Craft Scraps Collage

Right now, I am working on a special hands-on alphabet project for Baby Bear using random scraps and bits of household items and craft supplies (this will take at least a few weeks since the time I have to work on it is sporadic, but I will be sure to post when it is finally finished). While working on this project, Baby Bear became very interested in the craft supplies I had sitting on the table, and he wanted to use them, too. So, I sat him down with a piece of construction paper, some glue, and a small pile of craft supplies. He worked on his project while I worked on mine.

My intention was to give him something fun and constructive to do while I worked on my project, but he got so much more out of making this collage than I expected. I underestimated the amount of hand-eye coordination and the level of fine motor skills that making a collage demands of a toddler. Some of the supplies I gave him to use were small, colorful buttons. Those were his favorite, so he used a lot of them. This required him to pincer grip each little button off the table and carefully set it on the sticky surface without dropping it or pulling the paper up every time he placed a button on the paper. Making the paper sticky was also an effort. I offered to squirt the glue on the paper for him, but Baby Bear insisted on doing it himself. You can tell by the look on his face in the second picture what an effort it was to actually squeeze the glue out of the bottle. He loved the glitter glue, so he exerted quite a bit of effort trying to cover every object on the page in red sparkles.

Over the last few days, Baby Bear has reached for this collage several times. He touches it and shows it to Papa Bear and me over and over again. He is really proud of this work of art that he worked so hard to create.