art.

What You Will Need:

• A pair of scissors
• Coloured paper with predetermined shapes
• Glue
• Drawing paper

How to Perform:

1. Encourage the child to cut through the predetermined shapes on the coloured paper.
2. You can start with simple shapes and make them complex once your child gets a hang of them.
3. Let him stick the cutouts on the drawing paper to create an artwork.

2. Sticker Fun

Stickers were some of the best aspects of all our childhoods, and they also have beneficial effects on the child. Stickers help build motor skills, as the child concentrates on peeling it off without damaging the paper body, and it also teaches them to be patient.

What You Will Need:

• Stickers
• Drawing Paper/ or a book

How to Perform:

1. Give a wad of stickers to your child, and encourage him to peel them off and stick them the way they like in a book or on a drawing paper.
2. This helps build their creativity, and the resulting artwork is sure to be one to keep for ages.

3. Raised Salt Painting

A tried and tested favourite among children, salt painting is ridiculously fun to do and also an activity that helps improve the child’s creativity. Salt painting can bring out a real potential for art among children, no matter how disinterested they seem at first.

What You Will Need:

• Epsom salt
• Food colour in varied colours
• Glue
• Drawing paper
• Pencil
• Paper plates

How to Perform:

1. On a paper plate, add a few drops of food colour on some Epsom salt and mix. Repeat this process for all the colours the child wants.
2. Let your child draw his favourite shapes and patterns on the drawing paper.
3. Help him apply glue on the designs and then pour the coloured salt over the glued areas.
4. Let it dry.

4. Drawing With Oil Pastel

Although it is not strictly an activity meant for children, oil pastel painting is highly stimulating and fun to do. Encourage your child to draw various shapes on a canvas, and fill it in a variety of ways.

What You Will Need:

• Oil pastels
• Drawing paper
• Baby oil
• Cotton buds

How to Perform:

1. Let your kid draw his favourite things on drawing paper with the oil pastels and fill in the colour. Encourage him to make as many shapes as he wants.
2. For a fine, painting-like art effect, give him some baby oil and help him smear it on the painting with a cotton bud.
3. The baby oil can make any art look vibrant and deserving of being hung on the refrigerator.

5. The Back-And-Forth Drawing Game

Creative games for kids, such as this one, require active participation from the parent, and can greatly help in bringing your child closer to you. This game involves drawing a common image alternatively, so children are forced to think on their feet and make stuff up as the game progresses. This stimulates creativity in your child, as the game becomes harder with each step.

What You Will Need:

• Colour pencils/ crayons
• Drawing paper

How to Perform:

1. Start by drawing an unassuming picture on a paper, and pass it on to your child.
2. The child is to add something of his own accord to the image.
3. Both of you then proceed to build on the drawings of the previous person.

6. Playdough Modelling

Playdough has been a mainstay in toy stores for ages. Not only is it cheap, but it is also a highly fun and creative item to play with. Creative art activities for preschoolers, like this one, are simple. Just provide some playdough to your child, and let his imagination take over. Soon, the child will be seen making shapes of increasing complexity. Playdough easily stimulates the brain and makes the child think hard to make different shapes.

What You Will Need:

• Playdough
• Poke-ins
• Playdough mats

How to Perform:

1. Give your child some playdough and let him make shapes of his choice.
2. You may sit next to him and assist him or have fun making your own shapes.
3. Encourage him to use poke-ins, and playdough mats to make textures on his shapes.

7. Marble Painting

Marble paintings are fun to do and great to look at, so your child is sure to not get bored with this activity any time soon.

What You Will Need:

• Watercolour
• Drawing paper
• Some marbles

How to Perform:

1. Encourage your child to dip the marbles in the paint and draw shapes on the paper.
2. The child can roll the marbles to create interesting patterns or hold them in between his fingers and carefully draw his favourite shapes.

8. Water Balloon Painting

Water balloon painting is another great way to add new textures and techniques to your child’s activities. With this activity, your child can learn how to play with textures.

What You Will Need:

• Some water balloons.
• Watercolour
• Paper plates
• Drawing paper/ canvas

How to Perform:

1. Start with getting your child to fill some water in the water balloons. You may help them tie the opening so that the water doesn’t spill while he is painting.
2. You can have him fill different amounts of water to give him more sizes to experiment with.
3. Remove your child’s favourite colours on different disposable paper plates.
4. Let your child dip the water balloons in the colour. He can dab the balloons or drag and roll them as he pleases on the drawing paper.

