chapter 1 ( The Complete Guide Education Arts and Crafts For Kids

Hello Everyone, I hope you keep your healthy in every condition
before read this chapter




If you are reading this I can safely assume that you are a parent, a teacher or

an adult involved with young children. Not only that but you are interested in

presenting art activities to the children in a way that does not stifle them but

encourages growth.

And you are ready to use art as a conduit towards growth.

Why do your give your children art?

Is it because it lets you spend time together with them?
Is it because they love to cut and paste and glue?
Is it because you need to keep them busy as it helps them with boredom?
Is it because you think it’s good for them?
How about all of the above?
If you said yes! Than you’re right.

Art is good for them, (if done correctly it can help them grow and gain special skills that will
give them an edge in life.)
Art does keep kids busy and not bored and is certainly is a great way to spend
quality time together.



 Piaget identified the following four stages in children’s
cognitive (intellectual) development and the period of life in which each will
normally occur:
1. Sensory motor stage - Infancy
2. Pre-operational stage - Toddler and Early Childhood
3. Concrete operational - Elementary and Early Adolescence
4. Formal operational state - Adolescence and Adulthood


So from Piaget we know….children learn through sensory experiences
and handling many objects.

Another significant figure in the area of children’s development was Erik
Erickson. He was a well known psychologist who discovered the eight stages of
social and emotional development of man starting with infants.

According to Erickson the socialization process consists of eight stages of
man. His eight stages were formulated through wide ranging experience in
psychotherapy. Each stage is regarded by Erickson as a “psychosocial crisis” that
demands resolutions before the next stage can be satisfactorily negotiated.

The 8 stages of man

1. Trust vs. Mistrust (Infancy) (birth t-18 months)
Erickson also referred to infancy as the Oral Sensory Stage (as anyone might who watches a baby put
everything in her mouth) where the major emphasis is on the mother's positive and loving care for the
child, with a big emphasis on visual contact and touch

2. Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt (Ages 18 mo-3)
 During this stage we learn to master skills for ourselves. Not only do we learn to walk, talk and feed
ourselves, we are learning finer motor development as well as the much appreciated toilet training.

3. Initiative vs. Guilt (Ages 3-5)
During this period we experience a desire to copy the adults around us and take initiative in creating
play situations.

4. Industry vs. Inferiority (6-12)
During this stage, often called the Latency, we are capable of learning, creating and accomplishing
numerous new skills and knowledge, thus developing a sense of industry.

5. Identity vs. Role Confusion (12-18)
Up to this stage, according to Erickson, development mostly depends upon what is done to us. From
here on out, development depends primarily upon what we do.

(The next three are adult stages)

6. Intimacy vs. Isolation

7. Generativity vs. Stagnation

8. Ego Integrity vs. Despair

When children are allowed to grow, create and learn according to their
developmental age, they gain a healthy sense of self - worth, which leads them to
feel that they can succeed in any endeavor they may set out to do.
From the findings of both Piaget, and Erickson we learn that some crucial
points regarding children’s learning and developmental needs to be developed at
a young age.

We can determine that there are certain very important skills we need our

children to develop in order to be successful in school and in life. Skills in life

need to be developed at the right time. And the time to develop the skills we will

be talking about is in the preschool and early elementary years. If we miss this

time, it’s extremely difficult to develop the proper skills at a later time.

How to Apply these Concepts to Art:

Now that we are more knowledgeable of what skills children need to

develop than hopefully we can analyze all of the activities they do to see if they fit

these criteria.

So we can determine that the components needed in a good art project are to:

1. Help the children develop a good self esteem.

2. Allow them to think and solve problems.

3. Let them grow wise as they make choices by taking initiative.

4. Allow them to develop a sense of autonomy and independence.

5. And give them room for their creativity to blossom.

straight from the adult’s imaginations that

encourages children to follow exact directions and in general to be little robots? They are….

1. Not age - appropriate.

2. Conceived of by adults

3. Projects that all look exactly alike.

4. Copies of an adult model

Take any one of the number of projects that your child has brought home

from school, or you have seen on the internet, or is sold in prepackaged form in

any art store or stuff that you remember yourself doing…..and you will notice.

o Either there is a picture to copy

o Or a model that is supposed to look like the finished project

o There is no way for your child to have conceived of this idea on her own

o There is no initiative as there are no choices (except maybe what color crayon to

use)

o No thinking skills

o No problem solving

o Certainly no creativity 

ARTS & CRAFTS though the activity of choice for many, many preschool

classrooms and home environments totally undermines most of the basic

skills needed for children.

So what happens to many, many kids who just do the traditional arts and crafts is...

 1. The feel really badly about themselves because they feel they are

not trusted to create on their own.

2. The lose their initiative because they are waiting for directions

3. They lose confidence because only what is presented is

considered correct

4. They feel that they are no good in art and end up being the

adults who say “Oh! me I can’t draw straight line”

Many of these feelings are unconscious and children cannot tap into them

until they grow up and can remember and verbalize how they felt about these

projects.

If this is really the case why do SOO many people do arts and crafts

with children this way?

I have some suggestions of how this total misunderstanding of what art happened

1 Our society likes success, winning and finished products. Many children’s

things do not look perfect enough for society.

2 Lack of knowledge of what’s wrong with these crafts.

3 A feeling of helplessness as to what can be an alternative.

4 Thinking that by giving children projects that make them

follow directions they are learning important direction

following skills.

5 Assuming that anything having to do with coloring and pasting must be

creative

6 Inability to let children be children

7 Worried about others will say if the artwork looks messy.

8 Thinking that the only skills young children need to develop

area fine motor skills

Crafts or art

What’s the difference?

Crafts are very popular in the adult world. Woodworking, beading, flower

making, jewelry…..…..the list of crafts enjoyed by adults all over the world goes on

and on.

Problem is adults that want children to involved with art which is a good thing

do not realize that most crafts are for adults not kids.

Since most children cannot developmentally be creative on their own in

adults crafts the notion became that they just have to follow the adult’s crafts and

all will be fine.

Their crafts project than became what we call copycat projects or arts and

crafts projects as they are better known….

Crafts for kids has become projects that are copies of adult models or ideas

Art on the other hand is art.

While crafts are working in specific mediums to make “things” art just

makes art…for art’s sake. It comes from within and does not have as much of a

structure as crafts does which is why so many turn to crafts and stay away from art.

People who have always been given models to copy can never feel that they

can do art because they have learned the “They are no good in art” and “they can’t

draw a straight line” and have no direction how to create good art.

Art however, when done with young children is a wonderful conduit to not

just being more artistic but bringing out all of those qualities that we discussed

earlier that help them grow.

It helps the children develop a good self esteem, allows them to

think and solve problems, lets them grow wise as they make good

choices, allows them to develop a sense of autonomy and independence

and gives them room for their creativity to blossom

Not only that, but when art is added to a curriculum learning environment

in a school or home schooling environment this helps the learning itself stick

and become part of what they will remember most in later life. 

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