9. Elephant Toothpaste

Elephant toothpaste fits the bill perfectly as one of the best creative thinking activities for kids. Watch your child curiously play with a jumbo-sized toothpaste-like substance, which is created out of harmless ingredients.

What You Will Need:

• Safety goggles
• Dry yeast
• A plastic bottle
• Liquid soap, preferably dish soap
• 6% peroxide
• Edible colour
• Warm water

How to Perform:

1. Help your child put on the safety goggles.
2. Take some 6% peroxide in the bottle.
3. Add dish soap and colour.
4. Stir the bottle.
5. In another container, take some yeast and add warm water to it.
6. Add the yeast mix to the bottle with peroxide, dish soap and colour.
7. Step back with your child and watch the mixture lather up and flow out of the bottle in wonderful shapes and forms!

10. Shaving Cream Playdough

For a more interactive creative game for kids, you can choose to make dough out of shaving cream along with your child. Colour the dough in various colours, and watch your child thrive creatively.

What You Will Need:

• 1/2 cup of cornstarch
• 1/2 cup of shaving cream
• Food colour

How to Perform:

1. Help your child mix and knead the cornstarch, shaving cream and edible colour together.
2. The dough would still look crumbly after a while but will be able to hold shapes.
3. Let your child then create desired shapes and patterns with this dough.

11. Making Masks

Making masks can help kids truly think out of the box and use their imagination in creative ways.

What You Will Need:

• A construction plate
• A pair of scissors
• Glue
• Watercolour/crayons
• A pencil
• Two rubber bands

How to Perform:

1. Get your child to mark areas that need to be cut out on the construction plate (for your eyes, nose and mouth).
2. Help him cut the plate as per the markings.
3. Now, let your child colour the mask his way.
4. Poke two holes on opposite sides of the plate.
5. Tie a rubber band on each side, leaving a loop to put on the mask around the ears.

12. Finger Painting

Finger painting has traditionally been one of the messiest activities a child can do, but also one of the most creative.

What You Will Need:

• Watercolour
• Paint palette
• Drawing paper or canvas

How to Perform:

1. Spread some newspaper on a table before your child starts painting.
2. Remove all the colours he wants and let him paint shapes and patterns of his choice with his fingers.

13. Playing School

Playing school at home may not seem appealing, but believe it or not, your child will turn out to love it soon enough.

Things You Will Need:

• Some stationary
• A roll-up blackboard/whiteboard
• Some chalk/ whiteboard markers

How to Perform:

1. Let your child play the roles of whomever he likes; let him choose if he wants to be the teacher or the student, or the principal or the school nurse.
2. Make him alternate various roles until he is satisfied with the dialogue and the outcome.

14. Glowing Dough

Children seem to have an attraction towards anything that glows, and glowing playdough is no different. This activity is advisable for older children who can handle being around the stovetop and are exposed to some amount of cooking. Nonetheless, you need to be around them at all times to prevent any accidents.

What You Will Need:

• 4 to 5 cups of water
• 5 cups of flour
• 2 cups of table salt
• 2/3rd cup of vegetable oil
• 2 tablespoons of cream of tartar
• Edible colour
• Glow-in-the-dark paint
• Blacklight

How to Perform:

1. On a stovetop and on a medium flame, mix all the ingredients except the edible colour and the glow-in-the-dark paint.
2. Let the mixture cook till it starts coming together like a gooey dough.
3. Get it off the stovetop and let it cool a bit.
4. While it is still a little warm, add the food colour and the glow-in-the-dark paint.
5. Knead the dough properly.
6. You can store it in a ziplock, and whenever your child wants to play, he can have some fun making shapes with the dough with some black light.

15. Toy Excavation

To make for a truly memorable evening for your child, excavating toys are a great idea. This can improve their motor and reasoning skills.

What You Will Need:

• Some plastic toys
• Utensils
• Water
• A dropper
• Some saltwater
• Brushes

How to Perform:

1. Take enough water in the utensils and drop the toys in them. You may choose to drop one toy in each utensil or all of them in one large utensil.
2. Keep the utensils in the freezer and let the water freeze.
3. Then, remove the utensils, loosen the ice and drop it in a tray.
4. Make your child excavate the toys carefully with the help of some saltwater, a dropper and some brushes.

16. Butterfly Painting

Kids love butterflies for their vibrant colours. This activity is perfect for your little butterfly!

What You Will Need:

• Paint
• Popsicle stick
• Card paper
• Scissors
• Pipe cleaners
• Glue

How to Perform:

1. On the card paper, ask your child to draw the wings of a butterfly.
2. Using the scissors, cut the wings as one piece and not separately.
3. Colour one wing with the paints in any pattern.
4. Then ask your child to fold the wing over onto the other wing. It will leave the exact same print.
5. Let your child stick the popsicle stick in the middle of the wings to depict the butterfly’s body.
6. Use the pipe cleaners to create antennas for the butterfly.

17. Nature Walk Art

This activity encourages creativity but with a twist!

What You Will Need:

• A bucket for collecting items
• Glue
• Cardboard

How to Perform:

1. Take your child for a stroll out in the neighbourhood.
2. Encourage them to collect anything that catches their eye. It could be pebbles, sticks, fallen leaves, flowers, etc.
3. Once back home, ask your child to create a nature board by glueing whatever they have collected, onto the cardboard.

18. Dance Party

Who doesn’t love a good dance session? Light up your kid’s face with a smile by joining them in this fun activity.

What You Will Need:

• Music
• An open space (at home or outdoors)

How to Perform:

1. Just dance!
2. This is the perfect way to unwind after a long day
3. Explore different genres of music or different cultures
4. Get the whole family involved and make everyone’s day! Your child will thank you for it!

19. Chalk Drawing

Our childhood memories relived! Your little one will love this too.

What You Will Need:

• Different coloured chalk
• Open space outdoors

How to Perform:

1. Let your child channel their inner Picasso as they let their creativity loose by using chalk to draw anything they desire.
2. They can even create an obstacle course by drawing different shapes and reaching from the starting point to the endpoint.
3. They can draw whatever they imagine and there’s no right or wrong.

20. Best Out of Waste Robot

Children love building things and this activity provides a great opportunity to do so.

What You Will Need:

• Recyclable materials (kitchen tissue rolls, straws, buttons, etc.)
• Scissors
• Glue

How to Perform:

1. Start by discussing with your child what they think about which objects will represent which parts of the robots.
2. They can use a big cardboard box like a cereal box for the body and a smaller box for the head.
3. The kitchen rolls can form the limbs, while the buttons and straws can form the eyes and mouth.
4. These are just examples of how to go about with the activity. Your child could have their own ideas.
5. Once the outline has been decided. Let your child glue these objects to form the robot.
6. Allow the glue to dry, and you’ve got a brand-new robot at hand!

Tips for Choosing Most Suitable Creative Activities for Kids

While it may seem easy to set up creative activities for kids, it’s not the case. A lot of thought has to be put into this process. The following tips will help:

• Follow your child’s lead as kids like to be spontaneous. Understand what are their interests and accordingly choose the activity.
• Make sure that the activity is not too tedious as they may get overwhelmed and give up mid-way.
• Kids find happiness in the smallest of things. You do not need to invest heavily in setting up an activity. Regular day-to-day objects around the house should suffice. Also, make sure that the objects/ingredients are safe.
• Activities which are open-ended are the best because there’s no limit to the child’s imagination and creativity.
• Make sure the activity you plan is age-appropriate.

FAQs

1. What Is the Importance of Creative Activities in a Child’s Development?

Creative activities benefit children by encouraging their physical and mental development. It improves their imagination, encourages creativity, and boosts their confidence.

2. How Can I Use Crafts and Creative Activities for My Kids to Support Their Learning Process?

If you want your kids to learn efficiently, make crafts and creative activities a part of the regular day-to-day process. Learning need not just be rote learning. It can also be fun!

These creative activities will help you keep your energetic toddler happily engaged for long. By trying out these creative activities, his motor skills, reasoning skills, and observational skills will develop. If your child shows interest in craft activities, you can also get him craft kits too. The activities in the craft kits can help your child nurture his talents.

If you’re looking for a box full of activities that can not just keep your little one busy but also provide hours of learning through fun and play, subscribe to Intellikit, a monthly activity box subscription for kids. With interactive activities that ensure all-round development in kids through various types of play, your child will learn something each day while having fun. Subscribe to Intellikit and receive a unique box of fun learning at your doorstep every month!

These interesting activities can truly help your child have fun, learn something new, and also improve their cognitive and motor skills.

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Fun Brain Games for Kids
Amazing Free Activities for Children
Trust Building Activities for Kids